This is a
list of articles, interviews, and reviews related to my science fiction series
“Red Desert”. New
articles are added on the top. Check them
out!
A great adaptation of the novel by Herbert George Wells
The image above is property of BBC.
This BBC miniseries from 2019 (directed
by Craig Viveiros and produced by Mammoth Screen), set in the Edwardian period,
is yet another adaptation of the novel by Herbert George Wells (published
in 1898) and consists from three episodes of about an hour.
It is considered one of the most faithful transpositions of the book both
because of the historical setting (despite being set a few years later, in
1905), which further highlights humanity’s impotence in the face of an alien
invasion, and for the narration of events itself.
What is added to the original plot is the personal
story of the two protagonists, Amy and George, who live
together despite the fact that they are not married and that he is unable to
obtain a divorce from his wife. These two only partially replace the narrator
of the book and his wife, however, shifting the attention to the female
character, who was completely marginal in the original text. They are played by Eleanor Tomlinson (already
seen in Poldark in
the role of Demelza and in The Pemberley Mysteries) and Rafe Spall (son
of Timothy Spall; seen in Prometheus, Jurassic World — Fallen Kingdom, and Men in Black
International).
Furthermore, the main narrative is intertwined with
the one in the future, in which we see Amy and her son wandering in the devastated world
after the “failed” invasion of the tripods.
Even though I had not read the book, I immediately
perceived the Wellsian imprint in the story, starting with the
character of Ogilvy, the scientist also present in the novel and
here played by the great Robert Carlyle, and continuing with
the attempt
to a scientific approach, although limited by the knowledge of
the time, towards the consequences of the invasion, although this last
post-apocalyptic part from the point of view of the female protagonist was
added to the original story.
While reading various reviews, I noticed that the main criticisms concern
a certain depressing effect of the story, its slowness in some parts, the lack
of characterisation due to the limited time of the narrative (which perhaps,
therefore, is not so slow) and even the acting skills of the main actors. Someone
said it was a missed opportunity.
Well, I don’t agree at all. Personally, I
greatly appreciated this miniseries, both from a visual point of view and from
that of the actors’ performance and the pace of the narrative.
I watched this series in the original language, and as
always in these circumstances, this led me to focus completely on the story
without the slightest distraction. Furthermore, while watching it, I already knew
that the ending would be sad. Some of it was immediately
obvious due to the flash-forwards of the protagonist with her son in that
hellish setting, and some of it was told to me precisely in these terms.
Faced with all this, however, I just had fun.
I like Tomlinson a lot (I’m a Poldark fan) and I
appreciated her performance. And I also liked the way she interacted with Spall
and also with the character of Ogilvy and Frederick (Rupert Graves), the
co-protagonist’s brother.
The story between the two protagonists, who challenge
the conventions of the time, goes perfectly alongside the political
problems, which are shown to us at the beginning of the
miniseries (with the frictions between the British Empire and Russia), in
highlighting how many aspects considered important not
only fade into the background, but are completely swept away by the encounter and
clash with a species from Mars that intends to eliminate
our civilisation and take possession of our planet.
Obviously, the story of the two protagonists offers a
further element of conflict that is appreciable by the contemporary public and
increases their involvement.
As for the rest, I found both the
historical reconstruction and the special effects very
effective. Watching the immense tripods move through London at the beginning of
the twentieth century is fantastic, precisely because it is completely unusual
and yet extremely realistic, and underlines even more the sense of human
fragility towards an adversary that is too bigger and technologically advanced to
be even just faced. In some ways it mocks the expansionist aims of the British
Empire, which feels invincible in the face of any enemy and is instead forced
to come to terms with the hard reality.
I particularly liked the part in which Ogilvy,
together with the protagonists, begins to study what he believes to be a meteorite and
then what happens when the latter wakes up, the shell opens, and we see a
sphere inside capable of impressing a reflected image on itself. Not to mention
what happens next.
The sense of helplessness of the characters is
effectively conveyed to the viewer, as is the fear of the terrifying aliens,
particularly in the last episode, when they find themselves hunted by the
latter (whose appearance we finally see), and the story takes on horror nuances.
Here the dramatic element reaches its peak, and the inevitable sacrifice has a
very strong effect due to the involvement it creates in the spectator.
The part set in the post-apocalyptic future,
with which the series ends, actually has something depressing about it. I, in
particular, don’t like post-apocalyptic stories for this reason. Even from a
visual point of view, it seems it wants to oppress. But everything is saved by
the bittersweet
ending, which gives rise to hope in the protagonist, and in the
spectator.
