(Cover by artist Paul Youll)

Polly Newton has a plan: become a starship pilot and travel the galaxy. And in the pursuit of that plan, she is relentlessly focused.

But you know what they say about the best laid plans.

When the Martian native and her twin brother Charles are informed by their mother, director of operations on Colony One, that she has enrolled them both in the prestigious Galileo Academy, even the prospect of captaining starships in half the time it would take on Mars cannot assuage her despair. For Galileo Academy will take Polly Newton to the once place she has never wanted to go.

Earth

It has been a long time since I have contacted a publishing company to request a copy of a book for review. A very long time. But when Tor Books unveiled their winter line, something special happened.

Avid readers know the phenomenon of a forthcoming release capturing your imagination. It may be that the release is the long-anticipated novel in a favorite series, or the newest release from a cherished author. But sometimes it is something that is almost magical. The combination of a book’s cover and story description kindles a feeling that you recognize, that tug of something familiar that convinces you that this particular book shares a kindred spirit with others stories that are a part of your make up. Something tells you that this book will be special.

That was the feeling I had when I saw the cover and read the synopsis for Martians Abroad by author Carrie Vaughn. I had not previously read any of Vaughn’s many novels, though I was familiar with and enjoyed some of her short fiction. I quickly requested a review copy and was thrilled when the publisher contacted me to offer the opportunity to be a part of the Martians Abroad Book Tour.

Thus on a foggy, gray Monday morning, off from work in honor of Martin Luther King, Jr., I settled into my favorite recliner, dog on my lap, to discover if Martians Abroad was all that I hoped it would be. If his opinion counts for anything, I would assure you that Charlie was utterly satisfied with the novel, because I barely moved to disturb his rest as I sat for hours lost in the tale of young Polly Newton.

If you have any affection for the juvenile fiction of Robert A. Heinlein, the teasers for Martians Abroad will generate a familiar feeling. It did not surprise me at all to see back-cover praise from other authors invoking the name of Heinlein. It was the hope of reading a Heinlein-esque story that prompted me to request a copy of the novel, and that hope was certainly realized.

That is not to say that Vaughn simply parrots the work of predecessors of solid science fiction featuring young adults, like Robert A. Heinlein or even Andre Norton. Martians Abroad manages to encapsulate an optimistic retro vibe with modern sensibilities, sophisticated storytelling, and solid science. It is a very entertaining story that speaks up to its audience and in so doing exists as a book that will be enjoyed across a wide age spectrum.

Those familiar with my “reviews” know that I write very little about the overall plot of a novel. I prefer to let you discover the story for yourself rather than feed you details that are best experienced first-hand. There are familiar story elements here, particularly if you have read much young adult fiction, but that is something I generally see as a strength and not a weakness. My expectation of young adults in a novel, regardless of the genre, is that they will navigate some of the same waters that we all have in pursuing that elusive state known as becoming a “grown up”. It is the challenge of young adult novels to address those true-to-life circumstances in a way that speaks to the target audience while also appealing to those of us who are more than happy to be long past those tumultuous times. Carrie Vaughn does that quite well with Martians Abroad.

Polly Newton is understandably and demonstrably unhappy with the cards that she has been dealt. She is disappointed and unhappy and is not tremendously successful in internalizing these feelings. As I read I could not help but compare my feelings about Polly to another of my favorite literary characters, Richard Mayhew from Neil Gaiman’s novel Neverwhere. In all the many times I have revisited that novel, I always experience the same conflicting feelings of wishing that Richard would “suck it up”, for lack of a better way to put it, and not be so thrown by his circumstances while at the same time feeling a grateful kinship in knowing that he is acting exactly the way I would act. In other words, in the midst of the very unreal circumstances of the novel, he is very human…very real. Polly Newton is much the same.

Rather than quickly moving past her frustration to get to the action of the story, Carrie Vaughn allows this character to struggle, and in that struggle we see Polly develop in the same type of fits and starts that we have all experienced, and that makes her wonderfully three dimensional. And from Polly’s down-to-earth viewpoint, pardon the pun, we get to meet several other interesting, intriguing characters. In contrast to Polly, her brother Charles is quite enigmatic. He is a character that keeps you guessing right until the very end.

As you might expect, a significant part of the novel is set at Galileo Academy and contains familiar scenes of young people trying to establish themselves in a competitive school setting, but here Vaughn also steps out beyond the norm by introducing a series of unexpected, dangerous situations that not showcase the depth of her characters but also keep the reader guessing as to greater mystery that builds throughout the novel.

Martians Abroad is has been popping up on shelves over the last few days and is now officially available, and I highly recommend it to readers in general. For those who do not normally dive into the science fiction end of the literature pool, Martians Abroad is a novel that deftly weaves scientific and technological concepts into an accessible plot. For those who enjoy science fiction already, Martians Abroad posits the kind of future that we all hoped to be living in at this time, where our nearest planetary neighbor is habitable and mankind is getting ready to launch into further reaches of space.

And for those of you who grew up with, or later discovered, the novels of Robert A. Heinlein and Andre Norton, Martians Abroad will hold a special significance for you. With this novel Carrie Vaughn demonstrates that there is still a place for plausible science fiction adventure that imagines a future far better than the one we see on the current horizon.
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If you have read and enjoyed Martians Abroad, I highly recommend the following novels:

Podkayne of Mars by Robert A. Heinlein
Starman Jones by Robert A. Heinlein
The Stars Are Ours by Andre Norton
Star Born by Andre Norton
Apollo’s Outcasts by Allen Steele

I would also recommend the Robert A. Heinlein novella, The Menace from Earth, which also features a young adult female protagonist.