Rocket Ship Galileo

by Robert Heinlein

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Rocket Ship Galileo - Robert A. Heinlein - Audio Book

Brand New : (still shrink wrapped)  Unabridged 5.5 hours   5 CD

After World War II, three teenage male rocket experimenters are recruited by the uncle of one of them, Dr. Cargraves, an actual rocket scientist, to refit a conventionally-powered surplus "mail rocket". It is to be converted to run on a thorium nuclear pile which boils zinc as a propellant. They use a cleared area in a military weapons test range in the desert for their work, despite prying and sabotage attempts by unknown agents.

Upon completion of the modifications, they stock the rocket, which they name the Galileo, and take off for the Moon, taking approximately 11 days to arrive. After establishing a semi-permanent structure based on a Quonset hut, they claim the Moon on behalf of the United Nations, then set up a radio to communicate with the Earth.

However, they pick up a local transmission, the sender of which promises to meet them. Instead, their ship is bombed. Fortunately, they are able to hole up undetected in their hut and succeed in ambushing the other ship when it lands, capturing the pilot. They discover that there is a Nazi base on the Moon. They bomb it from their captured ship and land. One survivor is found, revived, and questioned.

The boys also find evidence of an ancient lunar civilization, and postulate that the craters of the moon were formed not by impacts from space, but by nuclear bombs that destroyed the alien race.

When the base's Nazi leader shoots the pilot in order to silence him, Cargraves convenes a trial and find him guilty of murder. Cargraves pretends to prepare to execute the prisoner by ejecting him into vacuum. The Nazi capitulates in the airlock and teaches them how to fly the Nazi spaceship back to Earth.

The boys radio the location of the hidden Nazi base on Earth to the authorities, leading to its destruction. They return as heroes.

About the Author Robert Heinlein

Robert Anson Heinlein (July 7, 1907 - May 8, 1988) was one of the most popular, influential, and controversial authors of "hard" science fiction. He set a high standard for science and engineering plausibility that few have equaled, and helped to raise the genre's standards of literary quality. He was the first writer to break into mainstream general magazines such as The Saturday Evening Post in the late 1940s with unvarnished science fiction. He was among the first authors of bestselling novel-length science fiction in the modern mass-market era. For many years Heinlein, Isaac Asimov, and Arthur C. Clarke were known as the "Big Three" of science fiction.

The major themes of his work were social: radical individualism, libertarianism, religion, the relationship between physical and emotional love, and speculation about unorthodox family relationships. His iconoclastic approach to these themes led to wildly divergent perceptions of his works. His 1959 novel Starship Troopers was excoriated by some as being fascist. His 1961 novel Stranger in a Strange Land, on the other hand, put him in the unexpected role of pied piper to the sexual revolution and counterculture.

Heinlein won four Hugo Awards for his novels. In addition, fifty years after publication, three of his works were awarded "Retro Hugos" - awards given retrospectively for years in which no Hugos had been awarded. He also won the first Grand Master Award given by the Science Fiction Writers of America for lifetime achievement.

In his fiction, Heinlein coined words that have become part of the English language, including "grok", "TANSTAAFL" and "waldo."

Rocket Ship Galileo - Robert A. Heinlein - Audio Book