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The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress
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It is a tale of revolution, of the rebellion of a former penal colony on the Moon against its masters on the Earth. It is a tale of a culture whose family structures are based on the presence of two men for every woman, leading to novel forms of marriage and family. It is the story of the disparate people, a computer technician, a vigorous young female agitator, and an eld
...more
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Paperback, 288 pages
Published
March 14th 2005
by Hodder & Stoughton
(first published April 1966)
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Stephen
The Audible book (Blackstone) is marvelously read with near perfect characterizations. I have listened to it many times in the car.
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Start your review of The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress

TANSTAAFL = There ain't no such thing as a free lunch.
My three favorite books of all time are (in no order) Heart of Darkness, The Dispossessed, and The Moon is a Harsh Mistress.
When I first read this years ago I loved it, I could not put it down. As Stranger in a Strange Land was a Robert A. Heinlein vehicle for theology, so is Moon is a Harsh Mistress to ideology. And just as The Fountainhead is the better, though less epic, of the pair with Atlas Shrugged, so is Moon is a Harsh Mistress, the ...more
My three favorite books of all time are (in no order) Heart of Darkness, The Dispossessed, and The Moon is a Harsh Mistress.
When I first read this years ago I loved it, I could not put it down. As Stranger in a Strange Land was a Robert A. Heinlein vehicle for theology, so is Moon is a Harsh Mistress to ideology. And just as The Fountainhead is the better, though less epic, of the pair with Atlas Shrugged, so is Moon is a Harsh Mistress, the ...more

Space camp prison fun time
So we have AI, use of food as a weapon of war, philosophy, how probability influences human decisions and satirizing statistics, rebellion, how to treat colonies right or wrong and what true independence means with many side blows on history, emancipation by imbalance of sex ratio that enables women to be more powerful and what kind of family models form out of this new situation, and, as always in Heinleins´works, many dialogues and monologues.
He always played with po ...more
So we have AI, use of food as a weapon of war, philosophy, how probability influences human decisions and satirizing statistics, rebellion, how to treat colonies right or wrong and what true independence means with many side blows on history, emancipation by imbalance of sex ratio that enables women to be more powerful and what kind of family models form out of this new situation, and, as always in Heinleins´works, many dialogues and monologues.
He always played with po ...more

“The Moon is a Harsh Mistress” – what a title, sometimes I wonder if this book is considered such a classic in large part due to that title. Despite some imperfections, it does have much to offer, especially being published in the mid-1960’s. The setting revolves around a former Lunar penal outpost, which has evolved into a highly functioning colony with ice mining and successful grain farming. The colony is tightly managed by the Lunar Authority which is controlled from Earth. Set in the later
...more

Ah, Heinlein: SF's great paradox artist. I am fairly certain that I have personally held every possible wrong viewpoint on the man. Namely, that he was:
1) A radically forward-thinking visionary of libertarianism
2) A raging fascist, homophobe, and misogynist
3) Any point on the sociopolitical spectrum in between.
It's not my fault. Over the course of his career, Heinlein seemed to espouse every possible viewpoint on religion, government, and gender relations (obviously, he liked to stick to small t ...more
1) A radically forward-thinking visionary of libertarianism
2) A raging fascist, homophobe, and misogynist
3) Any point on the sociopolitical spectrum in between.
It's not my fault. Over the course of his career, Heinlein seemed to espouse every possible viewpoint on religion, government, and gender relations (obviously, he liked to stick to small t ...more

do you play games where you know the outcome of the game itself is without question... where any fun to be had is not so much in the winning - that's predetermined - but in figuring out how exactly you will win, what moves you will make, how you will overcome all those minor hurdles along the way? that's sometimes how i feel when playing chess with some folks. for me, it's not the most exciting thing in the world; it's a little eye-rolling. i think others may have more excitement when playing a
...more

Imagine a prison colony on the Moon
Now add a new and updated twist on the American war of independence
A self aware computer that actually runs the colony
A non-political computer engineer
A beautiful freedom fighter
A politically cynical professor
The birth of a (new) nation
And you have one of the best hard science fiction tales ever !
image:
Prison History
My Grandfather Stone claimed that Luna was only open prison in history. No bars, no guards, no rules—and no need for them. Back in early days, he ...more
Now add a new and updated twist on the American war of independence
A self aware computer that actually runs the colony
A non-political computer engineer
A beautiful freedom fighter
A politically cynical professor
The birth of a (new) nation
And you have one of the best hard science fiction tales ever !
image:

