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21 of 22 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Satisfying if uneven trilogy conclusion, August 19, 2002
One of the most impressive ongoing hard science fiction epics of recent years is Kim Stanley Robinson's Mars trilogy. Red Mars won the Nebula award, Green Mars and Blue Mars each won the Hugo.Robinson has tried to portray, in considerable detail, the story of the colonization and terraforming of Mars, beginning in 2027 and continuing for some 200 years. He has worked hard to get the science right, and to this reader, it is very real-seeming, impressive and interesting. It must be admitted, though, that he made some errors. Robinson himself has admitted to fudging the time scale of terraformation (compressing maybe 1000 years of likely effort to 200 years) in order to keep the story at a human scale. In addition there were certain annoying thermodynamic errors, and some aerodynamic silliness. I also took issue with his large reliance on nearly autonomous machines; and with the somewhat handwaving and near-miraculous introduction of radical life-extension technology (this last being in part another strategy to keep the story "human-scale", as it allows him to have some characters survive the entire trilogy).) Red Mars told the story of the initial colonization of Mars, first by the "First Hundred", a joint Russian-American expedition, then by Earth-dominated, mostly corporate-controlled colonists who followed to build on the efforts of the "First Hundred". It ended with an unsuccessful revolution against Earth's domination of Mars. The Red in its title referred to the pristine, unmodified, planet. Green Mars advanced the story of Mars' colonization, introducing many second- and third-generation characters, and ended in a generally successful revolution which established Martian independence. The Green of the title refers to the greening effects of terraformation. The action of the book, like that of the first two, is presented in a series of novella-length parts, each somewhat independent, each from the viewpoint of a different character. Many of the First Hundred return in this book as viewpoint characters of sections, as well as some of the later generation members introduced in Green Mars, and at least one new, significant, character for this book. To me, Robinson's best work has always been at novella length, so this plays to his strengths. (For example, my favorite Mars story, not part of the official Mars trilogy, is "Green Mars", collected in The Martians.) The linked-novella form also allows significant jumps in time, important in a story which takes place over such a long time (about a century for Blue Mars, I believe). A negative effect of this structure is a certain slackening in the overall story: as I have said, Blue Mars seems mainly to be about the rapprochement of Red and Green (quite movingly symbolized on a personal level by several segments which deal with the personal rapprochement of long-time "enemies" Ann Clayborne, the leading Red, and Sax Russell, the first terraformer); but in addition it is concerned with rounding out the overall story of the colonization of Mars, and for Robinson this means considering the future of the rest of the solar system as well. Thus Blue Mars has sections set on Earth, on Mercury, and in the moons of Uranus, as well as visits to Venus, the asteroids, and the others of the Outer Planets. These sections are quite interesting, but also seem to result in a certain dilution of the overall effect. Besides his interest in the "hard" sciences as played out in the gut-level details of the exploration and terraforming of Mars, Robinson is very interested in "softer" sciences, and much of the trilogy is concerned with politics. I found the discussions of politics quite interesting, though a bit biased (but generally a pretty fair attempt is made to show most sides of the various issues). There is not one but two extended descriptions of "constitutional conventions". Robinson also takes on the sociological effects of life-extension: and here he seems a little less sound. He tries to depict the effects of great age on people, and makes some good points, but is not quite convincing. More tellingly, I think he severely underplays the negative population effects of life-extension. Robinson is, it seems to me, an Utopian at heart, and he is a little too sanguine about people almost automatically adopting (solar-system-wide) policies such as one child per couple. Blue Mars, by itself, is a pretty successful trilogy closer, but not quite successful as a novel. I still rank Red Mars as the best novel of the series: it had a more coherent structure, was set over a shorter time-period, and featured my favorite writing of the series: the ecstatic novella "Falling into History", its central section. Still, it is only fair, I think, to consider the Mars trilogy as a unit, and as such it is very successful, very worthwhile. Almost inevitably, there are longeurs, and the multiple viewpoint character approach sometimes blurs the impact, sometimes results in tedious chapters. (I, for one, could have done without every one of Michel Duval's sections over the three novels.) Robinson's writing is clear throughout: for the most part he seems to have purposely trimmed his prose: at times the writing becomes a bit clipped or telegraphic, and only rarely does he wax lyrical, or ecstatic.
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10 of 10 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
The Poetry Beneath Hyacinth Skies, December 3, 2005
Blue Mars is Kim Stanley Robinson's final, and lengthiest, installment that concludes the Mars terraforming adventure. The First Hundred are nearly 200 years of age (and will grow older by book's end), and Mars's surface slowly begins to bubble with liquid.
In Green Mars, Robinson took the reader back to Earth. He gave us a first-hand look at the population explosion and the rising seas, while introducing us to Art and his philosophically autocratic employer. Robinson returns to Earth in the third book, this time taking Nirgal, the super-athletic Martian, Maya, Michel, and Sax. A volcanic eruption beneath the Antarctic ice sheet melts half of the White Continent and raises the sea level by 23 feet around the entire globe. Our heroes arrive to Terra Aqua where the aboveground political activities and adventures through underwater cities create a starkly contrasting but pleasant digression from the pseudo-hygrophilous forests and dry lichens of Mars. (Unrelated, a 1955 astronomy text proves that scientists at the time thought dark patches on Mars were created by lichen growing on the surface!)
