Blue Mars

Kim Stanley Robinson

Book 3 in Robinson's Mars Trilogy (started in Red Mars and followed in Green Mars). Blue Mars is the story of nation formation. After the revolution, when you are basically independent and recognized as so by everyone, what do you do? How do you transition from a "leave us alone" mentality that has driven culture for many years of revolution into a "we are just like you" mentality that makes you part of civilization. Of course this is not easy, and Robinson recognizes that it takes time. Fortunately his plot device of long life lets him tell the story of nation building over decades without having to introduce new characters. The thing that I love about Robinson's story is that he (or his characters at least) are committed to non-violent action. Every time the "natural" reaction is to take up arms, or escalate tension via "normal" political processes, a few of the First Hundred step in, holding the vision that this nation that is being created is different and will not interact "normally". It is rare to see such a commitment to this value in any literature. In this case, it takes the fact that the key players in exploration, revolution and nation building are consistent across the couple hundred years that it takes to accomplish the goal. This extreme long view is a severe contraction to the current political scene or corporate scene with 2-3 year re-election cycles or quarterly profit reports. Can a great civilization be built (or survive) with only "short-view" pressures? What cultural pressures can be brought to bear to encourage a long view in either time or scale (to deal with planetary scale problems)? I love that Robinson puts all these socio-political thoughts in the forefront of my thinking.

My critique of the book is that Robinson continues to use long, meandering descriptions of geology or relationship, when at this point in the series, brevity could accomplish the same thing. I often wonder if a long, meandering passage about how slow and boring life can be is intended to bring the reader into emotional congruence with the characters. That is, the characters are experiencing the difficulties of a slow life, and in my reading I feel that slowness. I tend to think, that even if it is intentional, a good editor could help with pacing without destroying the reader/character connection. For this reason, I would say I enjoyed this book less than the first two. If you don't mind leaving long plot lines unresolved, go ahead and wait on this last volume until you have nothing else to read.

Wait