Author:	Robert A. Heinlein
Copyright:	1952
Date Reviewed:	12/17/86
Rating:	7.5

Synopsis: Castor and Pollux Stone are very smart twins who tend to get into trouble often. They are lunar citizens. The invention of a new spacesuit valve netted them quite a fortune which they hope to use to buy a space ship and start up a trading business throughout the solar system. The only hitch is that their father has all their money tied up in a trust fund and won't let them have it until they are adults. Cas and Pol can't convince their father to release the money but they do manage to get him interested enough to buy a good sturdy ship with a large cargo hold for the whole family to roam the system. The ship is christened "Rolling Stones". The family consists of, Roger Stone who currently writes comic strip stories for the television networks, Dr. Stone, the mother, Hazel, Mr Stone's mother and one of the founders of the lunar colony, daughter Meade and four year old son Lowell. The income from the networks and money saved up will be enough to carry the family for a couple of years of exploration.

Captain Roger Stone plans the first stop for Mars and Cas and Pol plan to make money there. With a loan from their father, they buy a stock pile of used bicycles and load them in the hole. Once enroute, they will move the bicycles to the hull and then fix them up one at a time in the cargo hold, which will be made into a workshop. On Mars, they expect to get a premium price for the bicycles from the sand rats whose own equipment will undoubtedly be in disrepair.

Two incidents jeopardize the twin's plans. On the way down to Earth for a gravitational swing by, Lowell gets violently ill. The family fears that he is just not cut out for null gravity but fortunately it turns out that he just had an allergic reaction to a shot his mother gave him. Well on the way to Mars, a much more serious medical problem occurs. An epidemic has spread throughout the cruise liner "War God" which is following a couple of hours behind the "Rolling Stones". They radio for help and Dr. Stone volunteers to administer aid. However to get close enough to the "War God", most of the cargo will have to be jettisoned - including all of the bicycles, which are now almost completely fixed up. The crew packages up the cargo and gives it a bare nudge into space in the hopes that it will fall into orbit around Mars and can be picked up later. Naturally, mother Stone comes down with the illness but by that time she has come up with a cure, a few lives are lost. In a show of gratitude, the captain of the "War God" who is also a friend of Roger Stone, gives the "Rolling Stones" enough Single-H fuel to retrieve their belongings.

Finally, the "Rolling Stone" touches down on the Mars base of Phobos and the "War God" follows shortly after. The large ship is quarantined but Captain Stone boards her to see his wife. He comes down with the flu also. This leaves Hazel, Meade, Lowell and the twins on their own. They go down to Mars to find that it is little more than an expensive tourist trap. The only apartment they can find is very expensive and their very little living space becomes even more cramped when the parents rejoin their family.

Now the twins try to peddle their bicycles but find that the sand rats aren't buying. Most of them are leaving for the Asteroid Belt where a new strike has been found. Instead of selling their stuff to a local merchant, the twins come away buying a flat cat for Lowell. The flat cat is a patch of fur with three eyes and no bones. Never wanting for ideas, the twins come up with a way of selling their bicycles. Their client is a restaurant owner who could set up a rental shop. The reconditioned bikes are perfect for that. They don't have to be new since the things people rent almost never are. They just have to look that way. The sale nets them a nice profit and lands them in jail. It seems that on Mars, there is a stiff import tax for luxury items - 40% plus another 40% fine for not reporting it in the first place. However thanks to some fancy legal footwork, Hazel gets the boys off by arguing that the bicycles are not luxury items since they will bring in good tourist income. Her fee is almost as stiff as the fine.

By now the stone family is bored with Mars so they blast off for the Asteroids to see what all the fuss is about. Enroute something interesting happens to their flatcat - it gives birth to eight flatcats. Soon each of those gives birth to eight more and each of these to eight more until there are hundreds all over the tiny ship getting into everything. Finally the Captain orders all but the original into the cargo hold at reduced temperatures where they will survive in a suspended state until the Stones can figure out what to do with them.

Upon arriving at the Hallelujah node, Dr. Stone is pressed into service once again as a general practitioner. The twins operate a radio station and manage to sell their lot of flatcats with some fancy promo techniques.

Tragedy strikes when Hazel drives Dr. Stone and Lowell on a house call to a woman in a traction splint. When another call comes in, Dr. Stone stays to await transportation and Hazel takes Lowell back to the ship. They don't get very far when their scooter begins to toss violently. It seems the gyro is broken. Hazel tries to fly the scooter by the seat of her pants until she uses up all the fuel and Lowell uses up all his oxygen. Hazel sacrifices her oxygen bottle so the child might live. Meanwhile, Roger Stone finds out that the twins knew about the possible gyro problem but neglected to fix or log it. They are placed under arrest but escape and rescue their grandmother and brother.

With their time in space almost up the family prepares for home but winds up heading further out into space to see the rings of Saturn.

Review: "The Rolling Stones" is yet another one of Heinlein's super teenager science fictions of the early 1950's. It is an average story for the genre -better than some but not outstanding. Still, in many places I found it hard too put down. What I enjoyed most about the novel was not the plot, which was weak at times, but the science. It is remarkable that this book had more good science in it 35 years ago than most stories published today. Many of the situations described in the book are easily recognizable from today's shuttle program. Heinlein describes a fault tolerant set of three computers - every calculation is performed in triplicate and the two correct answers are used if one computer goes out. In the beginning of the book is a description of how the "Rolling Stone" is moved to the launch pad at two miles an hour. The NASA crawler which moves the shuttle to the launch pad travels at 2 miles per hour unloaded and 1/2 a mile per hour loaded. The book also explained well gravity assisted space flight as used by the planetary probes.

"The Rolling Stones" may very well be remembered for providing the basis for one of the most successful "Star Trek" episodes, "The Trouble With Tribbles" written by David Gerrold. As I mentioned previously, Gerrold is well known for borrowing ideas from other established authors such as Heinlein, H. Beam Piper and Larry Niven. I just barely remember Gerrold writing in one of his books about "Star Trek" that he wrote the story about the Tribbles but didn't realize that it was taken from "The Rolling Stones". No one could read this book and not see the similarities.