Sometimes if cover art catches my attention I will look at the title and author then synopsis. Usually it's title and/or author. Sometimes subject matter or just fatness of book that looks well thumbed and previously loved.

I don't read self help books either,I can usually tell what's in them from the blurb or title. They are all the same more or less. Just different window dressing

Back then there was a middle class

Honey I remember watching for the gas war prices for my parents and it was 19 cents. We were on the road all during my childhood.

He wrote the book as a homage to the common infantryman. It's in his dedication. It's also I think him asking questions. Asking the reader to think about what the price of survival is. At what point do you lose your humanity? How do keep it and survive as a species? When you ask your youngest to fight for you and become maimed in body and soul, do they not deserve that "privilege"? He also advocated in the book that the officers fought with their men and never left them behind. Heinlein had many questions and thoughts in all of his books and left the thinking to you.

I believe you mean the director as Heinlein was deceased when this movie was made

I love cookbooks too. All kinds and varieties. I love vintage and regional spiral bound as well as professional and niche. You never know where you will get a good recipe or idea from. I'm always having to cull mine out. Mostly I'm fantasy cooking though