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Hell's Heart
Not yet published
Expected 17 Mar 26Hell's Heart is a queer speculative fiction retelling of Herman Melville's classic story.
Here, a small party go hunting for a giant space creature – and experience love and loss along the way.
Earth is a ruin, and the scattered remnants of humanity scavenge what they can from the stars. This under the watchful auspices of a grab-bag of collectives, corporations, and churches. These are all that remains of what we once called society. Having long exhausted any conventional sources of energy, life in the solar system is now sustained by a volatile, hallucinogenic substance – this harvested from the brains of vast cetacean-like Leviathans that swim the atmospheric currents of Jupiter.
Finding herself with no money and little to occupy her groundside, the narrator (“I”) takes a commission aboard the hunter-barque Pequod as it sets out in pursuit of these Leviathans. However, once aboard, she finds herself pulled inexorably into the orbit of the barque’s captain, a charismatic but fanatically driven woman who the narrator names only as 'A'. As the Pequod plunges ever deeper into the turbulent, monster-haunted atmosphere of the gas giant, the narrator begins to lose herself in the eerie world of Leviathan-hunting and the captain’s increasingly insistent delusions. The only thing that might keep her grounded is the bond she develops with Q, a woman from the wreck of Old Earth, whose skin is marked with holographic light and who remembers things others have lost.
A grand adventure is about to begin - one that will be strange, extraordinary and utterly unforgettable.
Here, a small party go hunting for a giant space creature – and experience love and loss along the way.
Earth is a ruin, and the scattered remnants of humanity scavenge what they can from the stars. This under the watchful auspices of a grab-bag of collectives, corporations, and churches. These are all that remains of what we once called society. Having long exhausted any conventional sources of energy, life in the solar system is now sustained by a volatile, hallucinogenic substance – this harvested from the brains of vast cetacean-like Leviathans that swim the atmospheric currents of Jupiter.
Finding herself with no money and little to occupy her groundside, the narrator (“I”) takes a commission aboard the hunter-barque Pequod as it sets out in pursuit of these Leviathans. However, once aboard, she finds herself pulled inexorably into the orbit of the barque’s captain, a charismatic but fanatically driven woman who the narrator names only as 'A'. As the Pequod plunges ever deeper into the turbulent, monster-haunted atmosphere of the gas giant, the narrator begins to lose herself in the eerie world of Leviathan-hunting and the captain’s increasingly insistent delusions. The only thing that might keep her grounded is the bond she develops with Q, a woman from the wreck of Old Earth, whose skin is marked with holographic light and who remembers things others have lost.
A grand adventure is about to begin - one that will be strange, extraordinary and utterly unforgettable.
Audible Audio
Expected publication March 10, 2026
26022 people want to read
About the author
Alexis Hall
62 books15.1k followersOne of those intricate British queers.
Please note: I don’t read / reply to DMs. If you would like to get in touch, the best way is via email which you can find in the contact section on my website <3
Please note: I don’t read / reply to DMs. If you would like to get in touch, the best way is via email which you can find in the contact section on my website <3
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 112 reviews
Review of advance copy received from Netgalley
Thank you to NetGalley and Tor for this e-ARC. Unfortunately, it’s going to be a soft dnf @ 30% (ch 25.) I say soft dnf because I was really looking forward to this book and might try the audiobook after release.
(( Update: the audiobook did not save it. Moby Dick isn’t exactly a fast paced book, but this is just…not good. I am incredibly disappointed. The characters aren’t just uninteresting, but are also incredibly annoying. The plot details are all shared though infodumps. The one positive I can give it is that it is giving the promised amount of sapphic, but in the worst possible way. ))
I do not like this main character. Moreover, I feel like I’ve read this same exact character a million times and I haven’t enjoyed it once. She genuinely has zero personality outside of attempts at quirky, wry humor and sex. Not that actual Moby Dick is a fast paced novel, but I am 25 chapters in and nothing has happened. You’re writing sapphic Moby Dick in space? Slay that’s all I want, but by chapter 25 I had better care about the characters or the setting enough to want to hold out for the plot. I genuinely do not care about any of these people except maybe Q, and even then, she’s just not enough to keep me going. I cannot handle another almost 300 pages of tongue-in-cheek humor that repeatedly misses paired with insane info dumps. Don’t get me excited about a Gideon the Ninth comp if you’re not going to give me Gideon the Ninth quality I’m not emotionally stable enough for that with the Alecto release nowhere in sight.
(( Update: the audiobook did not save it. Moby Dick isn’t exactly a fast paced book, but this is just…not good. I am incredibly disappointed. The characters aren’t just uninteresting, but are also incredibly annoying. The plot details are all shared though infodumps. The one positive I can give it is that it is giving the promised amount of sapphic, but in the worst possible way. ))
I do not like this main character. Moreover, I feel like I’ve read this same exact character a million times and I haven’t enjoyed it once. She genuinely has zero personality outside of attempts at quirky, wry humor and sex. Not that actual Moby Dick is a fast paced novel, but I am 25 chapters in and nothing has happened. You’re writing sapphic Moby Dick in space? Slay that’s all I want, but by chapter 25 I had better care about the characters or the setting enough to want to hold out for the plot. I genuinely do not care about any of these people except maybe Q, and even then, she’s just not enough to keep me going. I cannot handle another almost 300 pages of tongue-in-cheek humor that repeatedly misses paired with insane info dumps. Don’t get me excited about a Gideon the Ninth comp if you’re not going to give me Gideon the Ninth quality I’m not emotionally stable enough for that with the Alecto release nowhere in sight.
did-not-finish
January 11, 2026DNF @ 21%: This is all over the place, random women keep fingering her and I can't be bothered reading infodumps about whales. I'm literally so bored.
Currently reading
September 23, 2025A pub assistant reached out to ME about reading an ARC of this book and I have never felt so special in my WHOLE LIFE.
Read
February 7, 2026PSA: This👏Book👏Is👏Horny👏
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I've never read it, but the narrator in this is so horny that I fully forgot for the first 30% or so that this is a Moby Dick retelling.
...unless Moby Dick has always been really raunchy? lol I assumed not but I could be wrong.
4/5
The Writing:
This book is mostly written in first person, but isn't averse to breaking the fourth wall and addressing the reader directly with some frequency. As the book itself puts it, it's full of "weird chronality and constant digressions," and I imagine that that style of writing could be quite off-putting to some readers.
Also I just really cannot underscore the horniness here. If there's someone introduced to the story and they have 2 or fewer legs, odds are the narrator has already or will want to bed them. I didn't find the sex scenes to be overly titillating like an erotica? But their mentions are copious.
The Queerness:
I believe the narrator refers to themself as a young boy but as a woman now, and they make several references to overhauling their physicality such as: "this body is basically a rental anyway." So I'm fairly certain they're a transwoman and predominantly entering sexual relationships with women? I don't recall if the text is explicit or just heavily inferred (gender and sexuality are a spectrum, but at the very least the text is incredibly, incredibly queer).
The World-Building (Religion/Enterprise):
My favourite part of this novel were the little world-building nuggets that were never in the forefront of the story, but always building a bigger picture in the background. In particular I found it really entertaining the way that the fervent Christian dogma of modern America might be spun if its only progenitors were the ultra wealthy who destroyed and fled Earth then convinced themselves of their righteousness. I'm mostly saving these quotes so I can look back on them myself, but also I know some of my friends will be put off by the sex in this novel and might want to see this tiny slice all the same.
Overall:
This book was a lot but I appreciated that it was voicey and had something to say. I find the Classics very dull and difficult to get immersed in, so this was probably my only shot at ever engaging with Moby Dick and I think it's pretty neat that this exists.
Audiobook Notes:
I thoroughly enjoyed the narrator and their decisions throughout the entire novel. Very clear quality and distinct voices, too.
Thank you to NetGalley and Macmillan Audio for granting me an audio ARC. All thoughts and opinions are my own.
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I've never read it, but the narrator in this is so horny that I fully forgot for the first 30% or so that this is a Moby Dick retelling.
...unless Moby Dick has always been really raunchy? lol I assumed not but I could be wrong.
"As you might've worked out by now I'm an erotic, chaotic slut with so many issues I could write an allegorical novel about them."
4/5
The Writing:
This book is mostly written in first person, but isn't averse to breaking the fourth wall and addressing the reader directly with some frequency. As the book itself puts it, it's full of "weird chronality and constant digressions," and I imagine that that style of writing could be quite off-putting to some readers.
