Moving Mars
The young may not remember Mars of old, under the yellow Sun, its cloud-streaked skies dusted pink, its soil rusty and fine, its inhabitants living in pressurized burrows and venturing Up only as rite of passage or to do maintenance or tend the ropy crops spread like nests of intensely green snakes over the wind-scoured farms. That Mars, an old and tired Mars filled with young lives, is gone forever. Now I am old and tired, and Mars is young again. Our lives are not our. Own, but by God, we must behave as if they are. When I was young, what I did seemed too small to be of any consequence; but the shiver of dust, we are told, expands in time to the planet-sweeping storm... Casseia Majumdar was a daughter of one of Mars' oldest, most conservative Binding Multiples - the extended family syndicates that had colonized the red planet. But her life was changed forever by the student protest of 2171. Those brief days of idealism forged bonds. That would last a lifetime, and set the stage for a more dramatic act of revolution than anyone could have imagined. Charles Franklin, too, was caught up in those days of passionate youth. A brilliant young physicist with a deep love for his native planet, he was forced to leave his world behind to gain the training he needed. And in those years, the political distance between Earth and Mars was growing wider than the empty reaches of interplanetary space. Moving Mars is.
Stats for nerds
8recommend
12mentions
11people
2010–2023years
75% recommend25% neutral
Mentions per year
What Hacker News says
- Ah that's sad. Back when I was a teenager I discovered the Bova, Benford, Brin, and Bear SF section. That's what I called it anyway.
I have happy memories of reading Moving Mars and I have a prized (to me) hardcover copy of "Songs of Earth and Power". A talent who wrote wonderful books. He'll be missed
- I was not a reader as a kid. I just didn’t ever read books. But around age 13, I had to read a book for school. I picked up Eon at the library, and I read it, and actually wanted to read the whole thing.
After that I got my hands on every book he had written. Moving Mars is possibly the only book I ever read twice.
Later in life reading sci-fi is no longer an interest of mine, however his books were transformative for me.
- A sad loss. His books meant a lot to me at a particular time in my life, and I still re-read them sometimes. Queen of Angels and Moving Mars are probably my favourites, along with Eon and Blood Music. His works always delivered thoughtful depth and satisfying stories.
- Moving Mars is my favorite of his works as well. His other book, Heads, is something of a prequel, although Moving Mars does a good job of standing on it's own.
- He's the one that really got me obsessed with hard sci-fi in my teens, with Eon.
Followed by The Forge of God and Blood Music. I don't won't to ruin the endings of these two, but who knew you could end books like that?!
Queen of Angels was the weirdest detective book I'd ever encountered, with futuristic CSI way ahead of its time.
The power levels of the conflicts in Moving Mars and Anvil of Stars seemed unimaginable.
Slant, one of my favorites, felt like something like cyberpunk, but something else as well.
I've always thought him as my favorite of the Killer B's (Bear, Brin, Benford). And one of the authors that really changed how I thought about things
- Constellation Games, The Martian, Too Like the Lightning, Moving Mars, Nexus, Blue Remembered Earth,and The Caryatids are some hopeful SF that's come out recently that I recommend.
