Title: Starship Troopers (parts 1-4) - Novel
Written: 1959   Pages: 822
 
Description:
Part 1, 159 pages, contains notecards with story notes. Reviews of novel (many negative and focused on violence). Letters of support. Highlights are a 15 page letter by RAH discussing novel, and another lengthy reply to a reviewer who had done a negative review and offered RAH a chance for a rebuttal. Paperwork relating to game versions.
Part 2, 236 pages, contains mss draft labeled “Orig. draft”, titled “Star Soldier”, with numerous hand-edits. 
Part 3, 238 pages, contains mss draft labeled “Original draft”, titled “Starside Soldier”—looks like the same version as in Part 2 but possibly edited by someone else.
Part 4, 189 pages, contains list of possible titles, some notes for story. Scattered pages and edits to cut down for serial version.
 
Publication: 
Rejected by the Scribner’s editorial board; Heinlein expanded the novel to 90,000 words and sold it to Putnam’s, who brought it out in 1959. Serial publication of 20,000 word condensation in The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction as Starship Soldier in October, November 1959.
 
Notes: Alternate titles: Shoulder the Sky, Sky Soldier, Starship Soldier