Bill, the Galactic Hero is a satirical science fiction novel by American writer Harry Harrison, first published in 1965.

[2] Terry Pratchett once said: "I don't think The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy was the funniest Science Fiction novel ever written.

[3] Bill is a farmboy on a small backward agricultural planet who is drugged, hypnotised, then shanghaied into the Space Troopers and sent to recruit training under a fanged instructor named Deathwish Drang.

After surviving boot camp, he is transferred to active duty as a fuse tender on the flagship of the space fleet in battle with the Chingers, a small reptilian race who are, in Trooper propaganda, portrayed as being 7 feet tall.

Before the battle one of Bill's fellow troopers, known as Eager Beager, is revealed to be an android operated from within by a Chinger, who is in fact only 7 inches tall.

He escapes and flees into the depths of the city, where he first falls in with a gang of similarly "deplanned" outlaws, then finds employment with Helior's garbage disposal service, cannily using the galactic postal service to send garbage to other planets, since Helior has run out of room for it.

The book ends with the story coming full circle as Bill, with an artificial foot and Deathwish Drang's fangs, returns to his home planet and recruits more gullible young men, including his own younger brother, into the Troopers, even after his mother begs him to be merciful.

But one of the packagers said, coming back to this thing I said about the pornography of violence: Harry, why don't we do a Bill, the Galactic Hero series and actually do some anti-war propaganda instead of all pro war.

Harrison introduced a new euphemism, "bowb", in the series to cover the vulgarity necessary to render military life accurately.