A Literary High - 2021 Round-Up

 

Here we are again, another year of reading against the dark background of the pandemic, failing democracies and world leaders fiddling while the world burns, oh, and an engagement (my own). Reading is a fine way of grounding oneself while such events come and go, perhaps the best way. It's been a year of either starting or finishing off trilogies. I completed the Remembrance of Earth's Past trilogy, finally reading Cixin Liu's Death's End (2010), which proved to be not only the best book of the year, but also one of the greatest science fiction novels I have ever read. I read two novels of Jack Vance's Lyonesse trilogy - Suldrun's Garden (1983) and The Green Pearl (1986), both were excellent and also made me want to read more fantasy. I began Kim Stanley Robinson's Mars trilogy with Red Mars (1992), which I also rated as Sublime, joining Colm Toibin's The Magician (2021) and Don DeLillos' Zero K (2016) as among the best books I've read this year. 

In hindsight it was quite a good year for reading, with other notable books being Walter Tevis' brilliant novel The Queen's Gambit (1983) and Curtis Sittenfeld's alternate history novel, Rodham (2020). It was also great to read two Iain M. Banks books, with the short story collection The State of the Art (1991) compelling me to read The Culture novel The Hydrogen Sonata (2012), which was both excellent and a lot of fun. There's always a book that doesn't measure up, and although regular readers will know that I am not a harsh critic, the Alfred Bester novel, Tiger Tiger (1956) was absurd and bloated science fiction, and a very disappointing read. As for the year ahead? I look forward to completing the trilogies I began and my aim will be to read more classics. Reading The Magician about Thomas Mann has reminded me that there's a whole range of classics I've never read, Mann himself and also the Russian greats. I just need to prepare myself for all of the extremely long names and intense existential themes, which shouldn't be a problem, as it will be light reading compared to the daily news...

Red Mars - Kim Stanley Robinson (1992)

 

Rating: Sublime

I put off reading Red Mars for a long time, thinking that it would be a pretty dry narrative, with Robinson being the reigning king of realistic hard science fiction. How wrong I was! I could not believe just how compelling Red Mars is and how well Robinson captures both the practical difficulties of colonising Mars and the drama of the endeavour, not to mention the personal stories of the ensemble of characters, all of whom are brilliantly well rounded. It didn't take me long to realise just how special this novel is, the opening section, 'Festival Night' is set well after colonisation, and acts to pique interest, with a number of conflicts between the 'First Hundred' on display. The next section, 'The Voyage Out', is a stunning depiction of what a voyage to Mars might be like. It's completely fascinating and kept humming along by Robinson's efficient, yet engaging narrative style. Robinson is a superb writer, getting the balance between depicting characters interior lives and the practicalities of voyaging through space absolutely right. Robinson juggles the multitude of characters perfectly throughout the novel, all with their own strengths and weaknesses, flawed, like any humans would be, even though they are the chosen elite, dubbed the 'First Hundred'. Robinson deals with the problem of balancing so many characters by concentrating on around a dozen, establishing them as the principle protagonists; my favourites being the Russians, Nadia Chernyshevski, Maya Toitovna and the redoubtable Arkady Bogdanov, who has very different ideas about what should happen on Mars. The Americans are interesting in their own way, the good-guy hero John Boone, the sociopathic Frank Chalmers and the Asperger-like scientist Saxifrage Russell. Often long sections of the narrative are extrapolated via the perspective of one of these characters and you really get to know them and their personal and professional struggles whist you are exploring the surface of Mars.

The planet in question

As the novel progresses it becomes increasingly absorbing, with superb descriptions of the Martian landscape. Robinson perfectly evokes the alien beauty of the planet, particularly when several of the characters journey to the North Pole in order to set up an automated supply chain of blocks of ice to provide the fledgling colony with fresh water. Throughout the novel the hard science of building habitats, beginning terraforming and dealing with the politics of the situation, both within the 'First Hundred' and the authorities on Earth, is depicted so well that I just can't imagine any other writer doing a better job. Red Mars is totally epic in scale and things get really interesting once more and more people start arriving and infrastructure, such as a space elevator, is built. To reveal more would risk the intrigue of the novel for new readers; all I will say is that the novel has more drama and mystery than would you'd expect. Robinson also explores the philosophical aspects of humanity being on Mars and altering it forever, through individual musings and a rift between those in the "First Hundred' who are for terraforming and those who are against humanity, yet again, altering an environment for their own ends. At one point there is an amazing debate about this issue, which left me amazed at Robinson's insight and erudition. The novel's long endgame is exciting and unpredictable. Once it resolved I was bereft at losing access to Robinson's incredible world-building. Fortunately being the first in a trilogy, with Green Mars (1993) and Blue Mars (1996) to come, I'll be able indulge myself again in the near future. If you are a fan of hard science fiction, you should indulge yourself too....