The Martian Chronicles

With the passing of the master (Isaac Asimov)the question is hardly asked anymore. Who's better, Bradbury or Asimov? The two were both born in 1920 and they made their fame in the forties, fifties, and sixties, writing (and pioneering) a kind of fantastical pulp fiction that would eventually become known as science fiction. In short, the two men were giants of the genre and so their work, their art, naturally invited comparison. I have always loved them both, Asimov for his great ideas and Bradbury for his great storytelling voice. Asimov, the university professor, was trained as a hard science man--physics, mathematics, chemistry. If he had not made his name as a writer, he probably would have designed the first rocket ship that landed on the moon. In fact, we owe him thanks for the word "ROBOT", the rules for governing them (ha-ha-ha, see I Robot), and the fledgling field of robotics itself. Is there a more representative work of science fiction than The Foundation Trilogy? Though Asimov is known primarily in literary circles as a science fiction writer, the great man was a thinker of ideas so varied that his books earned him a place in the Guinness Book of World Records: he is the only author who has at least one book in every category of the Dewey Decimal System. In other words, no matter where you are in the library, you can find a book written by Asimov. Bradbury, on the other hand, is not a scientist. In fact, if you check out some of the stories in the Martian Chronicles, his best collection, you will discover working rocket ships that were built with hammers and nails in somebody's barn. You'll find life forms that are bubbles with voices. You'll find a variety of strange and contradictory rules for space flight. And you know what? None of it matters because Bradbury's appeal, unlike Asimov's, has nothing to do with his grasp of scientific principles and the various real and imagined extrapolations thereof. We read Bradbury because he is a writer first and a scientist second. Bradbury could write a story about ice melting in a cup, and we'd be on page 200, reading with pleasure, before we looked up and said, hey, why the heck am I reading a story about ice melting in a cup? Bradbury explores the humanity of his characters when he writes, as the stories in the Martian Chronicles prove, and he has an absolutely addictive storytelling voice. It's kinda like sitting under a tree with your grandfather and listening to him spin yearns. Time passes before you know it, and you wish he could go on talking forever. So here it is then, Read the Martian Chronicles not for the science, but for the fiction, and you will not be disappointed by the master.

...interested in human nature and the frightening part in us, the future of mankind. Like other classics, it still holds up today without seeming dated.So many authors, so many books to love...but The Martian Chronicles has remained one of my very favorites that I have read many many times. To the previous reviewer the reason the African American gets ridiculed so much is because he is the first astronaut to "appreciate & learn from" the Martians and for good reason, he is a minority with a racially torured past (racism, slavery, misunderstood etc etc by the establishment). One who could understand and want to preserve it's beauty. It was a statement. I met Ray Bradbury at a small book signing, I mentioned that The Martian Chronicles reminded me of the plight of the Native American people & other cultures in history must have been in the back of his mind when he wrote this. His response was "yes, you're very correct & observant, thank you"... Absolute brilliant author, very kind man (does book signings very often) & of course the auther of such awe imspiring books as The Illustrated Man, Fahrenheit 451 etc.This is REAL science fiction or should I say thought provoking novels. Always a humanitarian touch, something such dribble these days of very poor (if you want to call it) sci-fi is lacking...God how I miss Rod Serling to give a kick in the pants of Hollywood today...and how I miss the 60's-70's.ps: If you get the chance, see the film version starring Rock Hudson. 3 part (if I remember correctly, 6 hours) made for TV series. While it doesn't cover the entire book (films rarely do), it does a very good job getting the point across. You'll love the "golden bee gun", the Martians masks & the "sand ships"...

After reading Fahrenheit 451 in my high school English class, I was quick to ask my teacher what other books by Bradbury that he would reccomend. He told me to check out the Martian Chronicles...and so I did. When I started reading the book, I thought nothing could touch the breath taking sci-fi epic that I had just read by Bradbury...but I was wrong. The Martian Chronicles starts out with a bang and ends with an unusually happy ending. In between, you are taken on a roller coaster ride of climactic events; and although the book is broken up into several separate mini-stories, all of them intertwine with each other brilliantly. What puts Bradbury's work above other science fiction writers is that although his books are fictional, they have a great deal of real life meaning. Several parts of this book depict how the ignorant humans are so quick to ravage a vast world's ancient history and land. "The rockets set the bony meadows afire, turned rock to lava, turned wood to charcoal, transmitted water to steam, made sand and silica into green glass which lay like shattered mirrors reflecting the invasion, all about. The rockets came like drums, beating in the night. The rockets came like locusts, swarming and settling in blooms of rosy smoke. And from the rockets ran men with hammers in their hands to beat the strange world into a shape that was familiar to the eye, to bludgeon away all the strangeness." (Page 78-'The Locusts')Bradbury uses his excellent way with words to artistically describe the futuristic destruction of a world, which all relate to one common principle, the same principle many of his books relate to: We are afraid of what we don't understand. Bradbury paints an eerily familiar picture in this book and reminds us how eager humans are to destroy anything that is strange to us. The way that he explains the human condition is way ahead of his time. In summary, The Martian Chronicles is nothing short of incredible. There are no dull parts in it; you will want to keep reading it until you're done...then you will want to read it again and again. Bradbury uses language extremely well to convey to us the flaws in human thinking. This book is a must read for anyone in high school or older, whether you're a fan of science fiction or not. It's my all time favorite book, and if you spend a measly 6 bucks, you will see why.

