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This is a vast book: a chronicle of the exploration of Mars with some of the most engaging, vivid, and human characters in recent science fiction. Robinson fantasizes brilliantly about the science of terraforming a hostile world, analyzes the socio-economic forces that propel and attempt to control real interplanetary colonization, and imagines the diverse reactions that humanity would have to the dead, red planet.
Red Mars is so magnificent a story, you will want to move on to Blue Mars and Green Mars. But this first, most beautiful book is definitely the best of the three. Readers new to Robinson may want to follow up with some other books that take place in the colonized solar system of the future: either his earlier (less polished but more carefree) The Memory of Whiteness and Icehenge, or 1998's Antarctica. --L. Blunt Jackson
From Publishers Weekly
Copyright 1992 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
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Most helpful customer reviews
4.0 out of 5 stars
Good, but a little boring,
By A Customer
This review is from: Red Mars (Mass Market Paperback)
RED Mars is a really good book. Kim Stanley Robinson must be one of the greatest science fiction writers that I have read books of. This book is imaginative and in depth and very engrossing. There are a few problems with this book, though. First of all, there is too much complicated science in this book. The author often goes into long complicated descriptions that are not essential to the plot and that bog the reader down. The book can become immensely boring at times. I ended up reading this book off and on, stopping at the boring parts and coming back a couple of weeks later and starting to read it again. I ended up taking a long time to read the book because of this. This book is a hard read and many long and hard words. I am in ninth grade so it may be because i'm only 14 that it is hard, but I think it will be hard for most people. Another thing is that I've always loved detailed books, but this book almost has too much detail. The author is brilliant for coming up with all this detail, but it can bog the reader down sometimes. Overall this is a good book but a hard read.
5.0 out of 5 stars
Kim Stanley Robinson Does Mars - RED,
By
This review is from: Red Mars (Mass Market Paperback)
This whole series: RED, GREEN and BLUE, fully explores Mars like we wish we could, but can't afford.Character development as is usual with Kim Stanley Robinson is great as are the various scientific aspects of the books [you actually learn some actual science ]. Lots of adventure and excitement throughout make it an enjoyable read from start to finish. I've read this series twice now, IT'S THAT GOOD.
4.0 out of 5 stars
God and the devil in the details,
By
This review is from: Red Mars (Mass Market Paperback)
Kim Stanley Robinson does a masterful job of realizing a diverse array of characters, not the least of which is the planet itself. I found Ann and Frank exasperating, John and Nadia at times exhilirating and something of a disappointment, Sax and Hiroko equally inscrutable, and Maya making me wish someone would just slap her. I am astonished that anyone can keep track of so many personnae and keep their voices distinct. Equally, I am astonished by Robinson's command of geology, meteorology, thermodynamics, and even economics. The details read well and ring true. For years, I wondered why no one had covered this sort of project in detail: terraformation, colonization, expansion. Most writers seem satisfied to take these things as read. Robinson shows what a great literary work a little delving (okay, a whole lot of delving) can produce. On the down side, the details occasionally get in his way. In particular, I found three details more than a little discomfiting. First, in the personna of Michel, Robinson outlines his personal psychometry of personalities. In doing so, he provides both an oversimplification of human character and an unwelcome glimpse at Robinson's methodology for building characters. Like sausage-making and legislation, perhaps this process would have been better left unexamined. Second, I think the abundance of water in the substrate of Robinson's Mars is more than a tad optimistic. I realize that having to bring in water ice from the asteroid belt and Saturn's rings would have slowed the development quite a bit, but considering what a wealth of story Robinson typically finds in the details, I think this obstacle would have made for even more excellent writing opportunities. Third, in a move that appears nothing more than a technique to allow character continuity, Robinson introduces the deus ex machina of a revolutionary new genetic longevity treatment. With no foreshadowing or side-plot leading to it, the main characters suddenly have a chance to live for a thousand years. My, how convenient. This device left he second guessing the author's motives through the rest of the series. I love the books, but I don't think this was a necessary addition. As the principal plotline of this first book readily demonstrates, key characters can die without compromising the story.
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