The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress

The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress
by Robert A. Heinlein

The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress
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Book Summary Information

Author: Robert A. Heinlein
Edition: Paperback
Audio: English (Original Language); English (Unknown); English (Published)
Published: 1997-06-15
ISBN: 0312863551
Number of pages: 384
Publisher: Orb Books

Book Reviews of The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress

Book Review: Hands down, Heinlen's best
Summary: 5 Stars

While most folks seem to love "Stranger" (I do) or the bug book, I prefer this book.

When it was written, very little was known about the actual conditions on the moon. Heinlen worked from theories and extrapolated quite well. The descriptions of the computer character reflect what was current in computers of the time. And for the younger crowd, there were no blue screens of death.

That said, Heinlen worked in plausible science with strong character development and something that he eventually embodied in Lazarus Long: his ideals of liberty and individualism.

The main gist of this novel is the rights of the individual and his associated liberty. Once you grasp that, you grasp how the entire scenario comes together. Heinlen weaves elements not seen in the United States since we had a frontier: independence. The desire to be treated fairly and left alone drives the characters to perform incredible actions.

Summary of The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress

Robert A. Heinlein was the most influential science fiction writer of his era, an influence so large that, as Samuel R. Delany notes, "modern critics attempting to wrestle with that influence find themselves dealing with an object rather like the sky or an ocean." He won the Hugo Award for best novel four times, a record that still stands. The Moon is a Harsh Mistress was the last of these Hugo-winning novels, and it is widely considered his finest work.

It is a tale of revolution, of the rebellion of the former Lunar penal colony against the Lunar Authority that controls it from Earth. It is the tale of the disparate people--a computer technician, a vigorous young female agitator, and an elderly academic--who become the rebel movement's leaders. And it is the story of Mike, the supercomputer whose sentience is known only to this inner circle, and who for reasons of his own is committed to the revolution's ultimate success.

The Moon is a Harsh Mistress is one of the high points of modern science fiction, a novel bursting with politics, humanity, passion, innovative technical speculation, and a firm belief in the pursuit of human freedom.

Tom Clancy has said of Robert A. Heinlein, "We proceed down the path marked by his ideas. He shows us where the future is." Nowhere is this more true than in Heinlein's gripping tale of revolution on the moon in 2076, where "Loonies" are kept poor and oppressed by an Earth-based Authority that turns huge profits at their expense. A small band of dissidents, including a one-armed computer jock, a radical young woman, a past-his-prime academic and a nearly omnipotent computer named Mike, ignite the fires of revolution despite the near certainty of failure and death.

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