Also I just really cannot underscore the horniness here. If there's someone introduced to the story and they have 2 or fewer legs, odds are the narrator has already or will want to bed them. I didn't find the sex scenes to be overly titillating like an erotica? But their mentions are copious.
The Queerness:
I believe the narrator refers to themself as a young boy but as a woman now, and they make several references to overhauling their physicality such as: "this body is basically a rental anyway." So I'm fairly certain they're a transwoman and predominantly entering sexual relationships with women? I don't recall if the text is explicit or just heavily inferred (gender and sexuality are a spectrum, but at the very least the text is incredibly, incredibly queer).
The World-Building (Religion/Enterprise):
My favourite part of this novel were the little world-building nuggets that were never in the forefront of the story, but always building a bigger picture in the background. In particular I found it really entertaining the way that the fervent Christian dogma of modern America might be spun if its only progenitors were the ultra wealthy who destroyed and fled Earth then convinced themselves of their righteousness. I'm mostly saving these quotes so I can look back on them myself, but also I know some of my friends will be put off by the sex in this novel and might want to see this tiny slice all the same.
Overall:
This book was a lot but I appreciated that it was voicey and had something to say. I find the Classics very dull and difficult to get immersed in, so this was probably my only shot at ever engaging with Moby Dick and I think it's pretty neat that this exists.
Audiobook Notes:
I thoroughly enjoyed the narrator and their decisions throughout the entire novel. Very clear quality and distinct voices, too.
Thank you to NetGalley and Macmillan Audio for granting me an audio ARC. All thoughts and opinions are my own.
Want to read
July 3, 2025 “Gideon the Ninth meets Murderbot”????
Well, I mean, flamin' sign me up!
Well, I mean, flamin' sign me up!
February 1, 2026
Hell’s Heart by Alexis Hall is a queer space opera retelling of Moby Dick. The narrator, named I, boards a Leviathan-hunting spaceship captained by A and spends most of the book fucking around, both metaphorically and literally, with A and a Latin-speaking harpoonist from Earth named Q. The whole thing feels like it started with learning about sperm whales, realizing Moby Dick is about a whale, making the extremely obvious “Moby DICK / SPERM whale” connection, and deciding to make it sapphic with a side of cosmic horror.
I’ve seen a lot of people say they DNF’d this book, and honestly, I get it. The book never quite decides what it wants to be. It’s written like a memoir, sometimes talks directly to the reader, and moves at a painfully slow pace. The main character is a self-proclaimed intellectual trying to show off and fuck constantly (in short, obnoxiously unlikable), the sex scenes are constant and repetitive (I gets fingered by women she barely knows every five minutes), and the narrator seems to assume the reader is here for sex stuff exclusively. I wasn’t.
Q speaking only in Latin was another thing that wore me down. I get what the author was going for, but it was distracting and annoying. Even when I understood the Latin, I kept thinking: why am I being made to work this hard for a character I don’t care about? She never said anything interesting. Though, to be fair, I don’t think any of the characters ever said anything interesting 🤷♀️ The choppy, uninteresting narration is sort of explained at the end by the narrator saying she didn’t get the implants/alterations to be eloquent and this can work for a novella but this was a long book packed with irrelevant nonsense.
I can see what the book was trying to be, and I don’t think it’s bad, but the execution is terrible. The plot makes sense, and there are tense moments here and there. I just didn’t care about the characters at all. I and A never grew on me, and Q never became more than a gimmick. The characters had no growth throughout the book and seemed to be only there to move the plot forward and have sex, which made it all unexciting and uninteresting after a while. On top of that, there are frequent info dumps about whales and world-building details that only matter for whatever scene is happening at the time. The constant and repetitive sex stuff made the narrator feel very immature. Like, they’re hunting a Leviathan. Why is she making allegories about dildos? Every time I got immersed in the story, the writing would switch tone and start talking about sex stuff that had nothing to do with anything, and I’d stop caring about the scene. Like, we’re hunting a Leviathan and the narrator’s like, “you can skip the next two chapters to get back to the sex stuff,” keeps offering to have sex with people and being like “your loss” if they refuse, sexualizes people and puts forward fantasies constantly “as a defense mechanism,” points out that the ship had many officers and that an officer “is someone else that needs doing,” and speaks about the doctor only at the end of the book because, even though the main character visited him often for issues with the implants, they didn’t fuck, so the doctor wasn’t relevant. It was all a waste of words that cheapened the story. This was obviously intended by the author, but it didn’t work for me at all.
You’d think I’d enjoy a book that mentions Ganymede every five pages. Somehow, I still found it boring. The alien religion stuff from the early chapters was far more interesting to me than all the sperm whale material we got afterwards. All in all, I just think this book tried to be a humorous space opera, queer smut, a philosophical memoir, a retelling, and an adventure cosmic horror thing, and I’m sad to say it was all mediocre and didn’t mix well for me. I hope other readers will find some joy in it, but it was an annoying read for me with a lackluster ending.
ARC received for free. This hasn’t impacted my rating.
I’ve seen a lot of people say they DNF’d this book, and honestly, I get it. The book never quite decides what it wants to be. It’s written like a memoir, sometimes talks directly to the reader, and moves at a painfully slow pace. The main character is a self-proclaimed intellectual trying to show off and fuck constantly (in short, obnoxiously unlikable), the sex scenes are constant and repetitive (I gets fingered by women she barely knows every five minutes), and the narrator seems to assume the reader is here for sex stuff exclusively. I wasn’t.
Q speaking only in Latin was another thing that wore me down. I get what the author was going for, but it was distracting and annoying. Even when I understood the Latin, I kept thinking: why am I being made to work this hard for a character I don’t care about? She never said anything interesting. Though, to be fair, I don’t think any of the characters ever said anything interesting 🤷♀️ The choppy, uninteresting narration is sort of explained at the end by the narrator saying she didn’t get the implants/alterations to be eloquent and this can work for a novella but this was a long book packed with irrelevant nonsense.
I can see what the book was trying to be, and I don’t think it’s bad, but the execution is terrible. The plot makes sense, and there are tense moments here and there. I just didn’t care about the characters at all. I and A never grew on me, and Q never became more than a gimmick. The characters had no growth throughout the book and seemed to be only there to move the plot forward and have sex, which made it all unexciting and uninteresting after a while. On top of that, there are frequent info dumps about whales and world-building details that only matter for whatever scene is happening at the time. The constant and repetitive sex stuff made the narrator feel very immature. Like, they’re hunting a Leviathan. Why is she making allegories about dildos? Every time I got immersed in the story, the writing would switch tone and start talking about sex stuff that had nothing to do with anything, and I’d stop caring about the scene. Like, we’re hunting a Leviathan and the narrator’s like, “you can skip the next two chapters to get back to the sex stuff,” keeps offering to have sex with people and being like “your loss” if they refuse, sexualizes people and puts forward fantasies constantly “as a defense mechanism,” points out that the ship had many officers and that an officer “is someone else that needs doing,” and speaks about the doctor only at the end of the book because, even though the main character visited him often for issues with the implants, they didn’t fuck, so the doctor wasn’t relevant. It was all a waste of words that cheapened the story. This was obviously intended by the author, but it didn’t work for me at all.
You’d think I’d enjoy a book that mentions Ganymede every five pages. Somehow, I still found it boring. The alien religion stuff from the early chapters was far more interesting to me than all the sperm whale material we got afterwards. All in all, I just think this book tried to be a humorous space opera, queer smut, a philosophical memoir, a retelling, and an adventure cosmic horror thing, and I’m sad to say it was all mediocre and didn’t mix well for me. I hope other readers will find some joy in it, but it was an annoying read for me with a lackluster ending.
ARC received for free. This hasn’t impacted my rating.
September 4, 2025
Hell’s Heart wants to be a lot of things a space-faring fever dream, a queered-up Moby Dick, a poetic meditation on obsession and survival. And maybe it is, in a way. But mostly, for me, it felt like being stuck in a long, winding conversation with someone who loves the sound of their own voice.
There’s a ship. There’s space. There’s ruin. There’s a narrator who watches everything and feels very little until suddenly she’s supposed to feel everything. I kept waiting to be pulled in. To feel the weight of Jupiter’s storms in my chest. But all I found were words. So many words. Describing, explaining, telling. Never quite letting me breathe.
I wanted to care. I really did. But caring requires connection, and this book never stopped long enough to make one.
I suppose some people will find it brilliant. I wanted to like it. I just found it exhausting. Thank you to the publisher and author for this ARC.
