Klendathu

Starship Troopers

First edition cover
Author	Robert A. Heinlein
Country	United States
Language	English
Genre	Military science fiction Philosophical novel
Publisher	G. P. Putnam's Sons
Publication date	December 1959
Media type	Print (hardback & paperback)
Pages	263 (paperback edition)
ISBN
OCLC	2797649
Dewey Decimal	[Fic]
LC Class	PZ7.H368 Su8

Starship Troopers is a military science fiction novel by American writer Robert A. Heinlein, published hardcover in December 1959. The story was first published (in abridged form) as a two-part serial in The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction as Starship Soldier.

The first-person narrative is about a young soldier named Juan "Johnny" Rico and his exploits in the Mobile Infantry, a futuristic military service branch equipped with powered armor. Rico's military career progresses from recruit to non-commissioned officer and finally to officer against the backdrop of an interstellar war between mankind and an arachnoid species known as "the Bugs". Rico and the other characters discuss moral and philosophical aspects of suffrage, civic virtue, juvenile delinquency, corporal punishment, capital punishment, and war.

Starship Troopers won the Hugo Award for Best Novel in 1960.

Some time during 1958 and 1959, Heinlein ceased work on the novel that would become Stranger in a Strange Land and wrote Starship Troopers. It was first published in The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction in October and November 1959 as a two part serial called Starship Soldier. Although originally written as a juvenile novel for New York publishing house Scribner, it was rejected, prompting Heinlein to cease writing juvenile fiction for Scribners, end his association with that publisher completely, and resume writing books with adult themes. The novel was eventually published as teenage fiction by G. P. Putnam's Sons. A senior editor at Putnam's, Peter Israel, purchased the novel and approved revisions that made it more marketable to adults, and dodged the issue of whether it was aimed at children or adults: "Let's let the readers decide who likes it," he said at a sales conference.