I
close with a quirk.
Although this version is faithful to the novel in many parts, there is another
version in the form of a film which seems to be completely faithful. It was
produced in 2005 in the wake of the concurrent release of Spielberg’s film
starring Tom Cruise and Dakota Fanning. This is “The War of the
Worlds” by Timothy Hines.
There have been numerous other adaptations of this
work, ranging from the first very famous radio show by Orson Welles (1938),
through musicals and video games, up to comics (including Mickey Mouse in
Italy), as well as obviously films and TV series. An almost complete list is available in an
article dedicated to it on Wikipedia.
Here is the original trailer for the series.
This
article is taken from a phantom episode of FantascientifiCast(Italian podcast about science fiction), recorded in 2020 but
never released.
It was
really difficult for me to finish reading this book. If I hadn’t purchased the
print edition, I probably wouldn’t have gone beyond the first 30-50 pages. Yet
I had read the previous ones, “Red Mars” and “Green Mars”, and thought I was
prepared. Well, I was
wrong. “Red Mars”
actually had a nice, intriguing storyline, starting with a murder and then
taking us back to make up what had happened. It was full of pure scientific
speculation in the field of astronautics and the colonisation of Mars. Sure, those
parts were long, but they were well balanced with the events narrated, and
since I found them interesting, their reading had gone smoothly. Less
interesting were those related to psychological topics, which in fact I’m not
at all ashamed to say I skipped. However, despite everything, it had a plot
that, for better or worse, developed throughout the novel. There was a bit of
intrigue, even suspense, which made me want to keep reading to find out what
happened next (or what had happened before). Although I did not appreciate the
ending, I had no doubts that I had read a novel with all the elements necessary
to be defined as such. With “Green
Mars”, things got more difficult. The author focused more on the individual
stories, one by one, which tended to end when I began to get attached to the
characters. The minor appreciation I had in reading this book led me to delay
reading the last of the trilogy for several years. I only started reading it
because I already had it and it seemed only right to get to the end of the
story. What I
would not have expected was the absence of a real story. “Blue Mars”
is Robinson’s attempt to imagine the future of humanity’s conquest of space,
starting from Mars and then going beyond. World building is, in fact,
exceptional and represents the reason why I decided to give the book three
stars, instead of the two that better reflect my feelings. Robinson
certainly did some huge research to write it. And he shows an immense fantasy.
I can only bow to these two aspects. Moreover,
with his beautiful prose, he describes a terraformed Mars that is certainly
fascinating. But he
forgot that he was writing a novel, which, as such, needs a plot, in which the
characters must have a purpose to achieve, conflicts to deal with and a growth
of some kind, and above all that the reader expects a story arc. But there
was none of this. Each part
is narrated from the point of view of a character, but in fact, nothing or at
least nothing relevant happens. We continue to move forward in the decades and
to pass from one telling to another of political developments and the
description of places. Through numerous long pages, full of reports, everything
is told and almost nothing is shown. The few real scenes, that is, those in
which the characters interact or even speak to each other, add nothing to the
narrative, since there really isn’t one. The characters are in fact just a side
element. The reason
it took me over four months to read this book is that it bored me terribly. And, when I was not bored, I felt a sense of
sadness for the glimpses of existence (often depressing) of the characters that
the author threw there, from time to time, to avoid turning the book into a
speculative essay on the future.
Lately I’m
quite interested in European productions for what concerns TV series, so when
last autumn I found out that Rai 4 broadcast a French science fiction series
set on Mars, I immediately threw myself at it. I admit that I didn’t have
very high expectations, since it was evident that it was a production with a
limited budget, and instead, I had to change my mind.
“Missions”
(whose title can be pronounced in both French and English) is a French series
created by Ami Cohen, Henri Debeurme and Julien Lacombe and produced by
Empreinte Digitale in 2017. So far it includes two seasons, but a third
has already been commissioned and is in the pre-production phase. Each season
consists of 10 episodes of approximately 20 minutes each.
The cast,
mostly French, also includes the Italian actress Giorga Sinicorni, in the
role of Alessandra Najac, which is one of the most controversial and
therefore most interesting characters in the series. Omar Serafini and I had the
pleasure of interviewing
her recently on FantascientifiCast (in Italian).
