Red Mars, by Kim Stanley Robinson

What happens when you take the best and brightest of Earth’s biologists, engineers, computer scientists and geologists, and coop them up in a tiny habitat on Mars together?  They begin to hate each other with a passion, that’s what.

Red Mars is a fascinating study of what happens to society when we decide it’s time to colonize Mars.  The science of the book is rock-hard.  The first one hundred colonists make their agonizingly slower-than-light journey out to the red planet, and Robinson seems to have done his homework on every other aspect of the colonies: from physics to biotechnology to sociology.  And yet against the backdrop of all this plausible science, the story is character-driven.

Each of the first one hundred colonists who we get to meet has a unique character.  Maya Toitovna, leader of the Russian delegation of colonists, is a twit.  And yet, when times get tough, she gets tough, too.  John Boone is pretty much Buzz Lightyear, charismatic and arrogant.  Nadia Cherneshevsky is the badass engineer who solves problems.  And Frank Chalmers: oof.  The chapters that take place inside Frank’s head are some of the creepiest parts of the novel.  Never have I seen a man so pathologically out of touch with himself.

Each of these early colonists is witness to an epic span of time as Mars fills with people, political unrest and finally insurrection begins.  The end of Red Mars is not the end of the story (it’s part of a trilogy) and I fully intend to read the rest.

P.S.  Though most of the science in this book is excellent, there is one mistake that I found quite amusing.  In Kim Stanley Robinson’s 2026, the Internet is a very boring place.  It’s a handful of message boards that scientists sometimes use to share data.  Nobody thinks of using it for mass media purposes when politics get rough or even to sabotage it.  This in a world that has AI’s and omegendorph, a wonder drug.  Still, the book was written in 1993, so you have to give Robinson credit for even imagining that we will use the Internet in the future.

Triangle

Source: highlycontrasting.com

A 2009 psychological horror movie that was directed and written by Christopher Smith.  Jess, a waitress who’s struggling with raising an autistic son alone, is invited by her friend Greg to spend a day sailing off the coast of Florida with a few other people.  A mysterious storm wrecks their sailboat, then a mysterious ship called the Aeolus appears and everyone boards it.  Without giving away any spoilers, bad stuff happens.  And time travel.

The ending of the movie was chilling, but fifteen minutes later I began to notice holes in the plot that are ruining it for me.  Please, if you’ve seen the movie, can you explain the following?

.

(Everything that follows is a spoiler.)

.

.

  • Where did the time loop come from?  Jess is influenced to do a lot of things she does because of her future self.  But the first time she boards the Aeolus, her future self wouldn’t exist … right?
  • When Jess-with-a-sack attacks Jess-with-no-sack, Jess-with-no-sack wins.  So when Jess puts the sack on, she should still remember that she’s going to lose that fight.  So why does she attack Jess-with-no-sack?  Did she want to get thrown overboard?
  • If getting thrown overboard lets you escape the Aeolus, why doesn’t Jess just jump off?
  • Wouldn’t the weight of all the lockets and dead Sallys eventually sink the ship?
  • Is that creepy taxicab driver at the end Charon?

Ravensdaughter’s Tale is up

The Smashwords edition of “Ravensdaughter’s Tale” is complete and now up on the site.  Even if you weren’t a backer of the Kickstarter campaign, now’s your chance to get a copy.  It’s only 99 cents.

And check out the lovely cover art that Kelsey has made for it.  She’s awesome.

Updates of Two Kinds

First of all, the surviving lettuces on my balcony have set flower:

Secondly, my Kickstarter for “Ravensdaughter’s Tale” finished the other day, not only fully funded, but also having made its first reach goal of $300!  This means that I’ll be able to post “Ravensdaughter’s Tale” up on Smashwords as well as a new edition of Grizelda.  I’ll send links when there’s stuff to see.

Paper Copy of The Confederacy of Heaven

I’ve got some exciting news.

A graduate student from Spain and I have been working together for a few months now – she’s been using the text of The Confederacy of Heaven to make a mock publicity campaign for her thesis project.  Part of the project is to create a mock-up of a paper copy of the book.  She just sent me photos.

Needless to say, I’m pleased as all getout with what she’s done here.  And if you’re curious about the translation from Spanish, here’s a best effort:

Title:  The Journey to Calgary

Text on the back:  For two hundred years, the human race has been punished by the stars.  Since then, it hasn’t rained a single time.  The Earth is dying little by little, and the only one who can save the planet, Nasan of the Clan of the Rattling Bones, feels too lost to confront that task … alone.

(You can click on the pictures to see them bigger!)

Kickstarter campaign bonus rewards

We are go, I repeat, we are go for a bonus reward for the Ravensdaughter’s Tale campaign.  I’ve talked to Kelsey King about the possibility of using the extra Kickstarter money to commission cover art for one of my novels, Grizelda.  She sent me back some of her ideas here:

If the Kickstarter reaches $300 funding, I can commission Kelsey to make the cover art, and if that happens, all the backers will get a copy of the cover art along with their other rewards.  There are fifteen days left in the campaign and we’re already more than halfway there, so things are looking good.

… and Ravensdaughter’s Tale is 100% funded!

Wow, this is flabbergasting.  The campaign is only about half over, but I had a couple of people make big backings yesterday that put us over the top.

(For those of you who came to this blog just now, I’m running a Kickstarter campaign to make cover art for one of my short stories.)

What does this mean?  I can start aiming for one of the reach goals of the campaign.  I’m going to go talk to the artist I’m working with about doing more stuff, probably cover art.  If this project reaches one of its reach goals, everybody who backs it is going to get extra cool stuff.  More news when it’s ready.