Red Mars

It's always a little amusing to read old sci-fi stories that look into the then-future which is the now-present. Originally written in 1992 but set in 2026 (a scant 8 days away as I write this), this is a good example of the post-Cold War optimism people of that time felt. The idea of sending 100 human beings to Mars within the next 12 months seems laughably out of reach to me, but don't let that get in the way of a good story.

We have a big cast of characters here who are all instant celebrities (being one of the first 100 people on Mars will do that), and we get a half dozen different POV chapters among the more important ones. They're presumably all scientists with specialized fields, but they quickly slot into the role of playing avatars of a given political philosophy: the communist, the capitalist, the environmentalist, the centrist, etc. That didn't take away from my enjoyment, but it was hard to ignore with how unsubtle it all was.

A common complaint my friends brought up during our book club discussion for this read was how it felt selectively "hard" when it came to the science part of science fiction. There is a lot of discussion on geology and atmospheric engineering, but other aspects like where all these factories were coming from and how life support was never an issue within these prefab habitats are just sort of hand waved away as non-issues. Again, didn't bother me, but felt important to mention.

The middle did sag pretty heavily for me and I think I could've given this rating a whole other star if John and Frank's chapters weren't so long. I'll need a breather and a few palate cleansers after this, but I won't completely rule out revisiting this series in the future because it does end on a cliffhanger that I wouldn't mind following.