The series
follows the ESAmission Ulysses 1, the first manned
Mars mission. While the spacecraft is arriving at the red planet, the crew
is informed that a NASA mission, Zillion 1, in which nuclear propulsion
was used, arrived earlier, but there is no more news from the astronauts,
therefore Ulysses 1 has become a rescue mission. In the meantime,
a third mission is coming, Zillion 2.
A
particular aspect is that both missions are financed by private individuals.
That of ESA by William Meyer (Swiss billionaire), who is also part of the crew.
That of NASA by Ivan Goldstein (American billionaire) and is carried out by his
company called, in fact, Zillion.
I couldn’t
help but see in these two characters a sort of “good” and “bad” side of
contemporary public figures in the private aerospace sector. Meyer’s
character, in particular, with the desire to go personally to the Red Planet
immediately reminded me of Elon Musk.
The series
also opens on the story of the Russian cosmonaut Vladamir Komarov, who
died during the Soyuz 1 mission in 1967. It’s an original choice, which
allows the public to know more about this late space hero.
I can’t say
too much about the plot, which is characterised by continuous twists
developed throughout the serialisation. In each 20-minute episode, the plot
goes on seemingly slowly, then accelerates towards the end and leaves us with a
twist.
Fortunately,
three episodes were broadcast by Rai 4 in the same day (then made available on
Rai Play)!
The story
includes a set of elements already seen in Mars and non-Mars science fiction,
but the peculiarity lies in the way they are mixed.
Among the
original aspects there is the character of Komarov, or rather of
something that seems him, which has an important role within the plot. And in
this regard, a series of flashbacks allow us to know more about the real
Komarov, even if he turns out to be marginal in the story. However, it’s
interesting and adds a European touch to the narrative.
The whole
series is full of flashbacks, which provide information on the
characters. In the second season, in particular, they serve to explain what
happened in the past five years after the end of the first.
This
alternation of different timelines allows you to discover the story little by
little, providing unexpected twists.
It’s a
narrative choice that I particularly love, since it is able to surprise the
viewer (or the reader), showing them certain information only when it can
obtain the maximum effect.
The
first season cost 1.5 million euros and was shot in just 27 days. And despite this, the result is
truly commendable. But it’s in the second that, against a budget
increase of up to 2 million (therefore certainly not stellar), we observe the
opening of the story to new possibilities, which are accompanied by more
vivid visual effects and the use of a greater number of settings, which
make it even more realistic.
There is a
strongly mystical element in the story, although a scientific touch is
given to it, or an attempt is made. Here I have found disturbing similarities
with “Red
Desert”, although more in form than in substance. There are connected
minds, a biological element, artificial intelligence that rebels, a protagonist
who secretly comes out of a Martian base and then gets hurt (and then is
saved), people who suddenly die in accidents or in mysterious circumstances,
people who lose it and kill, affairs among the character. But there’s also
something else that has nothing to do with my Martian series, for example,
portals that remind me of Stargate and other supertechnologies of
unknown origin (at least so far).
Despite the
small budget, the visual quality is very good. There are some
simplifications, both scientific and with regard to some technical aspects
(such as the space suits, which are obviously not pressurised), but this does not
negatively affect the result, since we are totally taken by the events
occurring to the characters, that the details have very little importance.
The direction, photography and editing are very well done, and the never
cumbersome music underlines the story effectively. The whole is
characterised by a certain sense of reality. One has the impression of
dealing with a very near real future.
I’ve read,
on social networks and in articles on other blogs and magazines, some negative
opinions on dialogues, but I don’t agree. We are too accustomed to
Anglophone products and this is, instead, a French product. And you can
also see it in the dialogues. Indeed, the excellent work of adaptation and
dubbing, at least in my language (Italian), manages to blur any “theatrical”
excesses and also makes this aspect suitable for everything else.
Maybe Giorgia
Sinicorni’s self-dubbing (in Italian) tends to stand out a bit in the set
of voices, but it’s something inevitable, since she isn’t a voice actress and
at the same time the Italian voice actors are so good that they would make
anyone make a bad impression. In any case, this small detail tends to disappear
in the second season, partly because there has certainly been an improvement in
Sinicorni’s voice performance and partly because we have got used to her voice,
thanks also to the fact that the character has a larger role in the story. And,
let’s face it, being the only Italian character in the series, it makes
sense that she “sounds” different from the others.
However, to
appreciate the performance of Sinicorni, I
recommend watching her show reel, in which there are two clips of scenes
from this series: one in French and one in English.
