Job: A Comedy of Justice

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Title Job: A Comedy of Justice

Image:Jobcomedy.jpg Cover of first edition (hardcover)
Author	Robert A. Heinlein
Cover artist	Michael Whelan
Country	United States
Language	English
Genre(s)	Science fiction novel
Publisher	Ballantine Books/Del Rey
Released	1984
Media type	Print (Hardcover & Paperback)
Pages	376 pp
ISBN	ISBN 0-345-31357-7 (first edition, hardback)

Template:Wikiquote Job: A Comedy of Justice is a novel by Robert A. Heinlein published in 1984. The title is a reference to the biblical Book of Job and James Branch Cabell's book Jurgen, A Comedy of Justice. It was nominated for the Nebula Award for Best Novel in 1984 and the Hugo Award for Best Novel in 1985.

Plot summary

The story examines religion through the eyes of Alex, a Christian political activist who is corrupted by Margrethe, a Danish cruise ship hostess — and loves every minute of it. Enduring a shipwreck, an earthquake, and a series of world-changes brought about by Loki (with Jehovah's permission), Alex and Marga work their way from Mexico back to Kansas as dishwasher and waitress. Whenever they manage to make some stake, an inconveniently timed change into a new alternate reality throws them off their stride (once, the money they earned is left behind in another reality; in another case, the paper money earned in a Mexico which is an Empire is worthless in another Mexico which is a republic). These repeated misfortunes, clearly effected by some malevolent entity, make the hero identify with the Biblical Job.

On the way they unknowingly enjoy the Texas hospitality of Satan himself, but as they near their destination they are separated by the Rapture — pagans don't go to Heaven. Finding that eternity as depicted in the Revelation is far from the bliss he had so earnestly anticipated, Alex's journey through timeless space in search of his lost lady takes him to Hell and beyond.

Heinlein's vivid depiction of a Heaven ruled by snotty angels and a Hell where everyone has a wonderful, or at least productive, time — with Mary Magdalene shuttling breezily between both places — is a satire on American evangelical Christianity. It owes much to Mark Twain's Captain Stormfield's Visit to Heaven.

The novel is linked to Heinlein's short story, "They", by the term, "the Glaroon".

The book's depiction of alternate realities in which the US is dominated by ultra-conservative religious groups may have influenced Frederik Pohl in taking up a similar theme in The Coming of the Quantum Cats published two years later (1986).

Robert A. Heinlein Novels, Major Short-story Collections, and Nonfiction (Bibliography)

Image:Heinlein-face.jpg

Future History and World as Myth: Methuselah's Children (1958) | The Past Through Tomorrow (1967) | Time Enough for Love (1973) | The Number of the Beast (1980) | The Cat Who Walks Through Walls (1985) | To Sail Beyond the Sunset (1987) Scribner's juveniles: Rocket Ship Galileo (1947) | Space Cadet (1948) | Red Planet (1949) | Farmer in the Sky (1950) | Between Planets (1951) | The Rolling Stones (1952) | Starman Jones (1953) | The Star Beast (1954) | Tunnel in the Sky (1955) | Time for the Stars (1956) | Citizen of the Galaxy (1957) | Have Space Suit—Will Travel (1958) Other fiction: For Us, The Living: A Comedy of Customs (1939/2003) | Beyond This Horizon (1942) | Sixth Column (also known as The Day After Tomorrow) (1949) | The Puppet Masters (1951) | Double Star (1956) | The Door into Summer (1957) | Starship Troopers (1959) | Stranger in a Strange Land (1961) | Podkayne of Mars (1963) | Glory Road (1963) | Farnham's Freehold (1965) | The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress (1966) | I Will Fear No Evil (1970) | Friday (1982) | Job: A Comedy of Justice (1984) | Variable Star (1955/2006) Nonfiction: Take Back Your Government! (1946/1992) | Tramp Royale (1954/1992) | Expanded Universe (1980) | Grumbles from the Grave (1989)

See also

• Religious ideas in science fictionfr:Job : une comédie de justice

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