Stranger in a Strange Land

[PoolBoyG]

So, I just finished the the chapter with the orgy with the 50 year old woman, who had a full body tattoo, who was a religious zealot... and who had snake musk on her. I didn't expect that.

It's and odd turn the book took, but I'd like to know if people were satisfied with the books ending? Don't spoil it, I haven't finished yet.

One thing that bugs me about the book is how everyone is so nonchalant about there being Martians on Mars. Like they're some native american people that you ignore until you make a push to expand your settlement.

[Phaedrus]

Stranger is a weird book. Savor it as an experience, but don't read too much into it.

[Misanthropik]

*Quickly runs to Amazon to look for the book for research purposes...for research purposes*

[Erxomai]

I grok what you're saying, but it's been about 30 years since I've read it so I can't give too much input.

[Aseptic Skeptic]

Been a couple decades since I read that one. But I remember liking it the whole way through, and putting it on my favorite books of all time list when I was done, so I am sure the ending was satisfying. I was a teenager when I read that and while I wasn't ordinarily turned on by 50-year-old women at the time, but there was something primally sexy about Aunt Patty that made her a permanent fixture in my adolescent fantasies.

Ah, sigh, now I better go read it again...

Thou art God.

[PoolBoyG]

I finished the book some time ago.

I wasn't too thrilled about how hetero sex (homophobia aside) was imbued with some sort of mystical properties, rather than simple chemistry and biology - Easily explained, and easily replicated.

Here be Spoilers:

The book ends with a bit of cliff hanger. You're left with the following scenario 1. Humanity stays on its present course, and will be destroyed by Martians in the future. Or 2. humanity "evolves" into hippie demigods, at which point the Martians won't find humans objectionable, and leave them alone.