Perhaps it
would be worthwhile to watch again the two seasons in the original language, as
soon as Rai Play will make them available again (in Italy), which will surely
happen with the release of the third. In the meantime, the French version of the first season is available on DVD and Blu-ray
on Amazon.
Below,
however, you can watch the trailer.
Although
that of “Missions” is a story in which the aspect that goes beyond
science has a role of some importance, I found myself comparing it to the drama
portion of the docudrama “Mars” by National Geographic. The direction it
takes is completely different, because there are different purposes, but
concerning general quality, making the due proportions of budget, I believe
that “Missions” has nothing to envy to the American series.
Also, I
think it looks a lot like (and maybe has been influenced by) “Defying Gravity”, an American series
from 2009, cancelled after the first season, in which the same elements are
mixed (relationships between the characters, a mystery that goes beyond
science, space exploration in the near future) and the same techniques
(flashbacks), but obviously with a different budget. I admit, too, that I was
inspired by it when I conceived the plot of “Red Desert”.
It’s in a certain sense the same type of science fiction, which, starting
from distinctly hard elements, mixes them with something softer, not well
defined, capable of stimulating the spectator’s imagination.
In
conclusion, I really appreciated the imaginative effort of this series,
supported by an excellent script, with a fast pace and capable of
continuously giving rise to new questions. If I’d had both seasons
available since the beginning, I would have seen them in two or three days, so
much was my curiosity at the end of each episode.
In any
case, all this, together with a good cast and a very well-finished visual
component, in my opinion, makes “Missions” a bet won in the context of
European science fiction.
I returned
to Varese after two years and this time I stayed there for eight days, in which
I immersed myself in university life and in this beautiful Lombard city a few
steps away from Switzerland. I must say that the weather has favoured me.
Living in Cagliari (Sardinia), I was worried about having to fight bad weather
and cold. Instead, I enjoyed mostly beautiful sunny days, which served as the
setting for the conference titled “Mars: when will we go there and what will
we find? ” on 5 December 2018in the
main hall of the University of Insubria and the “Self-publishing
workshop in multimedia systems” between 6-11 December and addressed to the
students of the same university enrolled in the courses in Communication Sciences
and Communication Sciences and Techniques.
The conference
on Mars was a very special event for me. I found myself sharing the table
with two scientists like Roberto Orosei and Enrico Flamini of whom I had
only heard so far in the news spread by ASI, INAF and the media on the web.
Although it was the first time that we met in person and we had only had the
opportunity to exchange information on our individual parts of the speech by
e-mail, we managed to put together a smooth speech in which the individual
topics treated by each of us were perfectly interlocked with each other, with
different precise references that almost made think of a particular preparation,
which in reality there was not!
It is
really exciting to be talking to a large and interested audience about a
subject that you care about with people who have the same interest and with
whom you share the same scientific and science fiction references.
In my part
of the conference, in addition to introducing some general notions about Mars,
I have highlighted how who works in space exploration and who writes hard
science fiction on the same themes are all part of the same virtuous circle.
The work of scientists like Orosei and Flamini inspires authors like me to
write stories that describe a plausible science and technology. In turn,
stories like mine intrigue readers towards the work of those same scientists.
And the interest of the public is the first engine that allows those who make
science to have the necessary funding to carry out their research.
As a former
scientist (I worked in university research in the past) I cannot but be happy
to provide, in my small way, a contribution with my stories towards a
greater public awareness of the importance of space exploration, especially
in a country like Italy, which is a true world power in this area, yet this
excellence is not known to most of the local population.
By putting
together my fascination for the Red Planet, and in general for space, my
skills in the biological field, as well as my teaching soul, I found
myself writing a kind of science fiction in which I describe a realistic
science, even though with some licences, by making sure that my books offer
both entertainment and dissemination of science knowledge.
In
particular, my intent is to show stories through the characters, through
their thoughts and their senses, so that the reader can identify with them and experience
on their skin what it means to live on Mars and explore it. Through Anna
Persson and the other protagonists of “Red Desert” and the Aurora Saga,
the reader meets the signs of the ancient passage of water, dust storms and
devils, marsquakes, impact glass in a crater, blue aurora, huge barchan dunes
and even the underground water of Mars, the same water whose
existence was proved for the first time by the team of scientists headed by
Roberto Orosei and including Enrico Flamini.
