A graduate of the United States Naval Academy in 1929, where he specialized in Naval Science, Mr. Heinlein retired for medical reasons in 1934. After his retirement he studied mathematics and physics in the UCLA graduate school. During World War II he was an engineer in the Naval Aircraft Factory.

Mr. Heinlein's first story "Lifeline," was written in 1939. Between 1946 and 1961 he has written two books a year at his home in Colorado Springs. Foreign travel is his principal hobby. With his wife, Virginia, he has visited every major nation except Red China in the years between 1956 and 1961, over 180,000 miles of travel on six continents and every ocean.

Not since the publication of Philip Wylie's 'Generation of Vampires' has there been a book quite so deliberately designed to make us uncomfortable about nearly everything we take for granted. In this entertaining and often shocking novel, however, Mr. Heinlein uses fictional charecters in fictional situations to attack all explanations of the universe offered on faith, to undermine the idea of sexual relations founded on Jealousy , and to annoy the materialists and the politicians.

Although certain of the techniques of science fiction used, Stranger in a Strange Land might be classed as philosophical fantasy, or as an entertainment, or, perhaps, as Cabellesque satire. A completely freewheeling look at contemporary culture from the nonhuman viewpoint of someone from another culture, it is unlike anything that has ever been done before 1961. It is deliberately annoying, and often very funny. It runs down the sacred cows and sloughters them hilariously.