Mars, the fourth planet from the Sun, has appeared as a setting in works of fiction since at least the mid-1600s. Trends in the planet's portrayal have largely been influenced by advances in planetary science. It became the most popular celestial object in fiction in the late 1800s, when it became clear that there was no life on the Moon. The predominant genre depicting Mars at the time was utopian fiction. Around the same time, the mistaken belief that there are canals on Mars emerged and made its way into fiction, popularized by Percival Lowell's speculations of an ancient civilization having constructed them. The War of the Worlds, H. G. Wells's novel about an alien invasion of Earth by sinister Martians, was published in 1897 and went on to have a major influence on the science fiction genre.
Ray Douglas Bradbury was an American author and screenwriter. One of the most celebrated 20th-century American writers, he worked in a variety of genres, including fantasy, science fiction, horror, mystery, and realistic fiction.
The Martian Chronicles is a science fiction fix-up novel, published in 1950, by American writer Ray Bradbury that chronicles the exploration and settlement of Mars, the home of indigenous Martians, by Americans leaving a troubled Earth that is eventually devastated by nuclear war.
Dandelion Wine is a 1957 novel by Ray Bradbury set in the summer of 1928 in the fictional town of Green Town, Illinois, based upon Bradbury's childhood home of Waukegan, Illinois, and serving as the first novel in his Green Town Trilogy. The novel developed from the short story "Dandelion Wine", which appeared in the June 1953 issue of Gourmet magazine.
Zima Blue and Other Stories is the first collection of short works by Alastair Reynolds. It was published in September 2006, by Night Shade Books. It includes ten stories, most of them long out of print. None of the stories in it are set in Reynolds's well-known Revelation Space universe, although Galactic North, a collection of most of Reynolds's Revelation Space short stories, was released soon after.
"A Martian Odyssey" is a science fiction short story by American writer Stanley G. Weinbaum originally published in the July 1934 issue of Wonder Stories. It was Weinbaum's second published story, and remains his best known. It was followed four months later by a sequel, "Valley of Dreams". These are the only stories by Weinbaum set on Mars.
"There Will Come Soft Rains" is a science fiction short story by author Ray Bradbury written as a chronicle about a lone house that stands intact in a California city that has otherwise been obliterated by a nuclear bomb, and then is destroyed in a fire caused by a windstorm. The title is from a 1918 poem of the same name by Sara Teasdale that was published during World War I and the Spanish flu pandemic. The story was first published in 1950 in two different versions in two separate publications, a one-page short story in Collier's magazine and a chapter of the fix-up novel The Martian Chronicles.
A fix-up is a novel created from several short fiction stories that may or may not have been initially related or previously published. The stories may be edited for consistency, and sometimes new connecting material, such as a frame story or other interstitial narration, is written for the new work. The term was coined by the science fiction writer A. E. van Vogt, who published several fix-ups of his own, including The Voyage of the Space Beagle, but the practice exists outside of science fiction. The use of the term in science fiction criticism was popularised by the first (1979) edition of The Encyclopedia of Science Fiction, edited by Peter Nicholls, which credited van Vogt with the creation of the term. The name “fix-up” comes from the changes that the author needs to make in the original texts, to make them fit together as though they were a novel. Foreshadowing of events from the later stories may be jammed into an early chapter of the fix-up, and character development may be interleaved throughout the book. Contradictions and inconsistencies between episodes are usually worked out.
The Ray Bradbury Theatre is an anthology series that ran for three seasons on First Choice Superchannel in Canada and HBO in the United States from 1985 to 1986, and then on USA Network, running for four additional seasons from 1988 to 1992; episodes aired on the Global Television Network in Canada from 1991 to 1994. It was shown in reruns on the Sci Fi Channel and later on the Retro Television Network. It currently airs on Comet and can be streamed on IMDb TV, Peacock, Pluto TV and The Roku Channel.