Prison History
My Grandfather Stone claimed that Luna was only open prison in history. No bars, no guards, no rules—and no need for them. Back in early days, he ...more

One of the presents for my mother this Christmas was an Amazon Echo (Alexa). Having recently reread Robert Heinlein's The Moon is a Harsh Mistress, I couldn't stop thinking about the parallels between the awakened computer, Mycroft (Mike) in this novel and Alexa. This connection was reinforced when people kept asking Alexa to tell a joke. While he helps the former convict Lunar settlers in a rebellion against Earth, MIke's obsession remains fixated on jokes (and whether they are funny only once,
...more

DNFed it at 55 % or so. I can't believe that this difficult to read and difficult to follow story is so highly rated on Goodreads.
The story is so painstakingly revealed, yet there are more questions than answers. The coup prepared by the oppressed moon dwellers seems to take forever.
Each successful book has its own audience, or should I say, readership. Maybe only the hardcore sci-fi crowd rated this beast of a book.
Maybe the usual romance reading housewives had a hand in rating this book 4 or 5 ...more
The story is so painstakingly revealed, yet there are more questions than answers. The coup prepared by the oppressed moon dwellers seems to take forever.
Each successful book has its own audience, or should I say, readership. Maybe only the hardcore sci-fi crowd rated this beast of a book.
Maybe the usual romance reading housewives had a hand in rating this book 4 or 5 ...more

If you're into stuff like this, you can read the full review.
On How to Spin a Top-Notch Yarn of Bullshit: "The Moon is a Harsh Mistress" by Robert A. Heinlein
The usual pretty crude pneumatic sex-fantasies cropped up... But women actually have a pretty dominant role in Heinlein's lunar society... It's a penal colony, and Heinlein reckons that means there are going to be far fewer women then men there - so he's come up with a system called 'line-marriage'... wherein a few women in a household shar ...more
On How to Spin a Top-Notch Yarn of Bullshit: "The Moon is a Harsh Mistress" by Robert A. Heinlein
The usual pretty crude pneumatic sex-fantasies cropped up... But women actually have a pretty dominant role in Heinlein's lunar society... It's a penal colony, and Heinlein reckons that means there are going to be far fewer women then men there - so he's come up with a system called 'line-marriage'... wherein a few women in a household shar ...more

What do you want us to do? Throw rocks at them?
Nah, but we could have a tea party.
Wow. I'm still amazed at how good this Revolution novel has held up over the years. I had read it twice before this latest re-read, but it hasn't lost any of its charm.
Of course, I love Heinlein's heavy reliance on self-reliance, libertarianism, and TANSTAAFL. I'm lucky to have read him early so as to be fully indoctrinated in this gung-ho politicism of Rational Anarchy and I can laugh and whoop and grin foolishly ...more
Nah, but we could have a tea party.
Wow. I'm still amazed at how good this Revolution novel has held up over the years. I had read it twice before this latest re-read, but it hasn't lost any of its charm.
Of course, I love Heinlein's heavy reliance on self-reliance, libertarianism, and TANSTAAFL. I'm lucky to have read him early so as to be fully indoctrinated in this gung-ho politicism of Rational Anarchy and I can laugh and whoop and grin foolishly ...more

Very disappointing: 2.5* (it's not terrible, but it's weaker than books I award 3*, and I enjoyed it far less).
I know of Heinlein as a sci-fi author and had heard of some interesting language-type things that make this novel unique, principally a Lunar dialect.
Although it's mostly set in a lunar prison colony, just over 100 years after it was written (and 60 ahead of now), it's more of a political story, and the Lunar dialect is just a slightly stilted pidgin whose most notable features are the ...more
I know of Heinlein as a sci-fi author and had heard of some interesting language-type things that make this novel unique, principally a Lunar dialect.
Although it's mostly set in a lunar prison colony, just over 100 years after it was written (and 60 ahead of now), it's more of a political story, and the Lunar dialect is just a slightly stilted pidgin whose most notable features are the ...more

