Marsbound

June 16, 2008
As the Phoenix spacecraft begins examining Mars for conditions favorable to life, two renowned science fiction authors create very different stories of Martian cultures.
Marsbound
Joe Haldeman
. Ace
, $24.95 (304p) ISBN 978-0-441-01595-5

Hugo and Nebula–winner Haldeman infuses this yarn with his teen narrator's intelligent curiosity. Carmen Dula, part of the first human colony on Mars, looks like a typical young adult heroine: distanced from her parents, irritated by her bratty younger sibling and beset by tyrannical colony administrator Dargo Solingen. Then she accidentally discovers real Martians living in an underground city and has to convince Solingen that her story is true. When the Martians reveal a terrible threat to life on Earth, it's up to Carmen and her friends to save the day. Recalling Robert A. Heinlein's Red Planet
and Podkayne of Mars
, Haldeman updates the Martian setting while keeping faith in his characters' ability to respond to unexpected challenges.

August 1, 2008
The career path of recent high-school graduate Carmen Dula takes an adventurous turn when her family wins a lottery that sends them to the first human settlement on Mars. After an alternately tedious and exhilarating six-month journey, Carmen gets her first taste of living under a crimson sky while butting heads with authoritarian colony leader Dargo. In fact, its a fateful run-in with Dargo that prompts Carmens rebellious solo walk on the Martian surface and near-fatal plunge into an underground cavern. Her unimaginable savior is a multilimbed, potato-headed creature that has apparently been living with his brethren under the Martian surface for untold millennia. When the astonishment of first contact gives way to an orgy of study by the colonys xenobiologists, a new shock presents itselfthe Martians are the artificial creation of a distant alien race dubbed the Others, to whose universe humans are definitely not welcome. As one of sfs most consistently inventive storytellers, Haldeman gets bountiful mileage out of this ingenious blend of Martian exploration and extraterrestrial anthropology.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2008, American Library Association.)