There’s a ship. There’s space. There’s ruin. There’s a narrator who watches everything and feels very little until suddenly she’s supposed to feel everything. I kept waiting to be pulled in. To feel the weight of Jupiter’s storms in my chest. But all I found were words. So many words. Describing, explaining, telling. Never quite letting me breathe.
I wanted to care. I really did. But caring requires connection, and this book never stopped long enough to make one.
I suppose some people will find it brilliant. I wanted to like it. I just found it exhausting. Thank you to the publisher and author for this ARC.
Want to read
February 22, 2025This still doesn't sound like a real thing that's happening to me.
January 20, 2026
This was so epic; a sapphic sci-fi retelling of Moby Dick, with plenty of gore, drama, smushing in space and interstellar battles.
The storytelling in this one is pretty unique; it’s written in first person, but our narrator, known only as ‘I’, is narrating directly to the reader, which means we get a lot of asides and reminiscing. But it was very engaging and I think reflects the original story really well.
The crew of the ship was varied and fascinating. I enjoyed Q, I’s main love interest, who speaks entirely in Latin, and the assorted crew members who start as casually religious folks and descend rapidly into a cult that worships face-eating leopards. Or something. It’s an allegory.
I was a really engaging narrator. She’s cowardly, chaotic and completely unreliable. She just wants to be loved, but due to religious trauma, doesn’t feel like she deserves it. I also think she’s trans… but if anyone else reads this and has thoughts, I’d love to discuss it! She’s on the run as she’s had her whole body reconfigured (ie. hands being made smaller, limbs reshaped) and she cannot pay the big pharma company’s bills, hence her joining the doomed quest to hunt the Mobuis Beast. I adored her and her absolute devotion to getting laid, no matter the circumstances.
The whole book explores religion and capitalism and how they are intertwined. I loved how some of the characters (Captain, Marsh) speak in ‘old timey’ language that reminds the reader that this is a retelling of an old work. Then there is Locke, who speaks almost entirely in corporate jargon. It’s such a fun dichotomy.
Overall a chaotic read but one that I really enjoyed; perfect for queer sci-fi enthusiasts and those who want to shake their heads and roll their eyes at religion and capitalism simultaneously.
Read Hells Heart for:
✨ Sapphic Moby Dick retelling in space
✨ Speculative fiction
✨ Unreliable narrator
✨ Fictional memoir
✨ Trans MC (at least in my interpretation)
✨ Is it a religion, or a cult?
✨ So many sperm jokes. So many.
Thank you so much Tor Books for a physical proof of this book! It’s available on 12th March 2026 ✨
The storytelling in this one is pretty unique; it’s written in first person, but our narrator, known only as ‘I’, is narrating directly to the reader, which means we get a lot of asides and reminiscing. But it was very engaging and I think reflects the original story really well.
The crew of the ship was varied and fascinating. I enjoyed Q, I’s main love interest, who speaks entirely in Latin, and the assorted crew members who start as casually religious folks and descend rapidly into a cult that worships face-eating leopards. Or something. It’s an allegory.
I was a really engaging narrator. She’s cowardly, chaotic and completely unreliable. She just wants to be loved, but due to religious trauma, doesn’t feel like she deserves it. I also think she’s trans… but if anyone else reads this and has thoughts, I’d love to discuss it! She’s on the run as she’s had her whole body reconfigured (ie. hands being made smaller, limbs reshaped) and she cannot pay the big pharma company’s bills, hence her joining the doomed quest to hunt the Mobuis Beast. I adored her and her absolute devotion to getting laid, no matter the circumstances.
The whole book explores religion and capitalism and how they are intertwined. I loved how some of the characters (Captain, Marsh) speak in ‘old timey’ language that reminds the reader that this is a retelling of an old work. Then there is Locke, who speaks almost entirely in corporate jargon. It’s such a fun dichotomy.
Overall a chaotic read but one that I really enjoyed; perfect for queer sci-fi enthusiasts and those who want to shake their heads and roll their eyes at religion and capitalism simultaneously.
Read Hells Heart for:
✨ Sapphic Moby Dick retelling in space
✨ Speculative fiction
✨ Unreliable narrator
✨ Fictional memoir
✨ Trans MC (at least in my interpretation)
✨ Is it a religion, or a cult?
✨ So many sperm jokes. So many.
Thank you so much Tor Books for a physical proof of this book! It’s available on 12th March 2026 ✨
Read
January 7, 2026
Book Riot’s Most Anticipated Books of 2026:
If Sky Daddy was 2025's unhinged take on Moby-Dick, Hell's Heart is 2026's. Given that Moby-Dick is my favorite book of all time, I am always eager to read anything that claims it as an influence. This spacefaring version follows the narrator I in pursuit of spermaceti, a hallucinogen produced by Leviathans swimming in Jupiter's currents. With women cast in the roles of Ishmael, Ahab, and Queequeg, this book promises a story even more queer than the original, and that's saying something. —Isabelle Popp
If Sky Daddy was 2025's unhinged take on Moby-Dick, Hell's Heart is 2026's. Given that Moby-Dick is my favorite book of all time, I am always eager to read anything that claims it as an influence. This spacefaring version follows the narrator I in pursuit of spermaceti, a hallucinogen produced by Leviathans swimming in Jupiter's currents. With women cast in the roles of Ishmael, Ahab, and Queequeg, this book promises a story even more queer than the original, and that's saying something. —Isabelle Popp
September 21, 2025
I received a free copy from Tor Books via Netgalley in exchange for a fair review. Publish date March 10th, 2026.
I've been a longtime fan of Alexis Hall's, and I was interested to see what he'd do in his science fiction debut. In Hell's Heart, aimless and self-destructive I- signs on a space whaling voyage in order to flee her merciless medical creditors, who own her body and soul. In this retelling of Moby Dick, she begins to realize that their charismatically deranged captain is hell-bent at hunting down the leviathan who injured her--even at the cost of her life and the lives of the entire crew.
Well! As someone who's familiar with Herman Melville's Moby Dick, I should not have been surprised that the lesbians in space retelling had a pace as slow as molasses, interspersed with endless and aimless asides to the reader. Because I- states directly how the book ends from very early on, the four hundred plus pages of boat antics and Leviathan slayings feel like mere filler before the ultimate end. The effect is exacerbated by narrator I-, who is passive, depressed, and has a very detached perspective that makes the narration feel distant. I know many of you like your women soggy and pathetic, but personally I prefer the aggressively digging themselves deeper into a hole type rather than the facedown on the floor type.
By far the strongest point of the novel was the worldbuilding. Since the original novel was set midway through the process of driving whales nearly to extinction in the Atlantic, it's fitting that the retelling is also set in a capitalistic hellscape, albeit one set in a retro-style Solar System limited space future. While I- has mostly left the awful religion she was brought in (a grotesquerie of a certain type of prosperity Christianity), she accepts the values her culture presents her without much question, and drops the awful little details as casual little asides. Onboard the ship, shower minutes are billed and taken directly out of their wages. I's surgery (implied to be gender-affirming) puts her in debt to a pharma-corp conglomerate, and if she misses a payment, they can repossess her organs. People can be sold into debt-slavery for the crime of inheriting a patented gene complex. And so on and so forth. It's a fitting accompaniment to the grim plot.
Overall, Hell's Heart is a throwback to Hall's complex early steampunk novels rather than his frivolous recent historicals. It certainly isn't a romance novel--while I- has unhappy escapist sex with a number of women, there's no romance and nothing I'd consider a full sex scene. However, I did enjoy I-'s crewmate and sometimes-lover Q-. Q- is from Earth, speaks nearly exclusively in untranslated Latin in the text, and has a sort of smartphone reference device that I- doesn't understand and refers to as her "idol". Alas, Q- is almost entirely opaque to I-, who doesn't really understand her, and therefore to the reader as well.
There's some fantastic details here, but not much substance. I think this would have been a much stronger work chopped down into a novella..
I've been a longtime fan of Alexis Hall's, and I was interested to see what he'd do in his science fiction debut. In Hell's Heart, aimless and self-destructive I- signs on a space whaling voyage in order to flee her merciless medical creditors, who own her body and soul. In this retelling of Moby Dick, she begins to realize that their charismatically deranged captain is hell-bent at hunting down the leviathan who injured her--even at the cost of her life and the lives of the entire crew.
