Hella

 


Hella
by
David Gerrold

3 Stars

Hella is an interesting story set sometime in the future of an earth colony living on a distant planet where everything is really big. But while the story is entertaining and the writing is good, it just didn’t grab me. It’s clearly a young adult book but isn’t billed that way at all that I can see. And there are some aspects of the book that I found particularly troubling. One other reviewer described Hella as having a “social structure that has evolved past where we are now in terms of gender and sexuality.” I’m not sure evolved is the word I would use though. In this world, people are able to change their gender back and forth at will, and they often do so when they are very young children. It seems to me that issues of gender identity are far deeper than wanting to be like an older sibling or wanting to pee standing up (which were the reasons for a very early-life gender change for the book’s hero). And by the end of the book the 13-year-old hero has moved in to live with his boyfriend. I’m troubled by that not by the fact that it’s his boyfriend but by the fact that he’s 13 years old and is engaged in a live-in sexual relationship.

3 very generous stars.

https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/48499839-hella

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