Finally,
after sharing with the public my sources of inspiration (Robert Zubrin’s
books “First Landing” and “The Case for Mars”) and some information on other
contemporary hard science fiction authors who dealt with Mars (Kim Stanley
Robinson with his Mars Trilogy and Andy Weir with “The Martian”), I left the
floor to the above-mentioned speakers.
Enrico
Flamini offered an overview on the past and current exploration of Mars, while
Roberto Orosei reported the details of the discovery made in July 2018 with the
MARSIS instrument which is on board ESA’s Mars Express orbiter: a subglacial lake of liquid water near the South Martian pole.
It seems
that what I and many other science fiction writers believed to be a plausible
assumption, namely that there was water trapped under the surface of Mars, is
now confirmed.
In the last
part of the conference a possible timeline of the future exploration was
traced, up to imagine the arrival of the first humans on the Red Planet. In
this regard, I found it amusing that Roberto Orosei showed precisely the
imaginative timeline described in the film “The Martian”, the one based on the
book that I spoke about in my own speech.
I swear we
did not even discuss this detail!
Finally the
round of questions arrived and perhaps the most interesting of all was the last
one proposed by Paolo Musso, organiser and moderator of the event, who asked
each of us if we were optimistic about the human landing on Mars in a very
close future. And even here, without any particular agreement, we went from
a certain pessimism of Orosei to a moderate optimism of Flamini to my full
optimism, supported by the fact that the awareness and enthusiasm of the public
towards space exploration is increasing more and more, thanks to the ease with
which nowadays each of us has complete access to all information. I believe
that the more we commit ourselves to make the common man understand the
importance of this field of science and the more they will be involved in
its development, even more the will in aiming on it will develop, also
from an economic point of view. If this happens, and we are on our way, we will
get to Mars very soon.
Starting on
December 6, instead, I taught my self-publishing class for the second time.
The characteristics of the course have not changed (I mentioned about it in 2016), but I think this time,
compared to the previous one, there was even greater interest from the
students, who proved to be very active during the lectures and asked me
many questions, sometimes even anticipating topics that I would have dealt with
a bit later.
It was nice
to be able to teach these students what being a self-publisher really means,
i.e. becoming part in a professional way of the publishing market as a real
publisher who differs from the traditional ones only because the former is also
the author of the books they publish.
Then there
was the day of the presentation of the projects by the students, and it was
really fun. It ranged from a strategy book for “Risk” to a fantasy novel, from
an essay on the machines of Agostino Ramelli to a paranormal romance trilogy
and so on, without interruption. The students got to the bottom of their
fantasy, accompanying the presentations with images, editorial and
promotional plans and in one case even a sort of soundtrack.
In the end
we all wondered: but when will the book be published?
What a
shame that it was only a simulation, but luckily some of those projects are
real and maybe in the near future we will hear about their authors.
I’d like to
conclude this brief report, which just manages to scratch the surface of
everything that was done and said during those eight days, by thanking once
again all the people who made possible both the conference and the course, but
also in general my pleasant stay in Varese, in particular Paolo Musso
and Alberto Vianelli, Roberto Orosei and Enrico Flamini,
and obviously all the students of the self-publishing course and those
of Professor Musso’s course with whom I had the pleasure to talk.
In October 2018 I had the
opportunity to participate in the second edition of the event titled “Signs
and Voices of Other Worlds” organised in the headquarters of ALTEC in Turin. It was
a fantastic experience during which I was busy for two days in what is defined The
Italian Gateway to the International Space Station, as stated in the huge
inscription at the entrance, and allowed me to meet many interesting people, as
well as talk about my work.
The event itself, the one open to
the public, lasted only one day, 14 October, but we (my partner and I),
as exhibitors, also went to the headquarters of ALTEC the day before to prepare
our booth. It was the first time I attended an event like this. It was nice to
arrange all my science-fiction books (eight titles in several copies) on a
table, along with other promotional stuff, but also to view in advance the scale
model exhibition, which included really extraordinary works of art.
In addition to this, we had the
pleasure of making a short private visit to the factory together with Paolo
Navone, who led us to see, among other things, the control room, the
replica of a module that is part of the ISS and the pool used for astronaut
training, and who guided us, explaining the role of ALTEC in the construction
of the space station and other international space missions. Among these is
that of the ESA IVX mini shuttle, to which Paolo himself participated.
