1958 Scribner Juvenile Charles Scribner's Sons

Have Space Suit - Will Travel

1959 Hugo Award Nominee

Narrative Synopsis

High school senior Kip Russell enters a soap slogan contest hoping to win a trip to the Moon, and instead wins a used, surplus EVA spacesuit. After restoring the suit with elbow grease and engineering textbooks, Kip tests it in his backyard and accidentally flags down a flying saucer, plunging into a galactic tribunal that puts the human species on trial.

Anyone who cannot cope with mathematics is not fully human. At best, he is a tolerable subhuman who has learned to wear shoes, bathe, and not make messes in the house.
Notable Passage

Historical & Editorial Context

The twelfth and final novel in the official Scribner juvenile series, revered for its accurate space suit thermodynamics.