Well! As someone who's familiar with Herman Melville's Moby Dick, I should not have been surprised that the lesbians in space retelling had a pace as slow as molasses, interspersed with endless and aimless asides to the reader. Because I- states directly how the book ends from very early on, the four hundred plus pages of boat antics and Leviathan slayings feel like mere filler before the ultimate end. The effect is exacerbated by narrator I-, who is passive, depressed, and has a very detached perspective that makes the narration feel distant. I know many of you like your women soggy and pathetic, but personally I prefer the aggressively digging themselves deeper into a hole type rather than the facedown on the floor type.
By far the strongest point of the novel was the worldbuilding. Since the original novel was set midway through the process of driving whales nearly to extinction in the Atlantic, it's fitting that the retelling is also set in a capitalistic hellscape, albeit one set in a retro-style Solar System limited space future. While I- has mostly left the awful religion she was brought in (a grotesquerie of a certain type of prosperity Christianity), she accepts the values her culture presents her without much question, and drops the awful little details as casual little asides. Onboard the ship, shower minutes are billed and taken directly out of their wages. I's surgery (implied to be gender-affirming) puts her in debt to a pharma-corp conglomerate, and if she misses a payment, they can repossess her organs. People can be sold into debt-slavery for the crime of inheriting a patented gene complex. And so on and so forth. It's a fitting accompaniment to the grim plot.
Overall, Hell's Heart is a throwback to Hall's complex early steampunk novels rather than his frivolous recent historicals. It certainly isn't a romance novel--while I- has unhappy escapist sex with a number of women, there's no romance and nothing I'd consider a full sex scene. However, I did enjoy I-'s crewmate and sometimes-lover Q-. Q- is from Earth, speaks nearly exclusively in untranslated Latin in the text, and has a sort of smartphone reference device that I- doesn't understand and refers to as her "idol". Alas, Q- is almost entirely opaque to I-, who doesn't really understand her, and therefore to the reader as well.
There's some fantastic details here, but not much substance. I think this would have been a much stronger work chopped down into a novella..
Want to read
January 2, 2026Oh my god, this is where I deploy the I am seated. I am so seated that I've cuffed myself to the chair, swallowed the key (not looking forward to digesting it!) and nobody can remove me from the premises under threat of law!
February 1, 2026
Received from NetGalley, thanks!
Okay, this book was absolutely fucking brilliant. This was Alexis Hall being *the most* Alexis Hall.
I made sure to read Moby Dick before diving into this, and I’m really glad that I did. It’s certainly not necessary, I think that anyone would enjoy this regardless. But having read the source material, I was able to pick up on all of the little nods made to the original, as well as when the original is being lovingly made fun of.
I adored our narrator, she is funny and cynical and horny and an amazing narrator. I was also lucky enough to listen to an audio ARC, and Charlie Anne Delores was so very good.
I’m not sure what else to say. I just really really loved this book and can’t wait until it’s out in the world for everyone else to read!
Okay, this book was absolutely fucking brilliant. This was Alexis Hall being *the most* Alexis Hall.
I made sure to read Moby Dick before diving into this, and I’m really glad that I did. It’s certainly not necessary, I think that anyone would enjoy this regardless. But having read the source material, I was able to pick up on all of the little nods made to the original, as well as when the original is being lovingly made fun of.
I adored our narrator, she is funny and cynical and horny and an amazing narrator. I was also lucky enough to listen to an audio ARC, and Charlie Anne Delores was so very good.
I’m not sure what else to say. I just really really loved this book and can’t wait until it’s out in the world for everyone else to read!
Review of advance copy received from Netgalley
Thank you to Netgalley and the publishers for the e-ARC of this book in exchange for my honest review.
I picked this book up purely based on the description "a lesbian retelling of Moby Dick in space" so I had very little idea really of what to expect and somehow this book was still so much more than I expected.
It's one of those books that I absolutely adored reading and I can't even really put into words why, I just had a great time every time I picked it up, and I was constantly desperate to get back to it whenever I put it down. It manages to be both irreverent and profound, witty and emotional, at times cutting and at times devastating.
It follows a nameless main character on a space voyage to hunt monstrous leviathans that are killed and harvested for their brain fluid (spermaceti), which is used as a form of power. On board are a whole cast of characters, the main important ones being the captain, A, and our main character's bunkmate, Q, both of whom she is in some form of a relationship with. Like the original Moby Dick, the plot is meandering and slow, but the journey is still so compelling and along the way manages to make scathing points about religion, AI, society, and humanity, as well as relentless sperm jokes throughout.
Overall it was a delightful, thought-provoking fever dream, unlike pretty much anything else I've ever read.
I picked this book up purely based on the description "a lesbian retelling of Moby Dick in space" so I had very little idea really of what to expect and somehow this book was still so much more than I expected.
It's one of those books that I absolutely adored reading and I can't even really put into words why, I just had a great time every time I picked it up, and I was constantly desperate to get back to it whenever I put it down. It manages to be both irreverent and profound, witty and emotional, at times cutting and at times devastating.
It follows a nameless main character on a space voyage to hunt monstrous leviathans that are killed and harvested for their brain fluid (spermaceti), which is used as a form of power. On board are a whole cast of characters, the main important ones being the captain, A, and our main character's bunkmate, Q, both of whom she is in some form of a relationship with. Like the original Moby Dick, the plot is meandering and slow, but the journey is still so compelling and along the way manages to make scathing points about religion, AI, society, and humanity, as well as relentless sperm jokes throughout.
Overall it was a delightful, thought-provoking fever dream, unlike pretty much anything else I've ever read.
Read
December 19, 2025The sky itself will remember our names.
4.5 stars rounded up because it's Alexis Hall.
Honestly, I don't really know what more I can say to convince anyone to pick this up. If the cover and "SAPPHIC MOBY DICK IN SPACE" doesn't convince you to immediately drop everything and read this book, I don't know what will. Also, "sapphic Moby Dick in space" kinda tells you everything. It's Moby Dick. In space. With lots of queerness.
For those who already love Alexis Hall, you know what to expect: it's irreverent, fun, sarcastic, and will make you feel things at unexpected moments. There are lovely shiny moments were the narrator (Call her... whatever) muses on the logic behind hunting beautiful beasts so you can take them apart, religion and how it is used (and abused). Yes, sometimes they go off on tangents (which they freely admit early on) and ramble a bit but let's be honest: it's Moby Dick in space, if you didn't expect that then. Well...
And one last time: it's sapphic Moby Dick in space! Enjoy.
*I received an ARC from the publisher via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review*
4.5 stars rounded up because it's Alexis Hall.
Honestly, I don't really know what more I can say to convince anyone to pick this up. If the cover and "SAPPHIC MOBY DICK IN SPACE" doesn't convince you to immediately drop everything and read this book, I don't know what will. Also, "sapphic Moby Dick in space" kinda tells you everything. It's Moby Dick. In space. With lots of queerness.
For those who already love Alexis Hall, you know what to expect: it's irreverent, fun, sarcastic, and will make you feel things at unexpected moments. There are lovely shiny moments were the narrator (Call her... whatever) muses on the logic behind hunting beautiful beasts so you can take them apart, religion and how it is used (and abused). Yes, sometimes they go off on tangents (which they freely admit early on) and ramble a bit but let's be honest: it's Moby Dick in space, if you didn't expect that then. Well...
And one last time: it's sapphic Moby Dick in space! Enjoy.
*I received an ARC from the publisher via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review*
February 13, 2026
I was genuinely really looking forward to this book, which makes the disappointment hit even harder. Unfortunately, it just didn’t work for me. I couldn’t connect with the characters at all, the storyline failed to keep my interest, and the overall execution felt weak. On top of that, the humor came across as unnecessary and immature, pulling me out of the story rather than adding anything to it. Sadly, this one missed the mark for me.
September 21, 2025
I’ve never read Moby Dick but thought the idea of lesbians in space sounding fun. This was not that for me. It felt like it took me forever to read and I was never really sucked in.
The writing is well done. The worldbuilding was great. It was very easy to imagine this world and there’s so much information provided. I found all of the churches, religions and cultures mentioned to be interesting. As well as the leviathans themselves.
It does pick up at the end but that wasn’t enough for me. Overall I just don’t think this was for me. But if you’re a fan of the author or just wanna read Moby Dick in space then I would definitely give this a shot! Thank you to the publisher and NetGalley for the ARC!
The writing is well done. The worldbuilding was great. It was very easy to imagine this world and there’s so much information provided. I found all of the churches, religions and cultures mentioned to be interesting. As well as the leviathans themselves.
It does pick up at the end but that wasn’t enough for me. Overall I just don’t think this was for me. But if you’re a fan of the author or just wanna read Moby Dick in space then I would definitely give this a shot! Thank you to the publisher and NetGalley for the ARC!
