The Stainless Steel Rat Goes to Hell

Entertaining and fast read, although there's not much science in this SF crime case. I haven't read any of the earlier parts of the series, and so I got to know Jim and Angelina only in this story, when they have obviously a long history of saving worlds and universes together, something that can be a bit confusing when they inevitably refer back to their past heroics. But all in all they're a very likable power-couple, even if Jim is a bit on the Mary Sue-side of things.
Unfortunately the big bad evil of this case didn't have much of a personality, and I'm not a fan of adversaries that are nothing but cackling genius megalomania with a lot of technical tricks up their sleeve.

Stainless Steel Rat Goes to Hell

Jim DiGriz has his family, his twins and all is well. Until Angelina “goes to church” and gets herself abducted. Most of the book is about Jim’s adventures in finding the con artist who took his wife, uncovering a major conspiracy – multiple bodies, time dilation, multiple universes and a new element on the Elemental Table that creates eternal life.

But this is all very much not the DiGriz I read about years ago as a teen of such novels as Stainless Steel Rat’s Revenge, Stainless Steel Rat for President, etc. There is no real con going on with Jim and he is not surmounting authority or the law, like he usually does.

A bit disappointing but if you’ve never read a Stainless Steel novel you show more will be entertained.

Happy trails! show less

This is only my second Stainless Steel Rat novel, but I think I need to go back to the beginning and check out the first few in the series. Not only were there loads of characters and references to past events with which I was unfamiliar, this SSR story felt tired and forced. I felt like the author was just throwing in new twists and calamities for the heroes in order to boost his pagecount to novel length. There was no real flow to the plot and many of the events that either saved the day or ruined it seemed too convenient to be believable, even given a wide suspension of disbelief. Don't get me wrong - I still enjoyed the SSR's witty banter and sarcastic commentary, but overall I felt like the story was a little too aimless and random.

The Best audio book I have listened to in a long time.

Book 9 returns to the "current" timeline, no more prequels.

The "goes to hell" is about how Angelina and her friends get caught up into some religious cult that is all about going to heaven (a relatively "new" idea that has all but disappeared in this future context). If you give the "church" enough money you can take a special trip to heaven to prove its real and know you can go there when you die if you are loyal to the church.

Angelina goes on to investigate and Jim has to follow after when she goes missing.

of course its internal universal transporter that goes to "heaven" and "hell"

Like all the books in the series its great fun without a whole lot of fun without taking show more themselves too seriously. I really appreciate the jokes where they make fun of hard Science Fiction when Dr. Koupou starts explain how these various things work an inevitable Jim interrupts with "OK, whatever, lets just go already" show less

Our pulp rat makes an absurd journey into a religious hell (and still manages to slip his way to safety).

This book is weak compared to some of the best Stainless Steel Rat books. It suffers from the same almost-impossible-to-believe plot lines as The Stainless Steel Rat Saves The World and The Stainless Steel Rat Wants You. Frankly, the book also jumps around a lot, and I found it hard to follow.

http://www.stillhq.com/book/Harry_Harrison/The_Stainless_Steel_Rat_Goes_To_Hell....

Slippery Jim is a great character. I can't get enough of him.