Image - The Moon is a Harsh Mistress, Robert A. Heinlein

The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress

©1966 Robert Heinlein

Reviewed by Jillbe Badb

The setting: This novel describes people involved in a revolution on the lunar colonies - once a penal colony - against Earth. Loonies, as they call themselves, are no longer technically prisoners, but are economic slaves of the Earth.

The first two characters you get to know are Mannie, an engineer (the novel’s narrative voice) and his best friend, Mike, a computer that runs most systems on Luna. In the beginning of the story, no one but Mannie knows that Mike is sentient. Mannie develops an intimate relationship with Mike. Early in the novel, he reflects on Mike’s humanness, “[I] am not going argue whether a machine can ‘really’ be alive, ‘really’ be self aware.” Yet Mannie finishes this musing with the belief that Mike “started with ‘free will’ and acquired more as he was added to…” (p. 12)

Due to being in the wrong place at the wrong time (an underground political meeting), Mannie and Mike get joined by two radical individuals: Professor de la Paz and Wyoming (Wyoh) Knott. They also become privy to the fact that Mike is a computer, and develop relationships with him/her. (Mike becomes Michelle to chat with Wyoh on the telephone.) This foursome – each hiding an aspect of themselves from Earth authorities – begin a revolution to set Loonies free.

The revolution is run as a cell operation, with each member only knowing the person s/he is reporting to, plus two cellmates. However, Free Luna needed a leader so the foursome, “decided that Mike should talk voice-to-voice to any comrade…in three dimensions, [to] create ‘Adam Selene, Chairman of the Provisional Committee for Free Luna’” (p 126) The political aspects of this book include anarchy, post-colonialism, neo-libertarianism, and militarism, ending in a rock throwing contest that you will have to read to believe.

This novel also provides in-depth details about the customs of Loonies. Some are fascinatingly complex, such as group marriages and line marriages. Describing his line marriage, Mannie states, “Our marriage is nearly a hundred years old. Dates back to Johnson City and the first transportees – twenty-one links, nine alive today, and never a divorce.” (p. 42) According to the setting, these polyamorous agreements are necessary because males outnumber the females two to one. Not only does Heinlein endorse these relationships, but describes them as stable and preferable in many aspects to monogamy.

Another Loonie moral is treating women like goddesses, for, “Women are scarce. Aren’t enough to go around – that makes them the most valuable thing in Luna, more precious than ice or air, as men without women don’t care if they stay alive or not.” (p. 164)

To me, “The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress” is a novel that challenges ‘normal’ ethics regarding politics, ethics, morals, and -- perhaps most importantly -- what it means to be ‘human.’ At the end of the book, we are faced with the question, “When will our revolution begin?” Yet in a way, just by this novel’s existence, it already has.