Some of the newer characters recurr so that later stories will make much more sense if you've read the earlier ones. Many assume you know the characters and plot of the novels.

You need to keep your wits about you: some of the stories aren't set on Mars - some are set in an alternative timeline from that set out in the novels. If my theory were a submarine, this book is the depth charge that sinks it: not only is it necessary to read the stories in order for it all to make sense, it is best read whilst the details of KSR's Mars trilogy are still fresh in the mind (which wasn't the case for me), because we're back on Mars with the First Hundred and others for some stories that didn't quite fit in the novels and they are told in chronological order.except when we aren't, that is. Treat them that way and they might appear in a new light. They are almost always published individually in magazines prior to collection in paperback volumes. Read them in any order you like, read only one then put it back on the shelf, if you want. I encourage people to think of each story as the basic element, not each volume. I think this might be why some people end up not liking the short story form: they think the way to read them is 10 - 20 at a time by one author, one shortly after the other. Yet many people insist upon reading them as if they were novels start at page one and carry on until page the last. I tell people that short story collections aren't novels.

The Martians is a unique collection of previously unpublished fiction, a fascinating addition to Robinson’s oeuvre, and a must for all lovers of the red planet. Presenting unforgettable stories of hope and disappointment, of fierce physical and psychological struggles, The Martians is an epic chronicle of a planet that represents one of humanity’s most glorious possibilities. As the planet is transformed from an unexplored and forbidding terrain to a troubled image of a re-created Earth, we meet the First Hundred explorers-men and women who are bound together by Earth’s tenuous toehold on Mars. Robinson returns to the realm he has made his own, in a work that brilliantly weaves together a futuristic setting with a poetic vision of the human spirit engaged in a drama as ancient as mankind itself.įrom a training mission in Antarctica to blistering sandstorms sweeping through labyrinths of barren canyons, the interwoven stories of The Martians set in motion a sprawling cast of characters upon the surface of Mars.

Green Mars by Kim Stanley Robinson