History Literature / BetweenPlanets

* ObnoxiousEntitledHousewife: Don meets a middle-aged woman who is terrified into a racist (species-ist?) rant at the mere sight of his venusian dragon friend, Sir Issac Newton, complete with emasculating her husband to get her way and demands to speak to the manager (well, captain, since they're on a public space shuttle).

* DoesThisRemindYouOfAnything: The MacGuffin is [[Literature/TheLordOfTheRings a tatty ring- The least of rings, one might say-that only shows its true nature under specific circumstances; entrusted to the hero by an elderly family friend.]] Funnily enough, it predates Proffessor Tolkien's book by three years.

* WhatMeasureIsANonhuman: There are two Venusian species presented this way: The (apparently) nonsapient, deeply-affectionate and playful gregarians, and the intelligent, highly-traditional dragons. We meet an Obnoxious Entitled Housewife who's immediately terrified into a racist rant at the mere sight of a dragon, who for his part mostly shrugs it off (and is revealed to not only be [[spoiler: TheGoodKing, but a theoretical physicist to boot]]). At a fancy club, Don is served Baked Baby Gregarian. He's as disgusted by the idea of eating them as he would be at the idea of eating a human baby. DuringTheWar, greenies are as casually racist towards dragons as any pith-helmeted [[RichIdiotWithNoDayJob fop]] on safari from the 1800's, and are noted to eat gregarians when they think they can get away with it.

* EverythingsBetterWithDinosaurs: The intelligent life on Venus is ''Draco Veneris Wilsonii'' and they are commonly referred to as "dragons" but are a six legged multi-ton saurians with manipulator tentacles from their necks rather than arms and hands. They also have a dozen eyes on eyestalks and speak in musical whistles.

* {{Zeerust}}: The protagonist (who is staying on a dude ranch in New Mexico) takes a call from the cell phone mounted in his horse's saddle! Also, there are transcontinental and intercontinental ballistic passenger rockets rather than jets. Don Harvey travels from Albuquerque to New Chicago in 20 minutes on one. On the other hand, Don Harvey's luggage is "fluoroscoped" (that is X-rayed) before his flight to New Chicago and his name is on a watch list causing him to be pulled aside before his flight to Circum-Terra enroute to Mars. in the Afterword of the 2008 re-issue, Creator/TravisSTaylor Ph.D waxes enthusiastically about how Heinlein described stealth technology via faceting in 1951, decades before the development of the F-117A.
** Eerily enough, while being X-rayed Don half-jokingly mention this is to prevent him from storing a bomb in his underwear. Cut to 60 years later and a failed attempt at underwear bombing on a plane results in a major international incident [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Northwest_Airlines_Flight_253]].

* DoesThisRemindYouOfAnything: The MacGuffin is [[Literature/TheLordOfTheRings a tatty ring- The least of rings, one might say-entrusted to the hero by an elderly family friend.]] Funnily enough, it predates Proffessor Tolkien's book by three years.

* DoesThisRemindYouOfAnything: The MacGuffin is [[Literature/TheLordOfTheRings a tatty ring- The least of rings, one might say-entrusted to the hero by an elderly family friend.]] Funnily enough, it predates Proffessor Tolkien's book by three years

* DoesThisRemindYouOfAnything: The MacGuffin is a tatty ring-[[Literature/TheLordOfTheRings The least of rings, one might say]]-entrusted to the hero by an elderly family friend.

* TechnologyMarchesOn: Played straight with the absence of cell phones, lack of commercial airliners, and presence of filing cabinets.

** Averted with data storage, [[OurDragonsAreDifferent Sir Isaac Newton]] mentions that it's apparently possible for them to store the Encyclopedia Britannica on the head of a pin. [[spoiler: Averted harder when its revealed that the Maguffin Harvey was given is actually an optical data storage medium, still an emerging technology today.]]

* {{Zeerust}}: The protagonist (who is staying on a dude ranch in New Mexico) takes a call from the cell phone mounted in his horse's saddle! Also, there are transcontinental and intercontinental ballistic passenger rockets rather than jets. Don Harvey travels from Albuquerque to New Chicago in 20 minutes on one. On the other hand, in the Afterword of the 2008 re-issue, Creator/TravisSTaylor Ph.D waxes enthusiastically about how Heinlein described stealth technology via faceting in 1951, decades before the development of the F-117A.

