The Past Through Tomorrow: Bk. 2

by Robert A. Heinlein

Book Overview

This is the second half of what was published in the USA as the Past Through Tomorrow, as the American book was divided into two halves for the British hardcover edition(s) This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0450040054
• Release Date: January 1979
• Publisher: New English Library Ltd
• Length: 352 Pages
• Weight: 0.45 lbs.

Customer Reviews

Classic

This is the first Heinlein book I ever read, and I have never looked back since. A fantastic collection of thought-provoking and interconnected stories made for a very excellent read.

The collected works

This is a collection of all the Future History stories beginning with 'Life-Line', RAH's first story written in 1939 through 'Methuselah's Children' which introduced Lazarus Long and the Howard Families which appear so prominently in his later works. RAH's Future History, for those unfamiliar with the series, describes an alternative history of earth, particularly America. The stories begin during the 1930's and feature a society very much like the history with which we are all familiar. As the stories progress they build on each other and increasingly depict a society very different from ours, a permanent colony in the Moon has been established in the 1970's, Mars and Venus are colonized by the early 21st century while back on earth America falls to a religious dictator. This is an excellent place to begin reading RAH's work and is definitely a volume that belongs in the permanent collections of any Heinlein fan. Many of these stories have appeared in other collections including: THE MAN WHO SOLD THE MOON, THE GREEN HILLS OF EARTH, REVOLT IN 2100 AND METHUSELAH'S CHILDREN and others.

Great Sci-Fi Read!

If you're looking for a great Sci-Fi read that will take you out of this world, than you should read this great book by Robert A. Heinlein called, "The Past Through Tomorrow, The Future History Stories." It's such an intricate book full of short stories that interlace nicely with eachother. Heinlein is one of the greatest science fiction writers of all time. If you want to read more books by him, you should check out Stranger in a Strange Land as well. Boy, are both books great.

The complete Future History in one book

The Past Through Tomorrow contains all 21 stories, novellas, and novels of Heinlein's Future History series. The four books making up the series (The Man Who Sold the Moon, The Green Hills of Earth, Revolt in 2100, and Methuselah's Children) used to be a little hard to find in the pre-Internet days, making this collection an absolute boon to Heinlein readers. In addition to the convenience of having everything in one volume, this book also includes two stories that are not to be found in my copies of the originating books: "Searchlight" and "The Menace From Earth." These are rather lightweight stories, but they are quite entertaining.It was actually Joseph W. Campbell, Heinlein's editor at Amazing Science-Fiction, who came up with the term Future History; Heinlein did have some of the stories mapped out on a timeline, but he never intended to make this a series in any real sense of the word. Up until the final selection, these stories are largely independent of one another. With Methuselah's Children, however, Heinlein traces the tale's antecedents to his very first story "Life-Line," incorporates a few characters from other assorted stories, and casts a web of continuity over the whole package. Even still, this is only "a" future history, not "the" future history. Aspects of Heinlein's science indeed worked its way into the real world over time, but one would be wrong to label this body of work as some type of prophetic endeavor on the author's part. The contents of this collection basically offer the reader the cream of the crop of Heinlein's early fiction. Among the stories deserving special mention here are the novella "The Man Who Sold the Moon," featuring one of Heinlein's most unforgettable protagonists, "-We Also Walk Dogs," the story of a company able to perform small miracles to meet the needs of its clients, "If This Goes On-," a tale of the repressive theocracy that followed in the wake of evangelist Nehemiah Scudder usurpation of power, and the novel Methuselah's Children which brings the vision of these stories all together. I have only one criticism of this fine collection: no special mention is made of the century-long gap between "Logic of Empire" and "If This Goes On-." The fall of American democracy at the usurping hands of Scudder is a story that Heinlein never told, so the reader may be shocked to find a forward-looking free America suddenly transformed into an anachronistic, brutal autocratic regime at the start of the latter of these two stories. In my copy of Revolt in 2100, Heinlein includes a postscript concerning the stories never written-this does much to explain the striking transition that defines the "missing century" of this Future History, and it's a shame that this postscript did not find its way into this omnibus collection. The Past Through Tomorrow serves as a wonderfully useful map to the writing of Robert A. Heinlein. Not only does it contain the most important of his early short stories, it al

Classic

This collection starts with Heinlein's first-ever published story (Life-Line), and continues through the next several years of his writing. These stories, of course, make up his famous Future History series. There is one novel among them (Methuselah's Children; the book's standout piece, and the debut of Lazarus Long), a couple of novellas (The Man Who Sold The Moon, "-If This Goes On"), and numerous short to medium-length stories. Unlike his longer later novels, in these works his agenda is not being an idealogue, but rather exploiting one small central idea, or even simply writing a good story. To be sure, there are several stories of lesser quality here, but there are also many classics (the ones I've already mentioned, plus The Roads Must Roll, Blowups Happen, Logic of Empire, Coventry, and others.) If all you know of Heinlein is his later "message" novels like Starship Troopers and Stranger In A Strange Land, then do yourself a favor and pick up this immaculate collection of his early fiction.