Over the weekend I took the opportunity of having nice weather to sit out in the sun and finish off the remainder sixty or so pages in Starship Troopers that I had started reading a few weeks ago.  I had watched the movie adaptation when it came out quite some time ago (1998?) as well as the two sequels to the movie: Starship Troopers Hero of the Federation and Starship Troopers Marauder. The truth is that the movies go progressively campier, but hey, I liked the original so it was a good incentive to buy and view the other two.  I sort of feel the same way about Mission Impossible and Resident Evil.  I loved the first ones so I wanted to see subsequent ones, even though they may have sucked.

In any case, I have to say that as much as I loved the movie (the original Starship Troopers that is), the book was much better. Rico does come off as a more likable character in the book and Ibañez has a much minimized role (I gotta say, I really disliked Ibañez in the movie). A colleague of mine told me that the book ended in a way that didn't facilitate sequels, the way that the movie did, but I think that both the movie and the book ended in similar tones, and the book could have had a sequel. I'd actually be interested in reading more about the Federation and its inner workings, perhaps more from the Navy point of view as well. It's too bad that Heinlein is no longer with us in order to explain this universe he created.
Perhaps my next Heinlein book will be Have spacesuit, will travel. The interesting thing about this book is that most of it takes place off combat (it seemed like the movie was mostly combat and action), with only the last 60 or so pages of the book being combat driven. Most of the book deals with issues of citizenship, voting, military service and ethics (of all things). It's a quick read and it goes by pretty fast. Definitely one of the better books I read this year.