The day ended in a beautiful dinner
together with some people who had organised the event (belonging to CRAL ALTEC
and Centro Modellistico Torinese ) and others who would participate. In
addition to enjoying the company of Marco Ambrosio (who, together with
Paolo, invited me to participate in the event) and his wife, we met some of the
modellers, among whom I cannot avoid to mention Sandro Degiani, who led
the conversation among the people seated next to him (myself included), and
Professor Giancarlo Genta, here in the role of author of science fiction
novels. The legendary Giovanni Mongini, called Vanni, Italian author and
great expert in science fiction, joined the group, who I had met a few hours
earlier at the factory and whom I would find myself in the booth across mine
the next day.
And then came the day of the event.
The first two hours were the easiest part. I had the opportunity to present my
“Red Desert” series in the auditorium as part of the speech called “Female
Mars”, moderated by Maurizio Maschio. Along with me there was Giulia Bassani, who presented her novel “Ad Martem 12” (and was also my neighbour at the exhibition).
Both were asked how we came into
contact with science fiction and what prompted us to start writing it. I said
how I grew up among ET, Back to the Future, Star Wars (hence my nickname Anakina),
the Visitors and many other films and TV series that have brought me closer to
the genre and how it stimulated my imagination. I had many stories in my mind
and at a certain point I realised that the only way to make them real
was to write them down.
Immediately after the presentation,
I returned to my booth, where I welcomed some of the people who had listened to
me in the auditorium and wanted to buy one of my books.
As I said earlier, however, the
difficult part would come later. Starting from 11.30 a.m. new visitors entered
(they were divided into groups of up to 200 people for two hours each, to avoid
overcrowding) who did not know who I was. It was up to me to draw their
attention.
I think the phrase I used most often
was: “Would you like to take a postcard?”
I had with me a lot of promotional
postcards of “Red Desert” to offer visitors and I used them to induce
people to stop at my booth, so that I could explain them something about my
books. Keep in mind that I gave away 54 postcards and for most of them I
stopped a person so that I could tell them the beginning of the story of Anna
Persson and the structure of the Aurora Saga. I repeated it so many
times that my other neighbour, Roberto Azzara, learned it by heart!
I must say that my effort was repaid
and I managed to sell more than half the books I had with me. And so I also
avoided having to send them back to Sardinia by post.
Throughout the day (the event lasted
from 9.30 a.m. to 8 p.m.) I had the opportunity to talk with a lot of people
and among these I found myself in front of an unsuspecting reader, who,
only after seeing the covers, recognised my books and realised he had in
front of him the author of the e-books on his mobile phone. It’s the first
time that I happen to come across one of my readers by chance and it was really
nice to meet him.
That’s not all. A colleague of mine
from Turin also came to meet me: Luca Rossi, independent author of science fiction and
fantasy, who is my friend on Facebook since 2012 and who I finally managed to
meet in person. I was also delighted to meet Dario Tonani (also a
science fiction writer and long time friend on Facebook) and his wife Giusy
again, whom I had already met at Sassari Comics & Games 2015.
In all that chitchat and after
taking some photos with my booth’s neighbours (Giulia, Roberto and Vanni, which
I mentioned before, and Luigi Petruzzelli of Edizioni della Vigna) the hours
flew, interspersed with some short breaks to admire and photograph the scale
models exposed, and go to observe the Sun and then the Moon at the telescope,
thanks to the observation posts set up by Celestia Taurinorum.
In the end, tired but happy, we
left. The next day, waiting to take the flight that would take us back to
Cagliari, at the Caselle Airport we came across the actual ESA mini
shuttle XVI, exposed in the check-in area. A souvenir photo with the spacecraft was the worthy closure
of this beautiful weekend.
I take this opportunity to thank
once again Marco Ambrosio and Paolo Navone, who invited me to participate
in this event. Thank you so much!
Photos (from above): during my
speech together with Maurizio Maschio, my booth, entrance of ALTEC, view from
inside the replica of a module of the ISS, with Luca Rossi, on Mars (more or less)
with Giulia Bassani.
Written by
an aerospace engineering student who dreams of becoming an astronaut, “Ad
Martem 12” is a little jewel of hard science fiction aimed at a young audience,
but that can be appreciated by all ages. Although with some licence and
simplification (it is still a book of fiction, not an essay), in a background
of plausible technology and science, the author tells the story of the first
three children born on the Red Planet, who, reached the age of sixteen, begin
to wonder about their origins and Earth, from which all the other people living
in the Aresland station come from. The story is told from the point of view of
one of them, Jordan, and this is done in such a way as to facilitate the
identification of the reader in the character.