The Martian Chronicles is a 1980 television three-episode miniseries based on Ray Bradbury's 1950 book The Martian Chronicles and dealing with the exploration of Mars and the inhabitants there. The series starred Rock Hudson, Darren McGavin, Bernadette Peters, Roddy McDowall, Fritz Weaver, Barry Morse, and Maria Schell. It was aired on NBC in January 1980 in three episodes with a total running time of just over four hours. The series depicts Mars as having a "thin atmosphere" which humans can breathe, with water-filled canals and desert-like vegetation. The miniseries was directed by Michael Anderson and written by Richard Matheson.
Peter Crowther is a British journalist, short story writer, novelist, editor, publisher and anthologist. He is a founder of PS Publishing. He edits a series of themed anthologies of science fiction short stories published by DAW Books. He is also the editor of Postscripts, an anthology established in 2004, which has since 2012 released the Exotic Gothic series, including Vol. 4 and 5.
Forbidden Planets (2006) is a science fiction anthology of all-new short stories edited by British writer and journalist Peter Crowther, the fifth in his themed science fiction anthology series for DAW Books. The stories are all intended to be inspired by the 1956 movie, Forbidden Planet. The book was published in 2006.
The following is a list of works by Ray Bradbury.
Long After Midnight is a short story collection by American writer Ray Bradbury. Several of the stories are original to this collection. Others originally appeared in the magazines Planet Stories, Collier's Weekly, Playboy, Esquire, Welcome Aboard, Other Worlds, Cavalier, Gallery, McCall's, Woman's Day, Harper's, Charm, Weird Tales, Eros, and Penthouse.
"Mars Is Heaven!" is a science fiction short story by American writer Ray Bradbury, originally published in 1948 in Planet Stories. "Mars Is Heaven!" was among the stories selected in 1970 by the Science Fiction Writers of America as one of the best science fiction short stories published before the creation of the Nebula Awards. As such, it was published in The Science Fiction Hall of Fame Volume One, 1929–1964. It also appears as the sixth chapter of The Martian Chronicles, revised as "The Third Expedition."
In the Courts of the Crimson Kings is a 2008 alternate history science fiction novel by American writer S. M. Stirling.
Tales in Space is an anthology of science fiction short stories edited by Peter Crowther. It was first published as a trade paperback by White Wolf Publishing in April 1998. It was issued as a companion to Three in Space from the same publisher; the two books followed up a similar pair, Three in Time and Tales in Time, published in 1997.
Old Mars is a "retro Mars science fiction"-themed anthology edited by George R. R. Martin and Gardner Dozois, published on October 8, 2013. According to the publisher Tor Books, the collection celebrates the "Golden Age of Science Fiction", an era before advanced astronomy and space exploration told us what we currently know about the Solar System, when "of all the planets orbiting that G-class star we call the Sun, none was so steeped in an aura of romantic decadence, thrilling mystery, and gung-ho adventure as Mars." Old Mars won a 2014 Locus Award.
"The Old Cosmonaut and the Construction Worker Dream of Mars" is a 2002 science fiction short story by Ian McDonald. It was first published in the anthology Mars Probes and received positive reviews upon release, with several critics considering it the best or one of the best stories in the anthology.
Imagining Mars: A Literary History is a 2011 non-fiction book by science fiction scholar Robert Crossley. The book chronicles the history of Mars in fiction, and to a lesser extent in culture. The overarching thesis of the work is that the scientific understanding of Mars and the versions of the planet imagined in works of fiction have developed in parallel and influenced each other. It covers a timeframe spanning from the pre-telescope era up to the present day, especially the time period after 1877. Particular attention is paid to the influence of amateur astronomer Percival Lowell (1855–1916), who popularized the myth of Martian canals in the public consciousness, and science fiction author H. G. Wells (1866–1946) who wrote the seminal 1897 novel The War of the Worlds. The book charts how the depiction of Mars changed throughout the second half of the 1900s in response to successive advances in planetary science, while noting that some authors preferred to continue portraying the planet in a nostalgic way that was by then scientifically outdated.
