Customer Reviews

Eat My Martian Dust: Finding God Among Aliens, Droids, and Mega Moons

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"Eat My Martian Dust" is a wonderful collection of short stories. These 14 tales vary dramatically in locale and environment, but do have an interesting connection. The short stories are by different authors and this adds to the overall enjoyment of the collection. Excellent writers with different styles gives this book flavor! Some of the authors were new to me, but I will now search out their longer works. Indeed, this is short science fiction at its best. Readers should relate well to at least a few of the authors and tales, if not to all of them. Many of the characters described are engaging.

I found the "The Science Behind the Story" segment in some of the short very interesting. Also there is the added bonus of spiritual content that often is so lacking in ordinary sci fi. After all, Christianity has been around for two thousand years, it is only reasonable to assume that as humans spread out from our home world, we will bring Christianity along with us. I must admit to reading the "About the contributors" and being surprised by all the Ph.D.s and high tech science (NASA etc...) backgrounds of the authors. A last thought, it really is too bad Ray Bradbury's short story "The Man" was not included. While that tale long ago inspired Michael Carroll, it really would have fit in nicely with these other great stories.

Review of
EAT MY MARTIAN
Edited by Michael Carroll and Robert Elmer
Published 2005 by Baker Books

This collection of science fiction short stories with Christian themes is an unconscious continuation of a long-standing, if infrequent, tradition. THE DAY THE EARTH STOOD STILL edited by Lester Del Rey, appeared in 1972 with three novellas by SF greats Poul Anderson, Gordon R. Dickson and Robert Silverberg, In 1973, well-known anthologist Roger Elwood edited FLAME TREE PLANET with stories by Dean R. Koontz, Leigh Brackett, Barry N. Malzberg and Thomas N. Scortia. In 1982, editor Alan Ryan collected such writers as Tanith Lee, Alan Dean Foster, Joel Rosenberg, Michael P. Kube-McDowell, Suzette Haden Elgin, Brian Aldiss and Gregory Benford under the title PERPETUAL LIGHT.

Now Michael Carroll and Robert Elmer, with the clear intent of reaching young adults and teens, have commissioned and collected the likes Kathy Tyers, Sigmund Brouwer and Jim Denney to create a series of SF short stories that invite young readers to find "God among Aliens, Droids and Mega Moons."

Unfortunately the lead-off story, "Things Unseen" by big-name Sigmund Brouwer is a story fragment that should be read last instead of first. If you give this book to a non-Christian SF ready, tell them to ignore this one. It's not representative of the rest of the book. "Time Coffin", by John B. Olson was also a disappointment and might find a better home with tract producers, Chick Publications.

The rest of the stories range from adequate to very, very good, though some may seem clich?d to seasoned SF readers. Veteran Kathy Tyers' story, "Their New Masters" was a little hard for me to follow at first, but ended well, if predictably. Shane Johnson's "Buried Secrets" was very well-written, but the ending is na?ve and detracts from the rest of the story's somber mood. Jim Denney's "Shipwreck Planet" suffers from the Star Trek Syndrome - in which the captain of the starship puts his own life and expensive training on the line by going on a First Contact mission rather than sending an expendable second-in-command. Also, while I understand that the target audience here is teens, adding a teen to a First Contact mission stretches my suspension of disbelief.

Randy Ingermanson's "Chess 4 Life" is nicely creepy, well-executed, and even though it's an old idea; it's a very good story. Jim Denney's "Tin Man" is Golden Age SF at its very best and would have found a comfortable home in any 1950's issue of ASTOUNDING, GALAXY or F&SF. Collection editor Robert Elmer's "For Such A Time" might best be imagined as Tom Godwin's "The Cold Equations" meets Christianity and while I think the dues ex machine ending was somewhat disappointing, it worked well and drew me along. Marianne Dyson's "Zeus' Eagle" would have found a snug home in any issue of Boy's Life Magazine prior to the 1980's.

But it's her last story that was my favorite and the best of the collection in my opinion. "The Right Path" posits a Korean martial art called Kuk Sool as a method for maintaining muscle strength and tone on a Lunar colony. High school student Susan Thomson lives with her father on the Moon part of the year and with her mother back on Earth the other part. While the "d" word is never mentioned, it's implied and neatly places Sarah in the camp of half of all American youth (including Christians). Though her father has no interest in her martial arts passion, she is hard at work earning her black belt when she meets recent Earth immigrant Ian. Ian has no feel for the Moon's one-sixth Earth strength gravity - and makes embarrassing, "I'm-from-Earth-so-I'm-better-than-you" mistakes. He promptly blames his mistakes on everyone else and the "stupid Lunar gravity". Sarah relies on her skills in Kuk Sool as well as her faith in God to prevent a terrible accident caused by Ian and in the end, they become friends. This piece would have easily found a home in ANALOG SF Magazine if the Christian message was removed. It's good for this collection that it found its home here!

With sidebars to offer facts supporting the fiction and a running story line that tries to tie everything together, the collection should find its way into the hands of any young person interested in hard science fiction. It can be used as a witnessing tool as well and while I didn't care for the chatty, too-tricky running story line (I thought the space might have been better occupied with another short story or two), this book would make a fine gift and is an important piece to have in any church or home school library (and if you can afford to donate one) to any public library.

Although the 14 short stories in this book are all heavily Sci-fi with a good dose of Christianity, there's a surpising amount of variety here. One minute you're reading about a martial arts competition on the moon, and the next thing you know a suspicious stranger in a Martian restaurant is spelled out on the pages in front of you. Heck, there's even a story about a technologically advanced civilization living during the days of Noah. Lots of stuff to enjoy, no matter what you're into. If you like weird alien monsters, lo and behold, this book gives you "Shipwreck Planet" to read. If you're frustrated with the iron grip technology has on society now and in the near future, two stories from John Olson are there keep you good company.

I didn't care too much for the stories within a story format. There was really no need for a transition between stort stories.

To close this overly-simplistic review, it should be noted that I feel guilty because at least two of the tales are positively dripping with an altruistic message, and darnit, I now get the sense that I'm not a very good Christian. Most of the stories put their main focus on turning from unbelief to belief, but I didn't see too much of what should be done after that big leap is made. Although I did see some quiet mention of post-belief issues here and there.

I bought EAT MY MARTIAN DUST: FINDING GOD AMONG ALIENS, DROIDS, AND MEGA MOONS to introduce a 10-year-old boy in 4th grade to science fiction. This short story collection turned out to be an excellent choice.

I started out reading one story per night as a bedtime story. As a former high school English teacher I could see where in a Christian school the teacher could skip the "connective tissue" storyline that frames and threads the short stories together and nothing would be lost in understanding the individual stories. Though these Christian stories have spiritual implications in the themes, none are didactic and the sci-fi story is not sacrificed, rather enhanced by the additional spiritual layer, much as Melville added spiritual layers to his stories.

Within each story is a page of "The Science Behind the Story." However, I skipped these pages while reading the fiction story, then read the NF science lesson after I finished the fiction story.

After reading several stories aloud to the 10-year-old, he picked the book up on his own and read six chapters (different stories) all in one sitting. He now says he loves sci-fi and wants to find more books in this genre. It's a shame this book is OP by the publisher. The concept of Christian sci-fi seems as if it would be an unusual combination, which makes EAT MY MARTIAN DUST a rare gem. But I found it available on Kindle.