Book Review: Hella by David Gerrold

Hella
by David Gerrold (Gerrold)

 

I had wildly mixed feelings about Hella by David Gerrold. On the one hand, it’s about planetary colonization in the second or third generation when the Earth colonists are still tenuously holding on, but they’re just getting confident enough to start engaging in open conflict among themselves. The planet is filled with plants and animal life in a way that feels like a dinosaur-era location, but weirder. If you’re the kind of science fiction reader who enjoys reading about humans vs. environment, you may also really dig the first half or so of this book. It does have an odd shift to being almost all about humans vs. humans after this and in a way that isn’t strongly connected with the first half, which other reviews haven’t liked. Personally, I didn’t mind but it’s a little messy in that way.

 

On the other hand, the author tried to add diversity in a way that ends up being worse than if he had written this the way he would have written it in the 90s. Specifically, the main character (and his brother and his mother) are all transgender. The main character is also autistic. The author is neither and seems to have “done his research” exclusively by reading outdated research papers. He is gay, however, so the gay bits are okay.

 

Overall, not something I’d recommend to everyone, but by now you probably know if this might be a good book for you. Yes, the book title is from the slang “hella” meaning “extremely”.

 

[If you enjoy this, you may also wish to try To Be Taught, If Fortunate by Becky Chambers.]

[ publisher’s official Hella web page ] | [ official David Gerrold web site ]

 

Recommended by Garren H.
Bennett Martin Public Library – Public Service

 

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