The Martians - Hardcover

Robinson, Kim Stanley

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0002253585 ISBN 13: 9780002253581

Publisher: Voyager, 1999

Synopsis

A glorious companion volume to Robinson’s world-wide bestselling trilogy.

All Colours Mars

Red Mars. Green Mars. Blue Mars...

The Mars trilogy has rapidly assumed the status of modern science fiction classic, capturing the imagination of hundreds of thousands of readers around the world. Now, with The Martians, comes Kim Stanley Robinson essential companion to the Mars series. New novellas and short stories head the collection, featuring many of the trilogy’s central characters in events previously only hinted at in the novels. Added to this are works on Martian mythology, poetry, character histories, alternative scenarios to the events that actually took place in the trilogy and finally various pieces which the author omitted in the final edit.

In short, The Martians is a unique collection of previously unpublished fiction, a fascinating
addition to Robinson’s oeuvre, and a must for all lovers of the red planet.

About this title

Review:

Robinson's Mars trilogy--Red Mars, Green Mars and Blue Mars--was arguably the finest thing the SF field achieved during the 90s. Its account of the 'terraforming' of Mars, of revolts and repression and the creation of something approximating a Utopia, has an impressive sweep, but does not neglect the human dimension. The flawed but fascinating leaders of the original colony and their increasingly strange descendants interact and conspire down the decades; the discovery of longevity drugs at an early stage in the plot ensures that those characters who are not murdered, crushed, exploded or burned in warfare of the most inventively horrid kind just keep on going. The Martians is by way of a pendant-- several of the longer stories fill in background to the trilogy by telling us about relationships that happened mostly offstage. Sometimes Robinson tells us what would have happened in other circumstances--in two stories the colony never starts. And much of the rest of the book consists of the epiphanic evocations of exotic landscape which is yet another of the trilogy's strengths. The Martians is not the place to start with Robinson's Mars, but it is a nice addition. --Roz Kaveney

Review:

‘One of the finest working novelists in any genre’
GUARDIAN

'If I had to choose one writer whose work will set the standard for science fiction in the future, it would be Kim Stanley Robinson’
NEW YORK TIMES

Praise for The Mars Trilogy:

‘One of the finest works of American SF’
TIMES LITERARY SUPPLEMENT

‘The ultimate in future history’
DAILY MAIL

‘Absorbing, impressive, fascinating... Utterly plausible’
FINANCIAL TIMES

‘A staggering book. The best novel on the colonization of Mars that has ever been written’
Arthur C. Clarke

‘Red Mars may simply be the best novel ever written about Mars’
INTERZONE

About this edition

• Publisher: Voyager
• Publication date: 1999
• ISBN 10: 0002253585
• ISBN 13: 9780002253581
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 416