You may know Carrie for her urban fantasy Kitty Norville series (Kitty’s a werewolf and a DJ in modern Denver) which has been very successful. However, Carrie has always been a genre fan and, like many of us, grew up reading the classic genre authors – Asimov, Heinlein and so on.
Martians Abroad is a deliberate homage to the old classics. It wears its Heinlein-esque stylings proudly and is an entertaining read. It would be a better read for a modern audience, possibly Young Adult, than the dated prose of the original inspiration.
Polly Newton, the female lead, is a likeable character, who, in the best Heinlein manner (think Podkayne of Mars), is proactive and has plans for the future – to be a starship pilot. By contrast, her twin brother, Charles, is clearly also intelligent but in typical teenage mode seems remote and sullen, but clearly cares for his sister and vice versa.
Their lifestyle on Mars is typically ‘frontier-land’ – tough yet manageable, but relatively speaking, Polly and Charles have a fairly privileged (and rather sheltered) social life with their single-parent mother (Dad’s role is reduced to a sponsored sperm donor, interestingly), who is the Director of the colony.
As might be expected, our author then puts our lead characters into a bildungsroman situation, taking them out of their comfort zone. Their predictable lifestyle is transformed when Polly and Charles are sent by their mother to Galileo Academy on Earth, something they predictably react to with horror. Nevertheless, they take the journey to Earth, finding the change to an Earth gravity a trial, but determined to do their best.
When they start at the Academy, the story turns to traditional teenage educational issues – the work is hard, the other students see the Martian immigrants as outsiders, the teachers are stern and rather unfeeling, Polly develops a love interest with another new student. With all of this in mind, Polly tries to make the best of it and Charles tries to cover their backs.
A number of challenges lead the group to uncover a conspiracy, one that Polly is determined to get to the bottom of. As the book progresses, things become a great deal more serious. There’s issues with racism, bullying and a feeling that things may be being made deliberately more difficult for the non-Earthers.
On a practical level the ending doesn’t quite hold it together for me, though it is logically very Heinlein-esque. There are echoes of Tunnel in the Sky, Friday and yes, Podkayne of Mars throughout. I’m sure that there are other Heinlein touches too.
In the end, Martians Abroad has the pace and feel of a Heinlein juvenile, but with a pleasingly contemporary upgrade to reflect the views of the modern reader – Polly is not always a model student, occasionally moody, regularly flaunting the rules and bucking the system, and in a typically teenager manner often speaks before she thinks, unlike her brother. Carrie captures that awkwardness of being a teen better than many writers, possibly even including Heinlein.
Ultimately though, the book’s strength is that it extols the values of an RAH novel. Despite Polly’s weaknesses, she’s also bright, resourceful and independent. Perhaps most important of all is the point that although Polly and Charles struggle to come to terms with new situations daily, in true Heinlein fashion, they survive against all the odds.
Though clearly designed for today’s Young Adult reader, fans of the juvenile Heinlein (like me) will like it just as much. I rattled through it in a couple of reading sessions. Meanwhile, I’m still trying (and failing) to re-read Podkayne of Mars…
Martians Abroad by Carrie Vaughn
Published by TOR, January 2017
287 pages
ISBN: 978-0765382207
Review by Mark Yon
It’s something I would like to read in the future. Possibly this summer.
I can see it making a nice Summer holiday read, Adiyar.