My first taste of Heinlein was Stranger in a Strange Land a few years back. It was, in a word, bad. So I gave up on Heinlein all together, figuring if his most famous and critically acclaimed book was no good, what chance did the others have? This conviction was met with protests from Heinlein fans, saying I need to read some "good" Heinlein before making the call. So I did, though it took me an unusually long time to finish. I just couldn't get into it. The characters were two-dimensional and s
...more

This is an excellent novel, action-packed, exciting, and deftly-plotted, with fascinating, complex characters and some interesting science-fictional ideas. I also enjoyed reading about Luna's culture; I thought the marriage customs were particularly interesting.
One thing I noticed right off was the way the Loonies use language differently than people from earth do. In fact, it threw me at first -- I couldn't figure out what was going on or why the language was so rough and unpolished and choppy. ...more
One thing I noticed right off was the way the Loonies use language differently than people from earth do. In fact, it threw me at first -- I couldn't figure out what was going on or why the language was so rough and unpolished and choppy. ...more

The Moon is a Harsh Mistress begins, promisingly enough, with a conversation between the sentient computer Mike and the mechanic Mannie, our protagonist, about the subjective and paradoxical nature of humor. It then segues into a revolution whereby the Moon, a penal colony used primarily as a farm to grow wheat to feed Earth's beleaguered masses, attempts to become an independent state. The revolution is planned and executed primarily by Mike, essentially an omniscient God, and everything which
...more

THIS REVIEW CONTAINS MULTIPLE HEINLEIN SPOILERS
Robert Heinlein was a good friend of AI legend Marvin Minsky (check out his people page! It's interesting!), and I've heard that they often used to chat about AI, science-fiction, and the connections between them. Here's a conversation I imagine them having some time between 1961, when Stranger in a Strange Land was published, and 1966, when The Moon is a Harsh Mistress appeared:
"Bob, this book's not so bad, but I felt it could have been so much bet ...more
Robert Heinlein was a good friend of AI legend Marvin Minsky (check out his people page! It's interesting!), and I've heard that they often used to chat about AI, science-fiction, and the connections between them. Here's a conversation I imagine them having some time between 1961, when Stranger in a Strange Land was published, and 1966, when The Moon is a Harsh Mistress appeared:
"Bob, this book's not so bad, but I felt it could have been so much bet ...more

Mar 08, 2013
Tadiana ✩Night Owl☽
rated it
it was amazing
Shelves:
science-fiction,
oldies-but-goodies
$1.99 Kindle sale, May 3, 2020. Robert Heinlein's books too often don't age well, but this one is one of my favorites and is still a fascinating SF novel, if you like hard SF. This one won the Hugo Award (and was nominated for the Nebula) back in 1966.
It's the story of a human colony on the Moon, which Earth has used as a penal colony as well as a source of wheat. The main character, Manuel or "Mannie," is a computer technician who discovers that the Moon's master computer has become sentient an ...more
It's the story of a human colony on the Moon, which Earth has used as a penal colony as well as a source of wheat. The main character, Manuel or "Mannie," is a computer technician who discovers that the Moon's master computer has become sentient an ...more

I feel like I just took a psychedelic trip culturally through the 60s in a dream of the life in the future. I found the book to be very reflective of the culture and philosophies of the 60s projected to the 2000s. In some ways Heinlein was ahead of his time. I found myself impressed with his treatment and characterization of the sentient AI. There was a lot of unexpected philosophy in the storytelling where they are discussion the behaviors of crowds, and people and greed and motivations. I thou
...more

Fantastic! I won't be able to do this book justice in a review, but it really is one of the best I've ever read.
The language is brilliant and makes you feel that you really are living on the moon. The Loonies are interesting and the plot kept me completely absorbed and desperate to hear what happened next throughout.
One of the best revolutions I've ever had the pleasure to read. Highly recommended! ...more
The language is brilliant and makes you feel that you really are living on the moon. The Loonies are interesting and the plot kept me completely absorbed and desperate to hear what happened next throughout.
One of the best revolutions I've ever had the pleasure to read. Highly recommended! ...more

