From Newsgroup: alt.fan.heinlein

"Red Thunder (A Thunder and Lightning Novel)" by John Varley
https://www.amazon.com/Red-Thunder-Lightning-Novel/dp/0441011624/

Book number one of a four book space opera series. I reread the well
printed and well bound used MMPB book published by Ace in 2003 that I
bought on Amazon since most of my books are boxed in the garage. In
fact, I have read this book at least six to eight times. I have books
two through four in the series and may reread them again too. Too bad
the first and second books in the series are out of print.

I am a big fan of the Heinlein books, especially the juveniles. This
book is extremely inspired by the Heinlein juveniles but it is not a
juvenile. Somewhere of a cross between the juveniles and Stranger in a Strange Land and The Moon is a Harsh Mistress. One note is that all of
the characters in the book use names from Heinlein's books. In fact the
book is dedicated to "To Spider Robinson and Robert A. Heinlein for the inspiration; and to Lee, for that, and everything else.".

The book is extreme hard science except for the squeezer that Jubal
invents. Everything in the book is doable with today's science and engineering, and will be done, if someone invents a cheap spaceship
drive that can boost thousands of tons at one gravity from Earth to
anywhere in the Solar System. Or, Alpha Centauri or anywhere else in
the 5 to 20 light years away distance.

My review from the distant past: "What a book ! I grew up on Heinlein juveniles, this is great addition to that section of science fiction.
The squeezer drive is a great idea and building the spaceship out of
railroad car tanks is a great idea. The story flows well and was
difficult to put down (I was 45 minutes late to work Friday morning
because of it)."

The author has a blog and posts there fairly often. Unfortunately he
stopped writing new books and short stories about a decade ago in 2018.
https://varley.net/

My rating: 6 out of 5 stars (yes, six stars, I have 36+ six star books)
Amazon rating: 4.4 out of 5 stars (559 reviews)

Lynn
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