The inception of human-manipulated hydrometeorology began in Red Mars with the atmospheric collision of an ice asteroid. 1140 pages later, in Part 7 of Blue Mars, Sax, Nadia, and fellow scientists focus their cognitive energies on creating, controlling, fighting against, or sustaining what would eventually become oceans, gulfs, bays, seas and lakes, all of which are mostly located in the northern hemisphere. The disputes and ultimate agreements (reluctant acquiescence) between the environmentalists and the terraformers rivals the frustrations from the earlier two novels. So begins the hydrology, hydrobiology, eventual hydrodynamics, and everything else "hydro" that will tear apart, develop, or re-establish the friendships and relationships that make up the Mars Trilogy's realistic realm of fiction.
Some of the more fantastic journeys take place beyond Earth and Mars. As rocket propulsion technology becomes increasingly powerful (Mars to Earth in three days), so too become the terraforming efforts of nearly every planet and moon in the Solar System. "People would do anything for the sake of an idea, anything" (498). Robinson takes the reader (along with the feral Zo, Jackie's daughter) to witness the new frontiers of Mercury, whose city moves slowly on rails; Venus, whose greenhouse effects are being reversed (to be completed in the next 300 years); Ann Clayborne joins Zo to visit the terraforming of Jupiter's moons Callisto, Ganymede, Europa, and Io; and finally the moons of Uranus. Robinson's imagery here is reminiscent of those previously imagined worlds, deep-green skies, dark rocky landscapes, and ringed planets hovering palely over the horizon.
As our heroes grow older, they become wiser to the inevitabilities of memory-loss and death. As they (primarily Sax) struggle with antidotes and formulae to inhibit the frightening realities, the remaining of the First Hundred seem to grow calm and spiritual. Although they have literally created a new, peaceful world out of a barren rock, a sort of Walden Two of the Solar System, they soon realize that there is more to life than always fighting to survive. Even the crazed Maya slows down.
Robinson's prose is always in motion. Admittedly the political exposition is usually drier than, for instance, the poetic science of Sax's discussions and thoughts. But it is all-necessary. Once the trilogy is completed, the holistic work becomes a memory the reader has lived through and experienced. Interestingly, the completed planet is not so far removed from the reader's ability to relate to it; in fact, Mars becomes so Earth-like in Nature, I felt briefly shocked at imagining these characters in familiar surroundings. Suddenly, I understood who they were and what they had accomplished, completely.
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9 of 9 people found the following review helpful:
2.0 out of 5 stars
Get out the Big Scissors, October 19, 2006
This third book of the incredibly bloated Mars Trilogy has the fascination of watching a train wreck. There is actually some suspense: how many pages will I skim before something actually happens?
I have to admire the thoroughness with which KSR created a world and made Mars real. He has described every valley, crater, canyon, caldera and dune--and invented a lot of geographical features that aren't there yet, such as rivers and oceans. He has catalogued the lichens, fir forests and alpine vegetation that will someday live on a terraformed Mars. (These details are actually interesting... to a point. But KSR went waaay beyond that point.)
Most of all, he has described the society that will live on Mars. It will be a sort of free-flowing California in which eternally young Martians will flit from tent city to underground commune to coffeehouse to free-sex bathhouse. (I'm still not sure who is paying the bills, growing the food or creating the oxygen for them to breathe. I think a planet of artificial habitats would be tightly controlled, even tyrannical.) They will discuss politics until your face turns blue. Martians will all be utopians and anarchists of various stripes. But when the subject of immigration (from Earth) comes up, watch them turn out as xenophobic as any America-Firster. (yes, there is a group called Mars First.)
Why did I read this series? There is a fascination to the topic. Imagine terraforming and colonizing another planet! I hoped I would learn something. The most interesting chapters were the ones where humans colonize Mercury, Venus, the moons of Jupiter, and even places like Uranus' moon Triton. Imagine humans growing gills and genetically modifying their eyes for the low light of the "sun-deprived moons". That's science fiction! Although I was disappointed that there is not one mention of any sort of extraterrestrial life. The moons and planets are merely real estate to be exploited--making this trilogy a platform for the hubris of mankind.
I also liked the chapters where Nirgal visits Earth. What would a Martian think of Earth? Good stuff there.
As for the rest of the chapters, the editor should have chopped them out with a big scissors. Why oh why does KSR pack hundreds of pages with self-indulgent ramblings, travelogues and descriptions of sailing, hiking, racing, parasailing...ok, KSR is living out his outdoor sports fantasies. But Please! Novels are supposed to have Stuff Happening! Lord of the Rings was the same size as the Mars trilogy... but at least that book had a plot!
Even worse are the passages about the senescence of the First Hundred (now about 220 years old). I can see that space colonization and longevity could go hand in hand. Likewise, the longevity treatment was a plot device so KSR could keep the same characters through the whole trilogy. But why bother? I'm sick of those characters. Nirgal was the only character I really liked. Maya, Ann, Sax etc. are tiresome, whiny old farts and frankly I was glad when they finally started dying off. In fact I can't buy the whole concept of a longevity serum being widely spread through overpopulated Earth. (Which then wants Mars as an immigration safety valve.) A society that would go for such a thing is so stupid, they almost deserve whatever happens to them.
After I waded through this whole mess, the ending was a fizzle. Nothing happened. You will feel as if you are aging 220 years yourself, as you read this series.
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