Mom introduced me to Heinlein early on, and I have grown only more fond of his works as I've gotten older. Despite the accusations of misogyny leveled at his works (more on this later), I find them highly enjoyable. It is something to do with his voice. Though he establishes truly alien worlds and future societies, the things people do, think and say are as immediately familiar and understanding as the actions of, say, your next-door neighbor. Perhaps more so; neighbors can be weird.
Before I progress further into the discussion of sexism in Heinlein, I must also confess that I have not read much of his later writings, which I am informed are the most problematic. I did indeed have some problems with some of the remarks he made about important jobs women have--but while reading anything, it is important to take into account the world in which it was written. You do not pick up The Hunchback of Notre Dame in the expectation that Esmerelda will pick up a poker and beat the stupid out of Claude Frollo; similarly, you do not expect something written in the 1960s to live up to modern expectations of strong female characters. While I might object to that offspring-raising ought to take precedence especially for women, I love the fact that Podkayne wants to be a spaceship captain, and is accordingly good at math.
Another thing I enjoy about Poddy: while she wants a traditionally masculine career, she also enjoys being girly--dresses and all that. I like this; too often I've seen strong female characters who aren't allowed to enjoy looking female or being proud of being female. I don't like this trope, as it conflates femininity with weakness. Having a character who is cheerfully, enthusiastically fond of dresses and socializing at the same time as being good at math (I'm not and I wish I was!) and determined to succeed in her chosen field? Yes please. We need more of this, thanks.
And yes, Podkayne hides how smart she is most of the time so she doesn't scare off the men. I understand that this is easily seen as sexist in our modern day and age, but this is less a recommendation that women do this than a depiction of a coping mechanism that a smart women might use in a society that is still sexist--which Poddy's is. Heinlein isn't scared of Poddy's smarts--after all, he wrote her.
In Podkayne of Mars, Podkayne and her little brother, Clark (a menace to civilization as we know it) join their Uncle Tom on a trip from Mars to Earth with a stop en-route to Venus, a result of Uncle Tom's marvelous abilities in blackmail and a host of unexpected babies. The trip...doesn't go exactly to plan (and I'm not saying more because of spoilers).
My biggest complaint is that little brother Clark keeps stealing the show. It is Clark who resolves the conflict, rather than Poddy, which I found annoying. Indeed, Clark has a far more active role in the conflict than Poddy, the main character, does, so I cannot say much about the plot, as we, and Podkayne, are largely ignorant of it.
But there is Podkayne's world to distract us, and here Heinlein shines. Woven into the prose are loving descriptions of how this world works, how spaceships avoid solar storms, how the recycled air while on a spaceship becomes a problem, the necessary inoculations for traveling, different biological reactions to different substances... It is a new world, but one that makes sense, the alienness of it tempered by the very human eyes we see it through. I have found this consistent with other novels by Heinlein, and this is why I love his books so much. To depict the strange in such a way that it is immediately recognizable is a skill I desperately want to learn.