Although I
have not been a teenager for quite some time, in finding myself aware of his
thoughts, fears and sensations, I managed to recover a portion of that part of
me from the past and therefore to understand his motivations and actions.
The protagonists,
in fact, are not just the usual talented young people who are going to face an
adventure like an adult that you can find in most of the young adult stories.
In them you can see all the characteristics of the age in which you are no
longer a child, but at the same time you are not yet an adult. They are
prepared, intelligent and smart, but also naive, distracted and reckless, like
any teenager. The problem is that they live on a desert and lethal planet, and
the slightest mistake could cause their death.
Between
desire to know, dangerous accidents and unexpected feelings, Jordan, Anna and
Yan begin a journey to discover the truth about their past and especially about
the future awaiting them. With an engaging style, in its refined simplicity,
which at times manages to be evocative of landscapes from another world,
Bassani allows us to accompany them and be ain trepidation with and for them,
until the comforting ending that succeeds in being profound without falling
into banality.
Today’s guest on my blog is science fiction
author Kate Rauner.
In this article she tells us about her fascination for the exploration of the
Red Planet, which is the setting of her “Colony of Mars” series.
Mars is in the news these days. We’re learning so
much from NASA and the European Union, and other countries are joining with
their own missions. India, Japan... Mars will be a multi-cultural planet. But
what fascinates me is the number of private
organizations joining the race, and the people ready to take a one-way
trip.
Obsession with Mars isn’t new. The Mars Society is
celebrating its 20th anniversary this year. They run simulations of living and
working on Mars and you can apply to join a mission.
Some recent
entries into the Mars race have a lot of money. Elon Musk is a good example, a
billionaire who wants to live and die on Mars. His SpaceX might make it.
Then there’s Mars
One, a non-profit that seems more aspirational than able, but thousands of
everyday people from all over the world applied to take one-way journeys.
Colonizing Mars will be very difficult. There’s a lot to think about. Here’s
a problem that never dawned on me: MIT students calculated that, to raise
enough food in Martian greenhouses to feed the settlers, gardens would produce
dangerously high oxygen levels.
There are a
lot of ways Mars can kill you.
Cold and a
near-vacuum atmosphere make the surface immediately deadly.
Cosmic and
solar radiation require anyone who wants a long life to shield their habitat
under meters of regolith - that’s Martian soil, but with no detectable life,
calling it soil seems optimistic.
Imagine if
traveling millions of kilometers means you hunker in a burrow, living as a
subsistence farmer, and only venturing onto the surface by remote control
robot.
Technology
can protect settlers from everything except the low gravity (which will damage
your metabolism and immune system as well as your bones and muscles, but let’s
move on) but the biggest challenge is
human nature.
Could you
live confined in tight quarters with a few other people? For the rest of your
life? Results from an experiment at Biosphere 2 make that a dismal prospect, and NASA won’t
release all the findings from their confinement studies. Hmm.
Personally,
I’m not brave enough to move to Mars. I like my favorite coffee shop too much.
That and grocery stores, electricity delivered to my house, and space. Lots and
lots of space to roam around under blue skies in warm sunshine.
But
creating a first foothold is an intriguing project. I explore the challenges and the delights in a science fiction book
about the first twelve settlers. I send diverse settlers, civilians from
different cultures and different backgrounds. These are real people, as real as
I can imagine them, struggling on the real Mars.
I had to
give them technologies we don’t have ready-to-go today, but a story about
colonizing Mars might be too short otherwise.
My sci-fi
colony has an Artificial Intelligence, and construction robots to harvest air
and build habitat space from the Martian regolith. An extensive satellite
system monitors space weather, provides communications, and beams power down to
the surface. I truly wish we had a power system like this for Earth today.
My settlers
encounter real problems and danger follows them from Earth. Mars is a deadly
planet and no matter how earthlings plan, unanticipated hazards may doom the
colony.
They have
different reasons to risk the journey. Emma Winters, a young roboticist, wants
to explore in walkabout suits she designed. Her friends want to spread life to
the barren planet, study its geology, and climb its vast mountains. A couple
Brits just want to play with the robots, the best erector set ever, and a Kiwi
wants to pilot ships in orbit. There’s also an orange tabby cat that doesn’t
care if he’s on Mars. He’d be a cat anywhere.
But survival takes priority over dreams,
because something is terribly wrong in the colony. A strange illness threatens these pioneers,
tragic deaths may be no accident, and experts on Earth can’t protect them. With
no way back to Earth, they must save themselves or Emma may be one of the last
humans on Mars. Because, even in the real-world, the gruesome death of early
settlers is bound to spoil our taste for Mars.
