Valentine Michael Smith, a human raised from infancy by Martians, returns to Earth possessed of superhuman abilities and an alien worldview, and founds a radical new church that scandalizes and seduces American society in equal measure.
Books mentioned in Stranger in a Strange Land (8)
Just So Stories by Rudyard Kipling: “She found a spool of Kipling's Just So Stories and took it happily upstairs with her.”
The War of the Worlds by H. G. Wells: “Wells' The War of the Worlds?" "A long time ago, in school." "Consider the idea that the Martians might decide to make war on us-and win."”
The Art of Cross-Examination by Francis L. Wellman: “I then read The Art of Cross-Examination by Francis Weilman.”
Romeo and Juliet by William Shakespeare: “I then read the Tragedy of Romeo and Juliet by Master William Shakespeare of London.”
Memoirs of Jacques Casanova de Seingalt by Giacomo Casanova: “I then read the Memoirs of Jacques Casanova de Seingalt as translated into English by Arthur Machen.”
The Anatomy of Melancholy by Robert Burton: “Duke, you'll find some glasses stashed behind The Anatomy of Melancholy up there-”
The Golden Bough by James George Frazer: “the unabridged Golden Bough, The Way, Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures, the sacred writings of a dozen other religions”
The Book of the Law by Aleister Crowley: “even such deviant oddities as Crowley's Book of the Law.”
Books that mention Stranger in a Strange Land (3)
American Gods by Neil Gaiman: “a battered, yellowing copy of Stranger in a Strange Land”
The White Album by Joan Didion: “a piece of Scientology literature beneath a drawer lining, a copy of Stranger in a Strange Land stuck deep on a closet shelf”