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The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress

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The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress

By: Robert A. Heinlein
Narrated by: Homer Todiwala
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In 2075, the Moon is no longer a penal colony. But it is still a prison...

Life isn't easy for the political dissidents and convicts who live in the scattered colonies that make up lunar civilisation. Everything is regulated strictly, efficiently and cheaply by a central supercomputer, HOLMES IV.

When humble technician Mannie O'Kelly-Davis discovers that HOLMES IV has quietly achieved consciousness (and developed a sense of humour), the choice is clear: either report the problem to the authorities... or become friends.

And perhaps overthrow the government while they're at it.

©2014 Robert A. Heinlein (P)2025 W.F. Howes Ltd. Adventure Classics Genre Fiction Political Science Fiction
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I read this book years ago, had a massive effect on my way of thinking, one of my favourite books of all time, Narrator is brilliant, story is very clever and thought provoking, love this.

Will listen to this over & over

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Some of the story is dated, but a lot of it holds up well. The narrator did the various voices and accents well, but mispronounced several words (it is not monty-video) and inserted punctuation/pauses in the wrong places ('tycho under' is a place name, not 'tycho, under..').

Wondered at one point if being narrated by modem day version of Mike.

An old classic on audio at long last

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One of my all time favourite books let down by narration. Characters accents were inconsistent, changing from one chapter to the next. Stupid mistakes in pronunciation were made. Some are excusable (lunar place names, for example), but others mistakes more central to the subject matter (e.g. ‘neutral’ network) made it seem like the narrator had no idea what the book was about.

Great story, poor narration

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Humanity as it could be.
Beautifully imagined and well narrated.
Brilliant.
First read in paperback many years ago. Probably the first book that I couldn't put down.

One of his best.

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When I started listening to this I was wondering what I had let myself in for, with a made up lunar accent & slang but I’m glad I persisted. It is astonishing that this is a mid 60s novel, considering AI (before it was even called that) and what it means for a computer to become “conscious”. I loved the treatment of the Moon as a penal colony with independence aspirations.

Brilliantly ahead of its time

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