The Martian Chronicles by Ray Bradbury (3 stars)

Another sci-fi classic. Except this is less sci-fi, and more social commentary in a series of loosely-linked vignettes that happen to occur on Mars. Some of my favourite moments:

• The Earth Men must be the most unusual human-alien contact story I've ever read, where telepathic Martians frequently project hallucinations about being men from Earth, making it extraordinarily difficult for real men from Earth to be taken seriously.
• The anti-censorship message in Usher II where having read Edgar Allen Poe would have saved various overzealous sensors from death in a recreated House of Usher was a darkly humorous criticism that obviously later grew with Bradbury into Fahrenheit 451.
• In There Will Come Soft Rains I loved the idea of the automated house bravely plugging along after all of humanity has departed. It made me think of NEST Protect giving the smoke warnings, and brave little Roomba's trying to clean up ash even as the house burns down.

I found the idea that every single person on Mars would immediately pack up and depart for Earth after Earth had an entire continent and major cities obliterated by nuclear weapons just preposterous. Bradbury really wanted to show that greed, self-interest, and the worst parts of human nature eventually destroyed both planets, but he needed a better story for the Mars side.

"I was looking for Earthian logic, common sense, good government, peace and responsibility."
"All that up there?"
"No. I didn't find it. It's not there any more. Maybe it'll never be there again. Maybe we fooled ourselves that it was ever there."

Time and publishers have been unkind to this novel. I have two complaints about the kindle edition I read. First, the dates in the chapter headings have been advanced 30 years from the original. According to wikipedia this change occurred with publication of the 1997 edition, ostensibly so that the future was still in the future. I couldn't think of anything more pointless.

More sinister and worrying, the story "Way in the Middle of the Air" was replaced with another, according to Wikipedia because the original story was "less topical in 1997 than in 1950". The original story (which I found and read online) was about African-Americans freeing themselves from racism and servitude in 1950s USA by fleeing to Mars en masse to start again. Replacing it is whitewashing of the worst kind, and couldn't be more ironic in a novel with a strong anti-censorship message.

Definitely some nice ideas here, and an important piece of sci-fi history, but reading it today is more an exercise in understanding the origins of the genre than anything else.

3 stars.