* {{Zeerust}}: The protagonist (who is staying on a dude ranch in New Mexico) takes a call from the cell phone mounted in his horse's saddle! Also, there are transcontinental and intercontinental ballistic passenger rockets rather than jets. Don Harvey travels from Albuquerque to New Chicago in 20 minutes on one. On the other hand, Don Harvey's luggage is "fluoroscoped" (that is X-rayed) before his flight to New Chicago and his name is on a watch list causing him to be pulled aside before his flight to Circum-Terra enroute to Mars. And in the Afterword of the 2008 re-issue, Creator/TravisSTaylor Ph.D waxes enthusiastically about how Heinlein described stealth technology via faceting in 1951, decades before the development of the F-117A.

* AffablyEvil: Political Officer First Class, I.B.I. Stanley Bankfield was a pleasant and polite man when interviewing Don Harvey on Venus and puts a fatherly arm around his shoulder when sympathizing with his situation. Then he grabs Don's hand and painfully pulls back his little finger but but stops and says he will wait for a medical officer with TruthSerum since overzealous application can reduce the subject to incoherence and willing to admit to anything.

* {{Zeerust}}: The protagonist (who is staying on a dude ranch in New Mexico) takes a call from the cell phone mounted in his horse's saddle! Also, there are transcontinental and intercontinental ballistic passenger rockets rather than jets. Don Harvey travels from Albuquerque to New Chicago in 20 minutes on one.
** On the other hand, Don Harvey's luggage is "fluoroscoped" (that is X-rayed) before his flight to New Chicago and his name is on a watch list causing him to be pulled aside before his flight to Circum-Terra enroute to Mars.
** And in the Afterword of the 2008 re-issue, Creator/TravisSTaylor Ph.D waxes enthusiastically about how Heinlein described stealth technology via faceting in 1951, decades before the development of the F-117A.

* NickNamingTheEnemy: Venus Nationalists are called "fog-eaters" by Federation troops due to the heavy mists common on Venus and the Federation troops are called "greenies" due to their mottle green fatigues. Among themselves, the Venus guerrillas called themselves "duckfoots".

* LieDetector: Don Harvey is subject to questioning by Venus Republic soldiers while hooked up to a lie detector after first waiving his rights about self-incrimination. He is cleared since he hadn't done anything wrong.

* Main/BlackMarket: There is a flourishing one on Venus to, among other things, convert Federation currency to Venus Republic bills. Don Harvey is approached by someone with connections when he arrives on Venus and finds he missed the cut-off conversion date while spending months in [[ShownTheirWork Hohmann transfer orbit]] from Earth. It was a scam as he was offered 20% on the [[WeWillSpendCreditsInTheFuture credit]] when the going rate was 60.
* BoardingSchool: The novel begins with Don Harvey attending one for several years on Earth while his parents are busy with archaeological digs on Mars. Aside from academics it is also a dude ranch with each boy being assigned a horse to care for.

* CurbStompBattle: ''Little David'' englobes the three Federation warships enroute to Mars with its force field projector and the "battle" (sic) is over.

* ChasteHero/AccidentalProposal: Harvey is assisted by a woman who convinces her father to loan him money, despite the fact he has nothing to guarantee it. When he asks her to hold on to a ring for him (he thinks it has important secret information in it) she is startled about being given a ring and he doesn't understand why a woman would consider being given a ring something unusual. When her father finds out that Harvey gave his daughter a ring, he questions it also, but Harvey is still clueless about why it might be considered strange.

* ChasteHero: Harvey is assisted by a woman who convinces her father to loan him money, despite the fact he has nothing to guarantee it. When he asks her to hold on to a ring for him (he thinks it has important secret information in it) she is startled about being given a ring and he doesn't understand why a woman would consider being given a ring something unusual. When her father finds out that Harvey gave his daughter a ring, he questions it also, but Harvey is still clueless about why it might be considered strange.