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10-15 years ago (I was pretty young, maybe 13-14) I got my hands on a book about this space expedition on some celestial bodies that were actually alive and dormant. The book was in English, it might be 30+ years old. I remember it was pretty short, 100-150 pages and (I might be mistaken) but it was part of a collection of space-travel short books by the same author.

I don't remember much, as I didn't get to finish it, but I remember the story was told from the perspective of these spacemen that land on this (these) creature(s) that float through space, not knowing they are alive. The interesting part is that they get contaminated through the ground(skin) of the creatures and their DNA is mutated according to the area they landed on. I might be wrong on some of the details, it was a long time ago and my memory is terrible.

Also, about the story, I remember there was a pretty weird part involving growing genitalia because of the influence of the space-creature-thing. I remember because I was pretty embarrassed reading that part.

EDIT: I found it! I tracked down the friend who I got it from and she found the guy she borrowed it from and in the end we found the book: it's Serge Brussolo - Territoire de fievre. Apparently it was french so I threw you off quite a lot. Thanks for all your efforts!

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  • You could improve this question by going through the checklists here and editing in any relevant info you can think to add.
    – Valorum
    Commented Aug 26, 2020 at 8:09
  • See if anything rings a bell tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/BodyHorror/Literature
    – jo1storm
    Commented Aug 26, 2020 at 10:37
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    This also sound like it might be it (from my previous link): In the Cordwainer Smith story "A Planet Named Shayol", criminals are exiled to a prison planet inhabited by an alien parasite that keeps the prisoners alive but causes their bodies to grow extra parts - which the planet's single guard harvests when he visits the prisoners, and sends off-world to be used in organ transplants.
    – jo1storm
    Commented Aug 26, 2020 at 10:48
  • @jo1storm nope, unfortunately not it. I thought for a second it is, looking at the cover, but no. Thanks for your efforts
    – Eduard Barnoviciu
    Commented Aug 26, 2020 at 11:18
  • Re the last paragraph, do you mean the spacemen were growing extra sets of gentalia? If so, whereabouts on their bodies?
    – John Rennie
    Commented Aug 26, 2020 at 18:03

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The book in question is:

Serge Brussolo - Territoire de fievre

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    Can you explain the reasons it matches, to help future searchers? Also, you can accept your own answer I think 48 hours after asking your question.
    – Basya
    Commented Aug 27, 2020 at 18:17

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