Kate Rauner
A science fiction writer, poet, firefighter,
and engineer on her way to eccentric old woman
KATE RAUNER writes science fiction novels and
science-inspired poetry, and serves as a volunteer firefighter. She’s a retired
environmental engineer and worked in America’s nuclear weapons complex, so she’s
also a Cold War Warrior. Honestly, as designated by the USA Congress.
A friend
tricked her into writing, first by involving her in his own book, then asking
her to post on his blog, and finally encouraging her to join NaNoWriMo, the
National Novel Writing Month. Kate says her first story was “not-terrible” so
she kept writing.
She lives
outside Silver City, New Mexico, where copper mines still anchors the economy,
and a budding artist community makes the place a miniature version of an
undiscovered Santa Fe. From a ridge-top home on the edge of southwest America’s
Gila National Forest, Kate enjoys hiking with her husband, feeding the birds,
and indulging her cats, llamas, and dog. Kate says she’s pursuing her life
goal, “to become an eccentric old woman.”
***** An interesting alternative present and future
In
1959, when this book was published for the first time, we had yet to go to the
Moon (it would happen ten years later, a few months after the author’s death)
and the conquest of space was seen as a normal extension of the so-called Cold
War. This far from optimistic scenario is the background to the story of a
family of astronauts unravelling for two hundred years.
Wyndham’s
pessimism, which I had already seen in his post-apocalyptic novel “The Day of the
Triffids”, contrasts with the optimism of many other authors of the now-defined
classical science fiction who imagined human beings travelling in space a few
decades later; if they were still alive, they would be disappointed to learn
that we are still struggling to go to Mars.
On
the contrary, in “The Outward Urge” the conquest of space proceeds slowly, much
more than in reality, and is closely linked to events of a warlike nature. With
leaps of fifty years, the author tells us about four space adventures (a fifth
was added in the second edition) of men belonging to the Troon family (English,
as the author), plus the one of an aviator during the WWII, who was the
grandfather of the first of these astronauts. Through their stories we are
shown a grey future that for us is, fortunately, an alternative one, in which
astronautics is the tool of a destructive war that leads to upsetting the
political balance of our planet. Every story brings with it a gloomy atmosphere
and is resolved in a depressing ending, except for the last one, about Venus
(the Asteroids story wasn’t included in the edition I read), which ends with a
positive note.
The
speculative exercise of Wyndham seems almost a warning to the men of his time.
It is as if the author had sublimated his worst fears within this novel in an
attempt to find, at the end of the tunnel, a light of hope. To be able to
appreciate it today, especially in the light of current scientific knowledge
that highlights the ingenuity of the science narrated in this novel, we must
try to put ourselves in the shoes of the author, who a little more than a
decade after the beginning of the Cold War fears for the future of the world
and try to imagine what would happen if its worst fears became true.
Reading
this novel in a sense made me feel good, because the assumptions on which it is
based no longer exist and its dramatic development nowadays seems absurd, but
at the same time it has led me to reflect on how the perception of the world
and the future can change dramatically over the decades.
I know I
find myself in front of a science fiction classic written in the 50s of the
past century, but I’m obviously forced to judge it according to my tastes as a
reader from these times.
This is an
early example of hard science fiction, that is, a science fiction that seeks to
be based on real science, but being a novel from 1951, most of its science is
outdated. Therefore you must take it as it is.
The story
sounds cold and linear, even though there are passages that theoretically
should excite, both with regard to the private scope of the protagonist and the
adventurous events and discoveries that he has witnessed. This causes the novel
to appear as a report that doesn’t make you feel involved as you read.
The simultaneous
presence of these two aspects unfortunately prevented me from enjoying the
book.
I have read
other classics that show a totally different Mars from what it turned out to
be, but the way they were written still made it enjoyable, as they allowed me
to feel along with the protagonist, suffer with them. It created a strong
reader-protagonist bond that surpassed all scientific nonsense and
anachronistic aspects of the story.
I wasn’t
able to create such bond in this book. I just found it boring and I’m afraid
that it hasn’t left me anything at the end of the reading.
I know that
this is a risk you take by reading classic novels, since some of them are the
mirror of a type of fiction that is very different from the contemporary one
and therefore not everybody likes it today. I certainly don’t.
Anyway I
enjoyed some suggestive ideas generated by the imaginative setting.
