The Moon Is A Harsh Mistress - Critical Reception

Critical Reception

Leigh Kimmel of The Billion Light-Year Bookshelf says that the novel is "the work of the man at the height of his powers, confident in his abilities and in the editorial respect he enjoys, and thus free to take significant risks in writing a novel that would stretch the boundaries of the genre as they stood at the time." She characterizes the novel as a departure from what had previously been associated with science fiction. Kimmel cites Heinlein's “colloquial language..an extrapolated lunar creole that has arisen from the forced intersection of multiple cultures and languages in the lunar penal colonies”; the protagonist's disability; “the frank treatment of alternative family structures”; and “the computer which suddenly wakes up to full artificial intelligence, but rather than becoming a Monster that threatens human society and must be destroyed as the primary Quest of the story, instead befriends the protagonist and seeks to become ever more human, a sort of digital Pinocchio.”

Critic Adam Roberts said of the novel: “It is really quite hard to respond to this masterful book, except by engaging with its political content; and yet we need to make the effort to see past the ideological to the formal and thematic if we are fully to appreciate the splendour of Heinlein's achievement here.”

Andrew Kaufman praised it, saying that it was Heinlein's crowning achievement. He describes it as "Carefully plotted, stylistically unique, politically sophisticated and thrilling from page one." He goes on to say that "it’s hard to imagine anyone else writing a novel that packs so many ideas (both big and small) into such a perfectly contained narrative." Kaufman says that, regardless of political philosophies, one can still admire Heinlein's writing ability, and the ability to influence the reader to root for "a rag-tag bunch of criminals, exiles, and agitators."

Ted Gioia said that this might be Heinlein's most enjoyable piece of work. He says that it "represents Robert Heinlein at his finest, giving him scope for the armchair philosophizing that increasingly dominated his mature work, but marrying his polemics to a smartly conceived plot packed with considerable drama." He went on to praise Heinlein's characters, especially Mannie.