Like a lot of Heinleins books, Stranger in a Strange Land is good up until it starts straying into the authors 'free love' fetish at which point it becomes almost unreadable (though not nearly as bad as some of his other books. To Sail Beyond the Sunset is just spank material he got published).
I'd suggest Moon is a Harsh Mistress instead.
Kinda seems like the opposite message of starship troopers
ST was intended as satire. Heinlein hated the military industrial complex.
I loved the book. The movie is decent, but COMPLETELY different.
Edit: I’m wrong
The movie was satire. The book was not. Hard to say he hated the MIC when half his books involve space battles with competent military leadership, especially in his earlier pre-hippie period.
You have it backwards. The Starship Troopers movie was meant as satire but the book is supposed to be an honest exploration of the ideas around a militaristic society. Stranger in a Strange land is more of a satire about hippy culture, to wit, Heinlein was annoyed by how much hippies liked it and didn't get the joke.
From my understanding the movie originated as a completely different concept that they retrofitted and slapped the name on because they owned the rights to it.
Good to get both ends of the spectrum then.
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