Review of advance copy received from Netgalley
“Space whales, obsession, and a journey that’s more about the ride than the destination.”
🗓 𝗣𝘂𝗯𝗹𝗶𝗰𝗮𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻 𝗗𝗮𝘁𝗲: March 12, 2026
📚 𝗕𝗼𝗼𝗸 𝗧𝗶𝘁𝗹𝗲: Hell’s Heart
👑 𝗔𝘂𝘁𝗵𝗼𝗿: Alexis Hall
✨ 𝗤𝘂𝗶𝗰𝗸 𝗦𝘂𝗺𝗺𝗮𝗿𝘆 & 🍵 𝗧𝗲𝗮 𝗧𝗼𝘂𝗴𝗵𝘁𝘀
In a future where Earth is gone, humanity survives by hunting massive Leviathans drifting through Jupiter’s atmosphere. The narrator signs onto the ship Pequod and gets swept into a voyage led by a captain driven by obsession and purpose. There is a tight crew, strange cosmic scenery, and a hunt that slowly becomes more personal than practical. It is a sci-fi retelling of a classic story, focused on atmosphere, reflection, and the cost of devotion.
I liked this book, though I had mixed feelings along the way. The worldbuilding is creative and the concept is genuinely cool, but the pacing drifts and some sections feel longer than they need to be. A few character moments hit well, while others felt a bit distant, so I was not always fully emotionally invested. The writing style is engaging, yet occasionally leans too heavy on introspection instead of forward motion. It kept my interest, but not enough to make me want a reread. Still, it is a decent sci-fi adventure and a solid time passer.
🫶 Thank you to @panmacmillan for this gifted copy!
🚀 Spacefaring adventure
🐋 Leviathan hunting
🤝 Crew dynamics
🌌 Expansive sci-fi setting
📖 Slow unfolding journey
✨ Retelling inspiration
🗓 𝗣𝘂𝗯𝗹𝗶𝗰𝗮𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻 𝗗𝗮𝘁𝗲: March 12, 2026
📚 𝗕𝗼𝗼𝗸 𝗧𝗶𝘁𝗹𝗲: Hell’s Heart
👑 𝗔𝘂𝘁𝗵𝗼𝗿: Alexis Hall
✨ 𝗤𝘂𝗶𝗰𝗸 𝗦𝘂𝗺𝗺𝗮𝗿𝘆 & 🍵 𝗧𝗲𝗮 𝗧𝗼𝘂𝗴𝗵𝘁𝘀
In a future where Earth is gone, humanity survives by hunting massive Leviathans drifting through Jupiter’s atmosphere. The narrator signs onto the ship Pequod and gets swept into a voyage led by a captain driven by obsession and purpose. There is a tight crew, strange cosmic scenery, and a hunt that slowly becomes more personal than practical. It is a sci-fi retelling of a classic story, focused on atmosphere, reflection, and the cost of devotion.
I liked this book, though I had mixed feelings along the way. The worldbuilding is creative and the concept is genuinely cool, but the pacing drifts and some sections feel longer than they need to be. A few character moments hit well, while others felt a bit distant, so I was not always fully emotionally invested. The writing style is engaging, yet occasionally leans too heavy on introspection instead of forward motion. It kept my interest, but not enough to make me want a reread. Still, it is a decent sci-fi adventure and a solid time passer.
🫶 Thank you to @panmacmillan for this gifted copy!
🚀 Spacefaring adventure
🐋 Leviathan hunting
🤝 Crew dynamics
🌌 Expansive sci-fi setting
📖 Slow unfolding journey
✨ Retelling inspiration
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
January 31, 2026
Well…that just happened.
This book will definitely stay with me for some time. Was it good? No…but it was weird enough to be memorable.
This is a Sci-fi retelling of Moby Dick. Right down to the recycling of the sperm whale in Moby Dick into this universe’s leviathan. The “sperm” is the liquid they harvest from the beasts to power their cities. The sperm joke wasn’t funny a single time, and it was made countless times.
It felt like the goal was to make this universe sexually accepting and fluid, but the writing made any sex scene feel kind of cold and isolating. “I” has some major daddy issues and uses sex to mask boredom and their inadequacies. The sex they are having felt very one sided and often kind of violent.
Finally, the way the main character was described, by herself as the book was written like a journal, was confusing. She hints at medical procedures but never says what she had done. I assume she is a trans woman, but you’d think after reading the whole book, I’d actually know that for sure. The writing was so jumbled that I felt like I don’t have a clear vision of my protagonist which distanced me from the story.
This book will definitely stay with me for some time. Was it good? No…but it was weird enough to be memorable.
This is a Sci-fi retelling of Moby Dick. Right down to the recycling of the sperm whale in Moby Dick into this universe’s leviathan. The “sperm” is the liquid they harvest from the beasts to power their cities. The sperm joke wasn’t funny a single time, and it was made countless times.
It felt like the goal was to make this universe sexually accepting and fluid, but the writing made any sex scene feel kind of cold and isolating. “I” has some major daddy issues and uses sex to mask boredom and their inadequacies. The sex they are having felt very one sided and often kind of violent.
Finally, the way the main character was described, by herself as the book was written like a journal, was confusing. She hints at medical procedures but never says what she had done. I assume she is a trans woman, but you’d think after reading the whole book, I’d actually know that for sure. The writing was so jumbled that I felt like I don’t have a clear vision of my protagonist which distanced me from the story.
December 24, 2025
(3.5) An astronomical retelling of Moby Dick! Hell’s Heart takes a long-time classic and sets it in the swirling depths of the cosmos, among the budding madness of a revenge-driven captain and the frenetic energy of a crew who just wants to kill leviathans. I loved the often philosophical narration and how real the extra-planetary surroundings of the setting felt, from religions based on the eventual consumption of the universe to pharma companies who extract perpetual payments on the limbs they replace. I’ve personally never read Moby Dick, but I think if you’re a fan this will be huge for you.
I was caught off guard by the abruptness of the ending and the way the plot meandered in the last third of the book, but I think that may be a problem with Herman Melville and not Alexis Hall. The first 50% of the book was some of the best stuff I’ve read all year!
I was caught off guard by the abruptness of the ending and the way the plot meandered in the last third of the book, but I think that may be a problem with Herman Melville and not Alexis Hall. The first 50% of the book was some of the best stuff I’ve read all year!
September 2, 2025
This took me longer than I thought it would to read but that’s because it reads like Moby dick: long, meandering, weird, horny, sad, silly.
It’s not a line for line rewrite but it feels not far off. It hits all the major beats of the story the minor ones too. The story translates really well to space and sad horny lesbians. I had a great time and probably need to re read Moby Dick again!
It’s not a line for line rewrite but it feels not far off. It hits all the major beats of the story the minor ones too. The story translates really well to space and sad horny lesbians. I had a great time and probably need to re read Moby Dick again!
February 1, 2026
This prolific author turns her hand to sci-fi, and the result is a very funny, suspenseful, and successful novel.
The narrator signs up to work on the Pequod, a space-faring ship that travels around Jupiter hunting leviathans for their bodily fluids (ok, their spermicide), not unlike old whaling ships did on Earth for their blubber and ambergris. The narrator is continuously horny and manages to hook up with even the most unlikely of shipmates. The sex isn’t explicit, just constant, as if to ram home the point (haha) of what crews do on long ship voyages. The Pequod’s captain is a bit of an Ahab too: she wears a prosthetic to replace the leg she lost to a massive leviathan that got away, the one she’s now determined to hunt down.
We get stories of earth - a now-desolate place with no natural resources and a decimated population - and the space cults that have filled the void. These cult adherents worship profits and life, in that order.
One of the cleverest bits is when we meet a so-called serial killer on the ship, on the run from corporate overlords who have accused him of 435 murders because he removed and discarded cancer cells from human bodies. He is, in fact, a “back room oncologist” who signed up to the Pequod to get away. What’s the alternative to an illegal oncology session? You’ll have to read the novel to find out. Or do what I did and enjoy the well-narrated audiobook.
This book should have a higher rating, so I’m rounding up my 4.4 to 5. People who enjoy humor, adventure, and a snarky, self-deprecating narrator who is always ready for some sex will enjoy this romp.
My sincere thanks to the author, @AlexisHart, publisher, @MacmillanAudio, and #NetGalley for early access to the audiobook of #HellsHeart for review purposes. Publication date: 10 March 2026.
