The Empress of Mars (The Company)

Reading Kage Baker is like eating a puff-pastry infused with alcohol. It sits lightly on the palate, disolves effortless and far too quickly and leaves a lingering after-taste with a kick.

Unlike most novels of Martian independence, this one is about a commercial struggle rather than a military one;

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and the hand of the Company, while veiled, is quite visible to those with eyes to see. There are 3 cameos: one overt, one covert (though not very) and one I didn't recognize until after the novel was over and I had a chance to think about it...although I probably should have realized that X was Y much earlier.

The one true spoiler I'll give you is that this takes place _before_ the space-based events of the main Company sequence. No shuttles blow up. I say this only because I kept waiting for that act of sabotage and I think it distracted me a little.

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The Empress of Mars is most certainly an experiment in expectations. Having read Baker's The House of the Stag (and loving it, by the way), and being wholly unfamiliar with her Company novels, I had expected The Empress of Mars to be another adventurous, incredibly internalized story, only with

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spaceships and other science fiction furniture instead of magic and half-demons. Only, that's not what I got. Instead, The Empress of Mars provided me with more of Baker's ability to craft character and a strangely vibrant vision of a Mars that just might be, without the need for explosions and laser pistols to keep things interesting.

The Empress of Mars takes place on, well, Mars, obviously, and follows Mary Griffith, a worshiper of "the Goddess" and owner of a seedy bar called The Empress, practically the only thing she owns, and a business she is struggling to keep afloat. There, she and her daughters, and a ragtag group of unwanted men and women who have come to Mars for the chance to make a life for themselves, eke out a meager living under the stern hand of the British Arean Company. Mary has had a hard life, too, with the BAC breathing down her neck, but unable to do anything about her, and all manner of unsavory characters wanting to see her pushed off the planet for good. After a string of good luck, however, Mary finds herself the target of the BAC's legal rumblings and business acumen. Now everything rests on Mary's shoulders: her business, the fate of Mars, and, most importantly, her family.

Baker's pension for character is certainly a feature of this installment in her Company series. Mary Griffith is one of a set of astonishing array of unique characters, all with powerful motivations, wonderfully realized dialogue, and Baker's own flare for creating fascinating black and white figures on both sides of the coin. You still hate her bad guys, but you at least understand why they do what they do and disagree with them either because you hold different beliefs or because their tactics are unacceptable. Her good guys have similar problems, and this makes her story incredibly character-driven, because as the story moves along, Baker creates for us a long string of flawed, but endearing figures that you can't help but love, even if you disagree with aspects of their lifestyles. There are no wooden characters here.

Pacing and world-wise, The Empress of Mars doesn't leave too much to the imagination. Some might conceive of this as a flaw, considering that much of Baker's novel is not at all unlike what we might see going on today: legal blunders, corporations overstepping their bounds, bitter attempts to steal land from underprivileged people, etc. The plot does take some time to get moving, but once it does, Mars comes to life as a clear, but somewhat exaggerated (and necessarily so) reflection of our present. Everything is laid out for the reader, bringing focus to the characters and their struggles with what is going on around them and de-centering the wider struggle of mankind; this creates isolation in plot and world, providing ample space for Baker to develop the scenery and history of the Mars colonists. Only in the end do things move a little too quickly, and some questions are left unanswered, but perhaps for good reason (the supernatural might have played a welcome--or unwelcome, depending on your perspective--hand in the overall story, but that's up for the reader to decide on his or her own).

Beyond a somewhat lingering plot, Baker's imagining of religion seems to have a stronger connection to exoticism than realism. I feel as though the insertion of the mostly-pagan worship of the Goddess was inconsistent with what actually might be true in our own future. Mary's relationship to "the Goddess," while interesting, reflects more of the old, somewhat absurd early renderings of Mars in science fiction. Granted, I have not read her other Company novels, so perhaps there are some clear and powerful motivations for the changes in religion and social dynamics that I am unaware of in reading The Empress of Mars, but regardless, this seems a somewhat absurd complaint to have when the overwhelming majority of my thoughts about this particular novel center on my love for Baker's writing and her ability to create memorable characters.

If everything up to this point hasn't indicated whether or not I liked this book, then I'll clarify now: while The Empress of Mars is not perfect, I found myself thoroughly engaged by the characters and once again loving Baker's writing style. This novel may not be for everyone--after all, it is not about galactic wars or spaceships or many of the more explosive and action-packed elements of the science fiction genre--but it will certainly appeal to many readers, particularly those who enjoy stories centered on the characters, rather than on the shininess of the setting.

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Plucky colonists eke out a living on Mars and eventually triumph over the neglectful company that brought them there. Tangentially related to the Company series.

Eh, I love Kage Baker, but I think I prefer her more epic books. The Empress is more of a clever Martian Western. Good characters, though, as always with Baker.

Set on Mars in the distant future this enjoyable novel by Kage Baker was written with a style that reminded me a bit of some of the stories of Ray Bradbury. Mars has been settled initially by the equivalent of the British East India Company, who are of course interested in profit above all else. At

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first, they lure the best scientists in the hope of making Mars fruitful, but when that turns out to be more costly and difficult than expected, they abandon these people with only no support leaving only the hardiest among those who succeed. One of these survivors opens a saloon, The Empress of Mars, which caters to long-distance drovers and accumulates a host of misfits.