Well, I tried.
This is not a bad book by any means. But Heinlein’s decision to let his first-person narrator speak in broken English made this hard work for me.
I just never got into a real flow, and after three or four pages my mind always started to wander. So I actually had to force myself to think about the book's content instead of whether I’ve already done the laundry or not.
Right now this just hasn’t any of the things that I want from a book. Which is either be fun, or be educational, or be ...more
This is not a bad book by any means. But Heinlein’s decision to let his first-person narrator speak in broken English made this hard work for me.
I just never got into a real flow, and after three or four pages my mind always started to wander. So I actually had to force myself to think about the book's content instead of whether I’ve already done the laundry or not.
Right now this just hasn’t any of the things that I want from a book. Which is either be fun, or be educational, or be ...more

This is a classic SF story of the moon fighting for its independence from Earth, with a lot of parallels to the American Revolution. Heinlein has a political conversation with himself here, definitely coming down on the side of Libertarianism, but also acknowledges & points out the holes in his arguments himself. I've read some rants about Heinlein pushing his politics & I disagree with them. I think he's doing more questioning than pushing & that leads to some fun with the characters, especiall
...more

Apr 26, 2020
Gabrielle
rated it
it was ok
·
review of another edition
Shelves:
american,
read-in-2020,
reviewed,
classics,
own-a-copy,
sci-fi,
great-idea-terrible-execution
Short review :
So. Much. Mansplaining. Yuk.
Long review :
I wanted to read “The Moon is a Harsh Mistress” because I love both sci-fi and the idea of socialist revolution (even if I am well aware that socialism is not what Heinlein was going for here). I knew that there would be grossly outdated stuff in this book: sci-fi from that era tends to feature decorative and sexually pleasing female characters, there is often paper being used, as well as other quaintly outmoded ideas – and I can often make ...more
So. Much. Mansplaining. Yuk.
Long review :
I wanted to read “The Moon is a Harsh Mistress” because I love both sci-fi and the idea of socialist revolution (even if I am well aware that socialism is not what Heinlein was going for here). I knew that there would be grossly outdated stuff in this book: sci-fi from that era tends to feature decorative and sexually pleasing female characters, there is often paper being used, as well as other quaintly outmoded ideas – and I can often make ...more

The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress: Soap-box on the Moon
Originally posted at Fantasy Literature
Heinlein’s libertarian creed is TANSTAAFL ("There ain't no such thing as a free lunch"), and this book is probably the most complete expression of his political ideas about self-government, attempts to empower women while still being incredibly sexist and condescending, and some pretty good hard SF extrapolation of what a moon colony’s technology, politics and economy might be like. Oh yeah, and there happen ...more
Originally posted at Fantasy Literature
Heinlein’s libertarian creed is TANSTAAFL ("There ain't no such thing as a free lunch"), and this book is probably the most complete expression of his political ideas about self-government, attempts to empower women while still being incredibly sexist and condescending, and some pretty good hard SF extrapolation of what a moon colony’s technology, politics and economy might be like. Oh yeah, and there happen ...more

“Chaotic crossed with psychotic.”
Disappointed. I read this story fifty years ago and loved it. On re-reading it now, I found it not only trite, but disturbing. This is going to be long, but I must justify dropping a former five-star rating to two. (I gave a star back for literary merit. Heinlein was a great storyteller.)
“He really did think he was Sherlock Holmes’s brother Mycroft … nor would I swear he was not; ‘reality’ is a slippery notion.”
The star of the story is Mike, more properly Mycrof ...more
Disappointed. I read this story fifty years ago and loved it. On re-reading it now, I found it not only trite, but disturbing. This is going to be long, but I must justify dropping a former five-star rating to two. (I gave a star back for literary merit. Heinlein was a great storyteller.)
“He really did think he was Sherlock Holmes’s brother Mycroft … nor would I swear he was not; ‘reality’ is a slippery notion.”
The star of the story is Mike, more properly Mycrof ...more

As cynical as I have become about revolutions, this novel managed to warm my heart. This story about Loonies (residents of Luna i.e. the Moon) rebelling against Earth government is so well written it is really a crime to miss it. As a big a crime as not starting a revolution when revolution is due. If you want to feed your inner rebel with a delicious story of lunar colony rebelling against mother Earth, then what are you waiting for? If you’re feeling philosophical, then this might be a good no
...more

This is quite possibly Heinlein's most politically charged book. People speak of Stranger in a Strange Land as being socially revolutionary, but this book is both that (polygamous marriage to form extended families, murder generally allowed, but insults to women punishable by death) and politically charged (Libertarian, Libertarian, Libertarian, though not exactly that kind of loopy American Libertarian Party kind, but a kind based more strictly on a dismantling of governmental power).
It is a co ...more
It is a co ...more