The narrator signs up to work on the Pequod, a space-faring ship that travels around Jupiter hunting leviathans for their bodily fluids (ok, their spermicide), not unlike old whaling ships did on Earth for their blubber and ambergris. The narrator is continuously horny and manages to hook up with even the most unlikely of shipmates. The sex isn’t explicit, just constant, as if to ram home the point (haha) of what crews do on long ship voyages. The Pequod’s captain is a bit of an Ahab too: she wears a prosthetic to replace the leg she lost to a massive leviathan that got away, the one she’s now determined to hunt down.
We get stories of earth - a now-desolate place with no natural resources and a decimated population - and the space cults that have filled the void. These cult adherents worship profits and life, in that order.
One of the cleverest bits is when we meet a so-called serial killer on the ship, on the run from corporate overlords who have accused him of 435 murders because he removed and discarded cancer cells from human bodies. He is, in fact, a “back room oncologist” who signed up to the Pequod to get away. What’s the alternative to an illegal oncology session? You’ll have to read the novel to find out. Or do what I did and enjoy the well-narrated audiobook.
This book should have a higher rating, so I’m rounding up my 4.4 to 5. People who enjoy humor, adventure, and a snarky, self-deprecating narrator who is always ready for some sex will enjoy this romp.
My sincere thanks to the author, @AlexisHart, publisher, @MacmillanAudio, and #NetGalley for early access to the audiobook of #HellsHeart for review purposes. Publication date: 10 March 2026.
February 5, 2026
I was immediately interested in this book when I heard the pitch “sapphic Moby Dick in space,” but unfortunately it just wasn’t for me. The actual monster hunting in space was interesting, but the characters didn’t work for me because they were just becoming insufferable to read.
The novel is written as a memoir from our main character, I, after the events of the novel. She’s written as a weird quirky woman whose only response is sex or suicide. She is constantly trying to fuck anyone just because, there’s no necessary reason other than “she’s just so messed up”. It reads as instead of giving her an actual personality and backstory, they just make her constantly horny. The captain is also a terrible character with barely a motivation other than revenge.
2.5 stars, rounded up.
Thanks NetGalley for an Arc!
The novel is written as a memoir from our main character, I, after the events of the novel. She’s written as a weird quirky woman whose only response is sex or suicide. She is constantly trying to fuck anyone just because, there’s no necessary reason other than “she’s just so messed up”. It reads as instead of giving her an actual personality and backstory, they just make her constantly horny. The captain is also a terrible character with barely a motivation other than revenge.
2.5 stars, rounded up.
Thanks NetGalley for an Arc!
February 5, 2026
So weird. I enjoyed it at times - vibes are Moby Dick but in outer space and with a lot more weird sex. Definitely a good book for if you want to shake things up a little. I didn't love the ending & felt a bit underwhelmed, but won't say more because spoilers suck. I think I was left feeling like I didn’t care for any of the characters that much and wasn’t sure what I was supposed to get out of it.
Read if you like: Sigourney Weaver in Alien. Also, if you liked T Kingfisher’s Sworn Soldier series, you will definitely enjoy this book. The narrator's voice feels very similar - just with more sci-fi vibes than horror.
Thanks to Netgalley and Macmillan Audio for providing me with a digital copy of the book in exchange for an honest review.
Read if you like: Sigourney Weaver in Alien. Also, if you liked T Kingfisher’s Sworn Soldier series, you will definitely enjoy this book. The narrator's voice feels very similar - just with more sci-fi vibes than horror.
Thanks to Netgalley and Macmillan Audio for providing me with a digital copy of the book in exchange for an honest review.
November 6, 2025
A sapphic space opera Moby Dick retelling with a widely inclusive cast of characters went about as chaotically as I could’ve imagined.
Hell’s Heart thrives in the world building department which does slightly sacrifice the pacing up until the third act—but the capitalistic undertones really keep the intrigue alive in this one.
I’ll read anything Hall writes, because they consistently push literary boundaries—this does just that.
Thanks again to NetGalley & Tor for a digital copy in exchange for a fair/honest review.
Hell’s Heart thrives in the world building department which does slightly sacrifice the pacing up until the third act—but the capitalistic undertones really keep the intrigue alive in this one.
I’ll read anything Hall writes, because they consistently push literary boundaries—this does just that.
Thanks again to NetGalley & Tor for a digital copy in exchange for a fair/honest review.
January 24, 2026
I’d never read an Alexis Hall book prior to Hell’s Heart, and I suspect that this book diverges from their usual style.
I thought that this book was deceptively simple, and actually quite complex when you read on a metatextual level. On one level as an adaptation of Moby Dick and on another as an in-universe published book.
I’ll save my thoughts for my actual review, but for readers who may be anticipating this book— give it a good read! I enjoyed this book a lot. And though the style was different from my previous expectations, I think that was for the better.
I thought that this book was deceptively simple, and actually quite complex when you read on a metatextual level. On one level as an adaptation of Moby Dick and on another as an in-universe published book.
I’ll save my thoughts for my actual review, but for readers who may be anticipating this book— give it a good read! I enjoyed this book a lot. And though the style was different from my previous expectations, I think that was for the better.
September 2, 2025
It took me a while to finish this one, but it was worth it! I should preface that I was not assigned Moby Dick in high school, as such, I have not read it. My limited and vague understanding of that novel comes mostly from cultural osmosis and a brief phase in sophomore year where I got really into the Mastodon album about it, which is to say that my knowledge of this story is limited so I don't know how much of this book was taken from that one. Honestly? I don't think that's a bad thing.
The best pieces of this book are its characters (which I suspect are similar to the characters from the original novel just a bit queerer) and its world building. The way the leviathans are described and the way the hunting process was described was super interesting. All of the different churches and beliefs and cultures from around the solar system, even if they were briefly mentioned, gave this world so much depth. I found especially the mystique and confusion about people from Earth to be particularly interesting.
Much like the original (I imagine at least) this book is slooooooow moving until the last ten percent or so. Much of what happens before the climax feels almost like a serial tv show because the in-universe author's memory isn't great, but most of it is very interesting. But man! That last ten percent is going to stick with me for a while.
The best pieces of this book are its characters (which I suspect are similar to the characters from the original novel just a bit queerer) and its world building. The way the leviathans are described and the way the hunting process was described was super interesting. All of the different churches and beliefs and cultures from around the solar system, even if they were briefly mentioned, gave this world so much depth. I found especially the mystique and confusion about people from Earth to be particularly interesting.
Much like the original (I imagine at least) this book is slooooooow moving until the last ten percent or so. Much of what happens before the climax feels almost like a serial tv show because the in-universe author's memory isn't great, but most of it is very interesting. But man! That last ten percent is going to stick with me for a while.
November 25, 2025
so good! so weird and sad and vast and lonely! I love Moby Dick but I might love this book more.
Review of advance copy received from Netgalley
Hell's Heart is a sapphic retelling of the classic Moby Dick. The main character along with another companion, Q, board a working hunting ship. Along the way mishaps happen but mostly this story very faithfully follows it's source in terms of progression.
I wanted to like this so much more. This book is sort of a mess, unfortunately, and I don't think it's a great retelling. Hell's Heart does not have enough introspection or meditation for me to latch onto that is so heavily present within the source material it's basing itself on. Moby Dick is a slow read but every line feels intentional and filled with purpose. Most of this novel is just really unpalatable and therefore I do think it's only really going to hit with a specific niche audience.
The main character never becomes likable. There just isn't much to latch onto with her. She makes CONSTANT sperm jokes, particularly through the beginning but she will not stop by the end. (I do understand the whole sperm whale - spermacyte foil here when it comes to the leviathans but there was genuinely no need for the absolutely constant teenage level joking around the word when it was mentioned. I was gobsmacked to reach the near 70-ish% mark and we got ANOTHER "if you laugh, you've lost" joke.) Beyond this and the amount of sex the MC has, I have no real idea who this woman is. She feels like nothing in this story and yet she's somehow the main character.
The overuse of sex is entirely unreasonable and not needed. For this being a "memoir" there was an egregious amount of sex mentioned to the point that it was just exhausting for none of it to mean anything or have ANY wider purpose within the narrative or character arc. The main character notes how often she uses sex as a means of self harm with NO introspection on said behavior nor is there EVER a proper foil to this behavior meaning there is absolutely no purpose to it beyond it being a character trait, and it's not a good one. It was so, so tiring by the end to barely have an idea of what and why and how certain conflicts were progressing because the main character was more interested in sex and sexual worship than she was what was actively happening or any part of the mission. While there were scenes of her also finding awe in actions like flying the little boats or whatnot, those moments are inconsequential to how often sex overpowers Everything.
