Well, she didn't specify which reason put these two on the list. It could have been:
or something else.

I guess I'm too infatuated with the character to notice such things. I'd follow her anywhere, and happily sit listening to her read aloud from the phone book, just to hear her voice.

23. I had to wash my hair.
24. The cover had a blue guy on it.
25. The book was really heavy.
26. Can't catch up with reading all the authors named Patterson.
27. My ex liked this author.
28. Was just the right thickness to prop up a table.

I didn't read the essay, but the number one reason people don't get around to reading books is because they feel like work . . .

And on that ground, doesn't virtually all of Heinlein require work from the reader who might not have expected it -- and then shows them they really liked doing that kind of work???

So -- maybe the illusion broke down for our hypothetical general reader about these two books.

I agree, though, with Jim that these are absurd choice. I can understand why Cat -- but the idea that Stranger is a difficult read as a read is bizarre.

I think Fountainhead must be on the list (why Fountainhead and not Atlas Shrugged -- a book that demands much more from the reader?) because it was one of those things if you were conscious at all in 1968 and 1969 you were hustled into reading it and a younger generation is reacting to the boring old farts their parents have become trying to push it on them. Same may be true for Stranger.

I don't find any Heinlein to be a difficult read. Some of it I dislike, but it is all very followable, which is one of those he-makes-it-look-easy things that isn't - most authors, for instance, introduce too many characters at a time, make them too similar, don't repeat enough of the right details, or otherwise make it hard to follow who's who.

I thought Friday was good straight action all the way through. The World as Myth stories were the ones that frustrated me, because they start out Friday-like with action and made me think that he was back on the form I loved, then they would veer off into alternate universes and theology and oh-no-there's-the-parade-of-former-characters.

But I digress.

Any list like the one that started this thread is written just to get eyeballs and clicks, so it has to throw some curveballs rather than listing the obvious like Ulysses and Jane Austen. My pet theory as to why there is Heinlein on the list is the Mundane argument: The writer heard the name because Heinlein had penetrated the mainstream market, and then became dreadfully confused by all the sfnal stuff ("Why is this set so far in the future? What's a Martian? I don't understand these made-up words. Oh, save me, Tom Wolfe!") Some people should just stick to chick-lit.

Perhaps because Shrugged is the Capitalist Manifesto, and like all manifestoes, best used for beating someone in the head with. Fountainhead can be mistaken for an actual novel that is merely impaired by the crushingly supercilious lecturing and strawman arguments.

True -- but there's a movie of The Fountainhead.

I like the idea of reading Heinlein as rewarding work. Certainly some of these other unread books - War and Peace, Ulysses, The Fountainhead, for instance - are as well. This is not quite the same as either easy reading or equally enjoyable, even within Heinlein's work.

With multiple people contributing titles without explanation, the list isn't worth much.

The author misses her chance to write a more interesting essay on why a bookwoman has a number of books she can't manage to move into her "read" column. Maybe having an accusing stack of books-to-be-read is part of the problem, rather than simply picking an unread book from the shelves when she's in the mood for precisely that book. It could be enlightening to see what long-postponed books eventually are read with satisfaction, and why; or the opposite. Another category is books which require several attempts to get into properly, and whether the final result was satisfactory or not. A third category could be books which are read, but dismissively, and what we found when we tried them again much later.

On this Tor.com page (http://www.tor.com/blogs/2010/08/patterson-heinlein-biography-not-to-be-trusted-on-details), Jo Walton refers to a Larry Niven collection titled "N-Space" that apparently contains an alternate-history short story (?) wherein Heinlein “was cured of TB and became military dictator of the U.S.”

Does anyone know anything about this story?

Hmm. Perhaps she's misremembering the details of the story. It's this one:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Return ... m_Proxmire

I just re-read it. The precise wording (page 283 of Requiem) is "Admiral Heinlein doesn't let the Soviets build spacecraft." The text says nothing about a military dictatorship, but it does mention the Congress and the need for political support to get things done. So...no military dictatorship.