The Martian Chronicles is, in many ways, one of science fiction's most important novels. It's deemed an essential read on almost all notable lists, is the book that broke Bradbury into the mainstream, and was the single most widely read SF book during the 1950's. This book is not a novel per se, but rather a collection of separately linked stories that chronicle, in about as many ways as you can imagine, Man's experiences with Mars, hence the title. Though it covers a span of time from 1999-2026, it is, like all great SF, a commentary on the times in which it was written, rather than the times it is set in. This book is a startling example of human folly. In contrast to much science fiction (from The War of the Worlds onward) the Martians in Bradbury's universe are calm, peaceful, and dreamlike (for the most part, anyway) rather than vicious and malicious. This book shows how humans-arrogant, self-righteous, and irrespectful-can and probably will ruin a beautiful, peaceful planet through ignorance and lack of respect. Also in the book are situations depicting ways in which other races we meet in space may react to us. I found these situations to be highly original and imaginative, sometimes we fail to realize that there are other ways for them to react besides peaceful, cooperative tranquility and war. Sprinkled throughout the seriousness of the stories mentioned above, are lighter, somewhat comical tales that liven up the pace a bit. Through fictional situations, this book also manages to comment on such issues as racism, slavery, social life, marriage, etc. A highly interesting read. Though it is a short read (less than 200 pages) it feels like an epic. By the time you are done with the book, you will feel like you have witnessed a saga, a great work of art, a feeling that few books indeed, much less ones this short, manage to accomplish. The last two stories in the book are startling in their differences. There Will Come Soft Rains is an utterly believable, highly pessimistic, and ultimately thought-provoking piece of work followed by The Million Year Picnic, a contrastly optimistic, hopeful story. These two situations are beautiful in their contrast and a fitting ending to a wonderful book.

This book clearly deserves more than five stars. It is one of the most moving and important set of observations about our human issues ever written in either science fiction or science fantasy form. Ray Bradbury wrote these short stories in the late 1940s at a time when we knew almost nothing about Mars. Some scientists even thought there were probably canals and the remnants of a dead or dying Martian civilization on Mars. Written as science fiction originally by Mr. Bradbury, our growing knowledge of Mars makes these assumptions science fantasy today. But don't let that shift rob these stories of their power over you. But Mars was just the setting for a more serious set of questions. Mr. Bradbury was concerned that the world was too full of hate, war, short-sightedness, and greed to amount to much. He despaired as to whether humans would survive the discovery of the atomic bomb. From this raw material of human excess, he stitched together a powerful vision of our choices -- to operate at our best . . . or our worst. He appeals to our better selves in a vivid way that will be unforgettable to you, if you are like me.The development of the book has an interesting history. Mr. Bradbury was in his late twenties, and had written quite a few short stories. While visiting New York, he showed his short stories to publishers who liked them. The publishers advised him that there was a market for novels, but not much of one for books of short stories. Then one night it hit him, he had the raw material for a novel about Mars if he simply wrote a few transition stories to fit with ones he had already written. He sat up late that night writing the book proposal, and sold it the next day. That concept became The Martian Chronicles. Mr. Bradbury had recently read Winesburg, Ohio and was impressed by that book with the potential to use a series of stories as a way to tell a community's history. It seemed natural to use that structure for his Martian book.The book covers a time period from 1999 through 2026, starting with the first manned expedition to Mars from Earth. The American astronauts do find Martians. The complications of the first four expeditions come from the interactions between humans and Martians, and are unexpected and intriguing. The stories explore the implications of a race being telepathic in very revealing ways. Much of the human colonization of Mars in the book pits those who want to recreate Earth against those who appreciate what is special about Mars. So exploitation versus conservation is one theme in the book. As a backdrop for the stories, you will read about all of the themes of the Westward migration in the United States from the eradication of the native peoples and culture, to excess exploitation of natural resources, to the desire to be free of "civilized" society.There are wonderful stories in here against racisim, censorship of books (which became the basis of Mr. Bradbury's later book, "Farenheit 451"),