Red Mars

[Boerseun]

So, after years of procrastinating, I eventually got around to reading Kim Stanley Robinson's Red Mars.

 

I was intrigued by the possibilities in describing the whole Martian colonization from first landing to the eventual terraforming, and enjoyed every single page.

 

...up to page 250 (round there), where they got the bright idea to manufacture little windmills (about the size of a microwave oven) that converts wind energy to electricity, heating up an element on the side of the unit. I mean - is this guy serious!!?? He'll have to cover the whole planet with kazillions of these things to make a single degree change in the atmosphere! I mean, come on!

 

And that spoilt the rest of the book for me, seeing as there's no credibility to anything else anymore.

 

Anybody read Red/Green/Blue Mars? Should I read the rest of the series, or give it up as a bad joke?

[Tormod]

I never made it through more than half of Red Mars before I gave up. It started out very promising but in the end I was unable to not fall asleep while reading it...

[GAHD]

I read both Blue & Green. I don't remember which one it is, but one of them's main plot lines revolve around the rebellious adults getting fake IDs in martian sociaty, and the incestuous love of two of their children. Not really worth the time, and not noteable enough for me to remember much else of the plotlines, but they did occupy me for a few days.

[CraigD]

Anybody read Red/Green/Blue Mars? Should I read the rest of the series, or give it up as a bad joke?

I read them back in 1997.

 

I enjoyed them, not for their physical Science, which, as many have pointed out, is pretty incredible, but for the Sociology. It may be that this is as fabulous as his ideas about teraforming, skyhooks, and the like, but, since I’m poorly educated in these areas, I’d no way of knowing.

 

I recall many of my favorite parts of the story centering around the interaction of many different Earth cultures in the “melting pot” of colonized Mars, and around the idea that their economic theory was based on physical work and energy – the currently, if I remember clearly, used calories as its base unit. I found its exploration of the social impact of a world wide daily 25th “hour or rest & relaxation”, also.

 

If you like “soft” subjects like this, you might like the Red/Green/Blue Mars series. If you’re a dedicated hard SF reader, I doubt that you will.