Kim Stanley Robinson is the author of this Nebula & Hugo Award-winning trilogy. Red Mars won the Nebula for best SF novel of 1992. It begins an action-packed and thoughtful tale of the exploration and settlement of Mars, with both personal and ideological conflicts, in the early 21st century. (For his books I’ve read, click on his name.)

I received this highly praised and awarded Mars Trilogy as a birthday gift from a friend who is a big Sci Fi fan, but I delayed starting to read it because I was intimidated by the size (nearly 2000 very small-font pages in total). But once I started it I got hooked and so I read much of it at night (when I had more time to read) in Mar ’09. The cast of characters is huge, but Kim Stanley Robinson describes the lead characters in sufficient detail as to make them become well known and almost predictable. Red Mars starts with “The First Hundred,” who were carefully selected on Earth – many of them were scientists or engineers, of course. They arrived on Mars in 2026. The human drama takes up more of the book than do the fantastic engineering and scientific feats, but rather than detract from the books, it makes them more realistic. But it is obvious that Robinson used up-to-date knowledge about Mars. Much of the new knowledge of Mars since these books came out was predicted by Robinson, which adds greatly to this trilogy.

The ultimate goal for this UN mission is to make frozen Mars warm enough and with a breathable atmosphere for humans to colonize it and produce all they need for sustainability on Mars. Several ways are used to heat up Mars, ranging from black dust on the polar caps, putting a giant mirror in orbit to concentrate more sunlight on Mars, to drilling deep into geothermal hot spots to create huge vents of hot gases. But I found most interesting the human interactions in the very unusual lifestyles they must create just to survive. This puts very unusual pressure on the First Hundred. The main characters have emotions that range from rivalries to friendship to hate and even murder. Some of the people become “Reds” – opposed to the original idea of “terraforming” Mars because they have come to love the red planet as they found it, and only want to explore the fascinating terrain, content to live in pressurized “tents” and studying Mars as it was when they arrived. People from various cultures chose to maintain, as much as possible, the lifestyles and values their societies had on Earth. There are Arab, Japanese, Russian, and American groups within the First Hundred, although people from different cultures also connect if they have the same goals for Mars. As one would expect, the Reds (antgi-terraforming) and the Greens (pro-terraforming) are at odds with each other, But almost all of the First Hundred want freedom from the powerful multinationals on overcrowded Earth that have become more powerful than the UN or most nations. To really get into this trilogy requires commitment of much time, but if one chooses to do so, I don’t think you’ll regret it. This is the best Sci Fi series that I have read, so I recommend it highly to “serious” Sci Fi fans or fans of human nature under stress.