The story centers on Mary Griffith and her friends. After being let go as the xenobotanist for British Arean, she makes a new life for her and her daughters on Mars. The story charts the gradual development of the tiny colony into a self-sufficient city. A series of new settlers arrive on Mars over the course of events, each of whom ends up becoming pivotal in the establishment of a new service for the city. Mary and her allies must contend with interference by British Arean Company, resistance from various local collectives and a Neo-Pagan Ephesian Church. There is plenty of scientific background about Mars to hold the interest of all but the most particular hard science fiction fans. The climate, one that seemed at times comparable to Antarctica only with a red tinge, and its impact on the society that has developed on Mars is especially well-drawn. This was brought home effectively early in the novel when a young man succumbs to the incredibly unforgiving climate in a scene that was tremendously emotional.

Everyone is just barely holding on until like Sutter in nineteenth century California Mary discovers diamonds on Mars. In true Kage Baker style, the Martian misfits have resources undreamed of by the British Arean Corporation. This easy-going writing style, the engaging humor, the fascinating characters, and their interesting story made this an above-average science fiction novel.

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Mary Griffith came to Mars to be a fancy-pants scientist, but when her research looked less than lucrative, the British Arean Company fired her, leaving her stranded on the desolate rock. Luckily, Mary had an indomitable spirit, three beautiful daughters, and knew how to make beer. These assets in

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hand, she rapidly became the proprietess of the most successful (and only) bar on Mars. But the rulers of Mars are less than pleased with her success, and she'll need every bit of her wit to survive...

Really excellent story, with memorable characters, a twisting, intricately crafted plot, and a highly enjoyable ending.

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A pretty good collection of gold rush stories assembled to form a success story. Several of the characters are well-drawn, but the framing tale is a very well worn paradigm of colonial history. Not my favourite Baker.

A good story about terraforming Mars, verging in places on a parody of old Westerns, which it readily acknowledges. A definite feminist slant, and some memorable characters, keeps you interested in what's going to happen next.

Mary Griffith went to Mars as a biologist for the British Aerean Company, but when BAC pulled back from a full on push to terraform and colonize, she found herself out of work. Unfortunately, her severance package was only about half what she needed to cover a trip back to Earth.

So she opened a

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bar, The Empress of Mars.

The beer isn't great, but it's not just the best beer on Mars, but the only beer on Mars. She and her three daughters, along with a collection of similarly displaced people, earn a decent living running the bar--despite repeated challenges and efforts to shut them down for selling a "controlled substance," i.e., the beer.

This is a very episodic book. I haven't check its history, but it feels a lot like a fix-up, built out of related short stories. Regardless, it's a fun book, with good characters that are fun to get to know. Heroes, villains, eccentric geniuses, corrupt corporate villains, frontier settlers with loose ethics that will be familiar to anyone familiar with westerns, in a book built around the colonization of a cold, dry planet with very thin atmosphere.

Lots of fun. Read it, or listen to it.

I bought this audiobook.

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64/2021. [Empress of Mars], by Kage Baker, is a prequel science fiction novel in her Company series (and should be compulsory reading for anyone considering becoming indentured to Elon Musk's company, with a one-way ticket to Mars). It reads well as a standalone, unlike most Company stories. This

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tale is a pastiche of old west gold rush narratives about Irish immigrants, saloon owners with a heart of gold, navvies and prospectors, conmen and gamblers, except the expected evil American cattle barons have been replaced with capitalist English landlords, all successfully transposed to a futuristic Mars that doesn't quite achieve escape velocity from earlier science fiction about pioneering colonials... because why would it want to? Barsoom Day is even an official Martian holiday in this milieu. Characterisation of the stock types isn't especially strong but plot and subplots romp along fast enough to be interesting, and I laughed aloud a few times here and there.

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Quick and entertaining read. A little heavy on the western as sci-fi theme at times, but at least it was up front about it.

This was one of the best books I read in 2010. I think Baker did a marvelous job of creating plausible details of what colonizing Mars would be like, tackling the economics behind such an endeavor (at least better than anyone else I've read), and sketching out likable and believable characters. If

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I ever re-read this (and I think it is likely I will do so), I will revise my rating to 5 stars.
Update (3/29/2013) - So, I re-read it and gladly give it five stars. It was every bit as enjoyable the second time around as it was the first. But my enjoyment was tempered by the knowledge of Baker's death, and regretting that there will never be a sequel.

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This is a weird one. The general format is chapter-long episodes of "be careful what you wish for... you'll get it," but instead of gradually going to hell, things actually get better as plot bumps along. Increasingly complicated, but better.

Easily the best part of this book is the setting. The

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entertainingly and lovingly dysfunctional Martian colony manages to toe a narrow line between the hackneyed utopian-or-dystopian space colonies of other sci-fi.

The elements of magical realism kicking in at the end didn't come out of nowhere, but they were unexpected and didn't do it for me. I think I'd have to go back and reread the whole book through that filter for it to work.

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