We Have Always Lived on Mars by Cecil Castellucci
My rating: 4/5 cats
“It is hard to be alone,” I say. “I often do not know why we try so hard to survive.”
the many-generations-later descendants of earthling colonizers on mars continue to live as their ancestors before them, stranded but adapting to life on the most foreign of soils after communications with earth terminated abruptly long ago, leaving them to contend with an inhospitable climate, limited resources, timeworn equipment, and the psychological strain of isolation and close quarters. they are unable to travel more than two hours from base because of the limited capacity of their air tanks, and they must control their population to match the original number of colonists: 24. it’s a small, scrabbling existence.
until the day a young woman named nina discovers she can breathe without her mask, allowing her to travel further than two hours in any direction, and she is sent out to explore, bring back supplies and information, but what she really does is stumble upon something that’s gonna blow everyone’s minds.
i’m curious about how this tiny story is going to grow up into a movie, especially since so much of its weight is in its ending, but i’m interested in seeing how it gets fleshed out. even though i am no expert on martian living, some of the story’s details gave me pause as i was reading, in that “hey, wait a minute, science…” way that i think will benefit from having a team of consultants on board to develop the finer points and add more cool stuff. scientists know all kinds of cool stuff.
this is a story that is easily ruined by a careless reviewer, so i’m going to err on the side of courtesy and be all circumspect here and you can go discover it for yourself because again – it’s not long. but i will say that there are many touchpoints here: books, film, television that covers the same ground, but that doesn’t make this one any less fun. i was a little confused about why there were goats on mars
but i did a little research into the matter, using all of the reputable scientific news sites, and apparently space goats are quite common.
so maybe the film won’t need consultants after all.
read it for yourself here:
https://www.tor.com/2013/05/07/we-hav…