Also for how often the main character mentions "getting back to the sex" by the way, there is barely any actually there. It is literally just constant, neverending anecdotes about who she's fucked and how many times and if she liked it or not. There are not really any titillating sex scenes so what sex was there to even get back to? There is not a single chapter that I could find that didn't include sex in some way and it was exhausting and entirely unnecessary. ("I'm about to go into an explanation of tech and biology again. If it helps to get through, imagine me getting railed hard from behind." No!! Why would I? Goodness I really hated this aspect of the book. Absolutely Everything seemed to link back to sex for no good reason.) And it's worth nothing that excessive sex in this novel wouldn't be a problem for me at all had it seemed to have purpose within the narrative, but it doesn't.
Not to mention how confused the worldbuilding was and how often the main character contradicts herself, and not in ways that are compelling, interesting, or otherwise plot driven. Just intensely unlikable character that is really incurious about the world around her (and yet she claims to be the curious type, maybe it was just my reading but her disinterest in the worlds around her made her nothing but a passenger on a journey and not a curious character.)
Also hated how much of the book seemed to be condoning, and not criticizing, toxic power structures and such. I can definitely tell the author has progressive views, but this book can very easily be read in a way that is antithetical to that. I do not feel there was enough conversation surrounding certain topics for the opinion on the matter to be clear, and therefore for the inclusion of such needling subjects to be very frustrating. And this contradicts how often the author included modern sayings but didn't adapt them at all and therefore had to constantly include comments such as "if I even knew what a camel was" and the like. So the capitalism and religion and whatnot was easily converted but very common sayings wouldn't have been adapted after hundreds, maybe thousands of years?
I was really shocked at how much that capitalism was literally worshipped in this novel and yet I just could not find any foil to this to denote if that was a good or bad thing. There is a point where it is explained that the idea of community and collective action is akin to terrorists, but nowhere in the novel did I find that idea to be challenged which was extremely bothersome. "It's a well known fact that for a society to function a sense of individualism and a strong sense of personal responsibility are absolute necessities and to suggest otherwise is to sympathize with terrorists." ...WHAT? I believe that Q is supposed to somewhat subvert this view once they get to earth, but I truly do not feel that this point was ever challenged in a meaningful way. That isn't a viewpoint I agree or align with, and therefore am left feeling awkward about this novel and what it wanted to impart to me.
The narrator of the audiobook does a fantastic job, though. She also does the narration for Volatile Memory and she is a shining light of reading the novel for me. Absolutely great work!
Honestly I could go on about the negatives, I really didn't enjoy this at all, but I don't think all of my comments about why I hated this would all be very fair. This book does have value and is honestly going to be a big hit for the right reader, so I don't want to dissuade anyone from giving this book an honest shot. I truly don't want to hinder anyone else from potentially enjoying this, but I'll also be honest about my personal experience and it having not been enjoyable.
I wouldn't really recommend this book to anyone that I know. If someone asked me if they should try it, I would maybe field some questions their way to help them get a better view if it's what they're looking for, but wouldn't outright tell them not to read it.
Thank you very much to Netgalley and the publisher for an ARC copy of the novel in exchange for an honest review.
I wanted to like this so much more. This book is sort of a mess, unfortunately, and I don't think it's a great retelling. Hell's Heart does not have enough introspection or meditation for me to latch onto that is so heavily present within the source material it's basing itself on. Moby Dick is a slow read but every line feels intentional and filled with purpose. Most of this novel is just really unpalatable and therefore I do think it's only really going to hit with a specific niche audience.
The main character never becomes likable. There just isn't much to latch onto with her. She makes CONSTANT sperm jokes, particularly through the beginning but she will not stop by the end. (I do understand the whole sperm whale - spermacyte foil here when it comes to the leviathans but there was genuinely no need for the absolutely constant teenage level joking around the word when it was mentioned. I was gobsmacked to reach the near 70-ish% mark and we got ANOTHER "if you laugh, you've lost" joke.) Beyond this and the amount of sex the MC has, I have no real idea who this woman is. She feels like nothing in this story and yet she's somehow the main character.
The overuse of sex is entirely unreasonable and not needed. For this being a "memoir" there was an egregious amount of sex mentioned to the point that it was just exhausting for none of it to mean anything or have ANY wider purpose within the narrative or character arc. The main character notes how often she uses sex as a means of self harm with NO introspection on said behavior nor is there EVER a proper foil to this behavior meaning there is absolutely no purpose to it beyond it being a character trait, and it's not a good one. It was so, so tiring by the end to barely have an idea of what and why and how certain conflicts were progressing because the main character was more interested in sex and sexual worship than she was what was actively happening or any part of the mission. While there were scenes of her also finding awe in actions like flying the little boats or whatnot, those moments are inconsequential to how often sex overpowers Everything.
Also for how often the main character mentions "getting back to the sex" by the way, there is barely any actually there. It is literally just constant, neverending anecdotes about who she's fucked and how many times and if she liked it or not. There are not really any titillating sex scenes so what sex was there to even get back to? There is not a single chapter that I could find that didn't include sex in some way and it was exhausting and entirely unnecessary. ("I'm about to go into an explanation of tech and biology again. If it helps to get through, imagine me getting railed hard from behind." No!! Why would I? Goodness I really hated this aspect of the book. Absolutely Everything seemed to link back to sex for no good reason.) And it's worth nothing that excessive sex in this novel wouldn't be a problem for me at all had it seemed to have purpose within the narrative, but it doesn't.
Not to mention how confused the worldbuilding was and how often the main character contradicts herself, and not in ways that are compelling, interesting, or otherwise plot driven. Just intensely unlikable character that is really incurious about the world around her (and yet she claims to be the curious type, maybe it was just my reading but her disinterest in the worlds around her made her nothing but a passenger on a journey and not a curious character.)
Also hated how much of the book seemed to be condoning, and not criticizing, toxic power structures and such. I can definitely tell the author has progressive views, but this book can very easily be read in a way that is antithetical to that. I do not feel there was enough conversation surrounding certain topics for the opinion on the matter to be clear, and therefore for the inclusion of such needling subjects to be very frustrating. And this contradicts how often the author included modern sayings but didn't adapt them at all and therefore had to constantly include comments such as "if I even knew what a camel was" and the like. So the capitalism and religion and whatnot was easily converted but very common sayings wouldn't have been adapted after hundreds, maybe thousands of years?
I was really shocked at how much that capitalism was literally worshipped in this novel and yet I just could not find any foil to this to denote if that was a good or bad thing. There is a point where it is explained that the idea of community and collective action is akin to terrorists, but nowhere in the novel did I find that idea to be challenged which was extremely bothersome. "It's a well known fact that for a society to function a sense of individualism and a strong sense of personal responsibility are absolute necessities and to suggest otherwise is to sympathize with terrorists." ...WHAT? I believe that Q is supposed to somewhat subvert this view once they get to earth, but I truly do not feel that this point was ever challenged in a meaningful way. That isn't a viewpoint I agree or align with, and therefore am left feeling awkward about this novel and what it wanted to impart to me.
The narrator of the audiobook does a fantastic job, though. She also does the narration for Volatile Memory and she is a shining light of reading the novel for me. Absolutely great work!
Honestly I could go on about the negatives, I really didn't enjoy this at all, but I don't think all of my comments about why I hated this would all be very fair. This book does have value and is honestly going to be a big hit for the right reader, so I don't want to dissuade anyone from giving this book an honest shot. I truly don't want to hinder anyone else from potentially enjoying this, but I'll also be honest about my personal experience and it having not been enjoyable.
I wouldn't really recommend this book to anyone that I know. If someone asked me if they should try it, I would maybe field some questions their way to help them get a better view if it's what they're looking for, but wouldn't outright tell them not to read it.
Thank you very much to Netgalley and the publisher for an ARC copy of the novel in exchange for an honest review.
Review of advance copy received from Publishers Weekly
Came for the strangeness of the concept, stayed for the cynical protagonist.
I’m not really sure what I was expecting from Hell’s Heart, to be honest. The tagline is more than interesting enouhg to demand your attention, and the promise of a science fiction romp through the storms of Jupiter in search of fantastical monstrosities whose brain juice fuels the entire human species draws you in like nothing else.
But there’s a lot more going on beneath the surface than that.