May 30, 2012
Mike (the Paladin)
rated it
it was amazing
·
review of another edition
Shelves:
science-fiction
I read this first when I was young...we're talking young-young here, and my memories of it were of a sort of space opera. I'd remembered it along with many of Heinlein's "teen" or youth books. When I mentioned this it was pointed out to me (rather forcefully by some) that my memories were...incomplete.
Well, they were. While a young reader will see a "space rebellion" here the story itself is a well written tale of political science and human nature. Heinlein gives a very well done debate and/or ...more
Well, they were. While a young reader will see a "space rebellion" here the story itself is a well written tale of political science and human nature. Heinlein gives a very well done debate and/or ...more

This is a classic SF story of the moon fighting for its independence from Earth, with a lot of parallels to the American Revolution. Heinlein has a political conversation with himself here, definitely coming down on the side of Libertarianism, but also acknowledges & points out the holes in his arguments himself. I've read some rants about Heinlein pushing his politics & I disagree with them. I think he's doing more questioning than pushing & that leads to some fun with the characters, especiall
...more

I read Stranger in a Strange Land twice. I loathed it with a passion the first time I read it, sometimes in the Eighties. I tried again in 2008 when it was a selection for one of my GoodReads groups. I thought maybe I was missing something, so I decided to go for the re-read. It was just as awful the second time. Because of my experience, I vowed I would never read Heinlein again. Several people told me that Stranger in a Strange Land wasn't really his best work and that I should try The Moon Is
...more

I’ve read The Moon is a Harsh Mistress twice in twenty years. Two decades between readings and it still holds up surprisingly well. Heinlein’s Lunar Revolution, his benevolent AI, Mycroft (aka Mike), and Professor de la Paz’s ideas for government were all exactly how I remembered them. Yet I found that my favourite part of the rereading experience was the tale it told about me.
When I read this book the first time, I was an idealistic youth who believed that change was possible and worth fightin ...more
When I read this book the first time, I was an idealistic youth who believed that change was possible and worth fightin ...more

The opening chapter of The Moon is a Harsh Mistress presents an intriguing character study; Mike is a computer who wants to grow up. Mike doesn't understand humor or human nature but he wants to learn and he's got a willing teacher in the form of his assigned engineer, the clever but casual Mannie. Sound interesting? Do not get your hopes up (DNGYHU!)
Because this novel isn't about Mike's quest to make sense of humanity, it's about a libertarian revolution on the moon! (Liberty! Economic freedom ...more
Because this novel isn't about Mike's quest to make sense of humanity, it's about a libertarian revolution on the moon! (Liberty! Economic freedom ...more
topics | posts | views | last activity | |
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Hugo & Nebula Awa...: The Moon is a Harsh Mistress (Spoilers Allowed) | 40 | 34 | May 05, 2020 07:55AM | |
Play Book Tag: The Moon is a Harsh Mistress by Robert A Heinlein- 4 stars | 2 | 7 | Apr 30, 2020 03:41PM | |
Hugo & Nebula Awa...: The Moon is a Harsh Mistress (No Spoilers) | 48 | 33 | Apr 28, 2020 11:24AM | |
50 books to read ...: The Moon is a Harsh Mistress | 2 | 19 | Dec 04, 2019 05:26PM | |
UPEP Reading Grou...: Book 4: The Moon is a Harsh Mistress | 1 | 6 | Oct 18, 2019 08:08AM | |
Never too Late to...: 2019 May - The Moon is a Harsh Mistress by Robert A. Heinlein | 8 | 18 | May 16, 2019 06:47AM |
Robert Anson Heinlein was an American novelist and science fiction writer. Often called "the dean of science fiction writers", he is one of the most popular, influential, and controversial authors of "hard science fiction".
He set a high standard for science and engineering plausibility and helped to raise the genre's standards of literary quality. He was the first SF writer to break into mainstre ...more
He set a high standard for science and engineering plausibility and helped to raise the genre's standards of literary quality. He was the first SF writer to break into mainstre ...more
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“There is no worse tyranny than to force a man to pay for what he does not want merely because you think it would be good for him.”
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