In June, 1961, Robert A. Heinlein’s most famous novel, A Stranger in a Strange Land came out with little fanfare, and it wasn’t until August that a book reviewer outside the ghetto of science fiction magazines deigned to review it. Here is what Orville Prescott had to say about Heinlein’s book in the August 4 edition of The New York Times:
Later that year Robert A. Heinlein’s Stranger in a Strange Land would become the first science fiction novel to appear on The New York Times best-seller list.