What we have seen up until now, is the Dietzel’s intelligence is a lot more human-like than dog-like, and that The Library can read thoughts to a degree. (Its own intelligence is quite inhuman and difficult to comprehend).
Well, that’s an interesting bit of exposition — M isn’t living in her house anymore, but Digit and Dietzel are, and that they’ve got a library portal installed there. (And that Dietzel has his own access code.)
We don’t know (yet) whether that’s a Library portal. It could be something else entirely.
Dietzel could be headed off-dimension for a conference with his fellow Secret Masters of Earth (Stinky the kraken, Oscar the immortal Betta, Selenium the notreallyacat, and a group of paradimensional white mice who are still hoping to get their calculations back on track).
Call me a grump, but I was rather aggravated by the “explanation” of Pixel making cat doors appear at need in “To Sail Beyond the Sunset” – it seems like yet another case of answering the question that nobody asked. I love pretty much everything Heinlein ever wrote, but never understood why he felt compelled to explain the inexplicable in this particular case.
In “The Cat Who Walks Through Walls”, she simply passes through them without thought or pause, with no special access required. One of the other characters explains it as Pixel simply being too young to understand that what she’s doing is not possible. The protagonist’s sentient ship watches the kitten pass through her hull and declares that she can’t tell how Pixel did it, but that it kind of tickles a bit. I liked that mental image far more than the mentally created cat doors.
Okay, rant concluded, move on with your lives…
Side note: if there are any Heinlein fans who haven’t read Spider Robinson’s finished version of RAH’s unwritten novel “Variable Star”, please do yourself a favor and get it ASAP. He took the few pages of plot outline that Heinlein left behind and turned it into a great novel that could easily have come directly from the master’s own hand. I don’t think there’s another writer in the business who could have done it justice like Robinson did.
It didn’t bother me exactly, but it felt unneeded. Still didn’t change my love for the book though. My cat is named Pixel, in fact. Well, unless she’s been very bad… Then she’s Pixelation. Cuz pixelation is never a good thing 😋
Fairportfan: Variable Star came out in 2006 and is easy to find on secondhand sites like Thriftbooks. It does have some concept overlap with other Heinlein works, such as twins being used as psychic communicators between different starships and/or earth. Robinson has (like me) been a lifelong fan of Heinlein so he completed this novel with utmost respect and authenticity.
Well, THAT’S a new trick.
How do you know it’s new?
New to us.
What we have seen up until now, is the Dietzel’s intelligence is a lot more human-like than dog-like, and that The Library can read thoughts to a degree. (Its own intelligence is quite inhuman and difficult to comprehend).
Looks like the Library likes him.
Well, that’s an interesting bit of exposition — M isn’t living in her house anymore, but Digit and Dietzel are, and that they’ve got a library portal installed there. (And that Dietzel has his own access code.)
We don’t know (yet) whether that’s a Library portal. It could be something else entirely.
Dietzel could be headed off-dimension for a conference with his fellow Secret Masters of Earth (Stinky the kraken, Oscar the immortal Betta, Selenium the notreallyacat, and a group of paradimensional white mice who are still hoping to get their calculations back on track).
Frankie and Benji? Yeah, that would explain a few things really.
One must be very polite to the longtooth squeakers.
Selenium?
Tha’s not a cat – tha’s a Flurka!
Could be something that doll Monica talks to left it behind. Tepoz?
The fact that Dietzel was “smarter than the average dog” should have been a clue that he’s had para abilities all along. This is really cute. <3
It was an on-going discussion for many years with dozens of folks saying he MUST be a para several times
Interdimensional portal to pizza-girl’s place?
Borrowing a page from the playbook of Pixel! XD
Call me a grump, but I was rather aggravated by the “explanation” of Pixel making cat doors appear at need in “To Sail Beyond the Sunset” – it seems like yet another case of answering the question that nobody asked. I love pretty much everything Heinlein ever wrote, but never understood why he felt compelled to explain the inexplicable in this particular case.
In “The Cat Who Walks Through Walls”, she simply passes through them without thought or pause, with no special access required. One of the other characters explains it as Pixel simply being too young to understand that what she’s doing is not possible. The protagonist’s sentient ship watches the kitten pass through her hull and declares that she can’t tell how Pixel did it, but that it kind of tickles a bit. I liked that mental image far more than the mentally created cat doors.
Okay, rant concluded, move on with your lives…
Side note: if there are any Heinlein fans who haven’t read Spider Robinson’s finished version of RAH’s unwritten novel “Variable Star”, please do yourself a favor and get it ASAP. He took the few pages of plot outline that Heinlein left behind and turned it into a great novel that could easily have come directly from the master’s own hand. I don’t think there’s another writer in the business who could have done it justice like Robinson did.
It didn’t bother me exactly, but it felt unneeded. Still didn’t change my love for the book though. My cat is named Pixel, in fact. Well, unless she’s been very bad… Then she’s Pixelation. Cuz pixelation is never a good thing 😋
Is that the one that reads like an early draft of “Time for the Stars” and some other one i can’t recall right now – or is it more recent?
Fairportfan: Variable Star came out in 2006 and is easy to find on secondhand sites like Thriftbooks. It does have some concept overlap with other Heinlein works, such as twins being used as psychic communicators between different starships and/or earth. Robinson has (like me) been a lifelong fan of Heinlein so he completed this novel with utmost respect and authenticity.
Still in control of his destiny.
Isn’t Digit still a high school student? Is she considered an emancipated minor now?
No, she’s a middle school teaching assistant.
🤔I thought she was an assistant ^librarian^! It certainly looks like she’s now a full member of the School’s Library-Staff.
Came here to say what Roger said.
I’m imagining a little bitty “BOOM” when the portal opens.
Too small for a Boom Tube.
A *BOOP* Tube maybe?
Or just a tiny *POP*.
That’s not really how ya poit pooch.
I didn’t notice till now that Monica moved out. “Late at night, the big old house gets lonely…”
Could be a portal to Cricket’s place.
DIETZEL HAS ACCESS TO THE LIBRARY???
Why wouldn’t he? When he first became small, he and Digit (the Spider) were running all over the library.
So the squeaky dog gets the quantum grease?
Some one’s playing with Portals!