The main character, referred to simply as “I”, is a lot more complex than she would have you believe. Her narrative voice is cynical, self-hating, borderline nihilistic at points. She makes it clear to the reader that the urge for self-destruction drives her, and that signing up onto a Leviathan-hunting ship just about to set off on an expedition everyone else thinks is doomed aligns perfectly with her need to pursue oblivion. Her narrative voice never strayed too into jaded territory, and the author did a fantastic job of balancing I’s self-loathing and sarcasm with a fair amount of actually quite philosophically internal monologues. “I” might label herself a fake philosopher, and be called such by members of the crew, but there’s a lot of depth to her. She spends a fair amount of time reflecting on her decision and why she needs to destroy herself so badly.
She’s also incredibly meta and canny. This books is framed as a memoir of sorts, being written by “I” years after the events of the story have taken place. She addresses the reader on multiple occasions, and will draw attention to certain narrative decisions in a way which felt natural and engaging. For example, there are a few chapters where “I” dedicates the pages to explaining some aspect of Leviathan biology or providing an overview of the mechanics of the hunt itself. She then breaks the fourth wall and notes that she’s aware she’s rambling or drawing our attention away from the plot’s main thread, but we need to know this stuff and she didn’t know how else to include the context. I’ve never read Moby Dick, but I’ve heard the author does similar things by overexplaining topics not directly relevant to the plot, so this was quite an amusing way of poking a bit of light fun at the original classic.
Moving on from the MC, the plot itself is relatively simple at its core. The Captain Ahab stand-in, a fanatical and enigmatic woman named simply “A”, lost her leg to the Möbius Beast, and not only craves revenge, but also desires the immortality killing the beast will give her. As the hunt progresses, “I” comes to understand the captain’s mission whilst also unpacking why it is the crew follows “A” when even they recognise her madness. There are also a number of well-developed secondary plots supporting main pursuit, including the rise of a religious cult within the crew (who believe the Leviathans of Jupiter are sent by God to devour everyone, and the most faithful will be devoured last), an encounter with space pirates (and their silver-tongued captain), and “I’s” growing relationship both with crazy captain “A” and a woman named “Q”, who she joined the expedition with.
The character of “Q” was an interesting one. She and “I” barely share and language, though manage to communicate and share a quite significant romance that served to humanise “I” and remind her that, even against her wishes, she is capable of caring for people. “Q” was always there to sweep in and save “I”, framing herself as a competent warrior-like woman who also serves as one of the ship’s harpooners when it comes to hunting the monsters themsevles. “Q” also hails from Earth, and in this far-future reality, our home planet is shrouded in rumour and mysticism, placing “Q” on the fringes of common society and making her a pariah, just as “I” is a pariah.
The setting was also fantastic, it has to be noted. The idea of populating the storms and continent-sized clouds of Jupiter with huge monsters was an inspired one, as Jupiter being a gas giant means a large part of the ship’s hunt is spent beneath the surface. There was also mention of, and a brief near-miss with, a huge hydrogen sea at the very centre of the planet, which added an extra layer of space opera danger to an already expansive plot.
The descriptions of the hunts themselves, as well as the resulting butchery, were well handled. Rather than an account of the mindless murder of animals whose bodies we require for our own selfish needs, “I” frames the hunt in a slightly more compassionate manner. She feels connected with the carcasses of the hunted Leviathans, and watches as they are disassembled, their bodies claimed as their lives are stolen. It feeds into the themes of ownership, and how, in this bleak future, even our own bodies don’t belong to us anymore, much as the Leviathans’ don’t. “I” herself is in a huge amount of debt to a pharmaceutical state (because she had some undetailed surgery to alter her body at some point in the past), a debt she can never hope to repay. These pharma states essentially run humanity, enforcing widespread debt and ensuring no one is truly free. The Leviathans and the hunting of them encapsulates this theme because they are only as valuable as the brain juice they can provide, just as people are only as valuable as the debts they can accrue to keep them indentured.
Overall, this was a fantastic book. Not only did it defy my expectations, it also subverted them, thrust itself head and shoulders above them, and turned them on their head.
It has a lot to say about the state of the world and the selfishness of humanity, and it explores those darker themes in such a fun, unique way.
Thank you to the publisher for my free copy.
I’m not really sure what I was expecting from Hell’s Heart, to be honest. The tagline is more than interesting enouhg to demand your attention, and the promise of a science fiction romp through the storms of Jupiter in search of fantastical monstrosities whose brain juice fuels the entire human species draws you in like nothing else.
But there’s a lot more going on beneath the surface than that.
The main character, referred to simply as “I”, is a lot more complex than she would have you believe. Her narrative voice is cynical, self-hating, borderline nihilistic at points. She makes it clear to the reader that the urge for self-destruction drives her, and that signing up onto a Leviathan-hunting ship just about to set off on an expedition everyone else thinks is doomed aligns perfectly with her need to pursue oblivion. Her narrative voice never strayed too into jaded territory, and the author did a fantastic job of balancing I’s self-loathing and sarcasm with a fair amount of actually quite philosophically internal monologues. “I” might label herself a fake philosopher, and be called such by members of the crew, but there’s a lot of depth to her. She spends a fair amount of time reflecting on her decision and why she needs to destroy herself so badly.
She’s also incredibly meta and canny. This books is framed as a memoir of sorts, being written by “I” years after the events of the story have taken place. She addresses the reader on multiple occasions, and will draw attention to certain narrative decisions in a way which felt natural and engaging. For example, there are a few chapters where “I” dedicates the pages to explaining some aspect of Leviathan biology or providing an overview of the mechanics of the hunt itself. She then breaks the fourth wall and notes that she’s aware she’s rambling or drawing our attention away from the plot’s main thread, but we need to know this stuff and she didn’t know how else to include the context. I’ve never read Moby Dick, but I’ve heard the author does similar things by overexplaining topics not directly relevant to the plot, so this was quite an amusing way of poking a bit of light fun at the original classic.
Moving on from the MC, the plot itself is relatively simple at its core. The Captain Ahab stand-in, a fanatical and enigmatic woman named simply “A”, lost her leg to the Möbius Beast, and not only craves revenge, but also desires the immortality killing the beast will give her. As the hunt progresses, “I” comes to understand the captain’s mission whilst also unpacking why it is the crew follows “A” when even they recognise her madness. There are also a number of well-developed secondary plots supporting main pursuit, including the rise of a religious cult within the crew (who believe the Leviathans of Jupiter are sent by God to devour everyone, and the most faithful will be devoured last), an encounter with space pirates (and their silver-tongued captain), and “I’s” growing relationship both with crazy captain “A” and a woman named “Q”, who she joined the expedition with.
The character of “Q” was an interesting one. She and “I” barely share and language, though manage to communicate and share a quite significant romance that served to humanise “I” and remind her that, even against her wishes, she is capable of caring for people. “Q” was always there to sweep in and save “I”, framing herself as a competent warrior-like woman who also serves as one of the ship’s harpooners when it comes to hunting the monsters themsevles. “Q” also hails from Earth, and in this far-future reality, our home planet is shrouded in rumour and mysticism, placing “Q” on the fringes of common society and making her a pariah, just as “I” is a pariah.
The setting was also fantastic, it has to be noted. The idea of populating the storms and continent-sized clouds of Jupiter with huge monsters was an inspired one, as Jupiter being a gas giant means a large part of the ship’s hunt is spent beneath the surface. There was also mention of, and a brief near-miss with, a huge hydrogen sea at the very centre of the planet, which added an extra layer of space opera danger to an already expansive plot.
The descriptions of the hunts themselves, as well as the resulting butchery, were well handled. Rather than an account of the mindless murder of animals whose bodies we require for our own selfish needs, “I” frames the hunt in a slightly more compassionate manner. She feels connected with the carcasses of the hunted Leviathans, and watches as they are disassembled, their bodies claimed as their lives are stolen. It feeds into the themes of ownership, and how, in this bleak future, even our own bodies don’t belong to us anymore, much as the Leviathans’ don’t. “I” herself is in a huge amount of debt to a pharmaceutical state (because she had some undetailed surgery to alter her body at some point in the past), a debt she can never hope to repay. These pharma states essentially run humanity, enforcing widespread debt and ensuring no one is truly free. The Leviathans and the hunting of them encapsulates this theme because they are only as valuable as the brain juice they can provide, just as people are only as valuable as the debts they can accrue to keep them indentured.
Overall, this was a fantastic book. Not only did it defy my expectations, it also subverted them, thrust itself head and shoulders above them, and turned them on their head.
It has a lot to say about the state of the world and the selfishness of humanity, and it explores those darker themes in such a fun, unique way.
Thank you to the publisher for my free copy.
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