THE MARTIAN CONTINGENCY - Mary Robinette Kowal

Elma York, often referred to as The Lady Astronaut, is bound for Mars. 

After the meteor strike that destroyed Washington, Dc and triggered a global, catastrophic event, mankind began the earnest search for a new home. Elma is part of the second expedition to Mars but as she arrives she quickly realizes that something isn't right and that there may have been many problems on the First Mars Expedition that were never reported.

In addition to dealing with whatever mess was left for her from the previous expedition, Elma has to deal with more emergent issues. While making Mars habitable for families is one of the goals, hence the number of couples on the mission, having a baby is not part of the plan. But an unplanned pregnancy is just what she has to deal with. There's no question in the mind of the pregnant astronaut that the pregnancy should be terminated, but the very question brings about turmoil on earth.

Challenging the support on earth brings about other concerns over possible repercussions - including being recalled or a halt to supply ships - but the Mars astronauts are determined to stay to build the future for humanity on the red planet.

I have become quite enamored with the writing of Mary Robinette Kowal and this Lady Astronaut series is fabulous science fiction (it might be categorized as "Alternative History" as it's set in the 1950's-70's).

Elma York is precisely the sort of protagonist we want in our science fiction - in any fiction, for that matter.  She's not super-human and she doesn't perform super deeds.  She is smart and courageous and willing to be among the first to attempt something. She's Alan Shepard, John Glenn, and Buzz Aldrin in a woman's body.

The story is rock solid. This isn't fast-paced space opera, but there's still plenty of action and mystery to keep the reader interested.

I loved how Kowal reminds us that while missions such as this Mars expedition has a lot of major issues to be concerned with (air circulation, for instance), there are plenty of 'small' things to be considered as well:

"While we have redundancies for everything, this is now going to create shortages - specifically in birth control. The majority of our birth control options were on that cargo drop, so we're going to have to do immediate rationing."
...
"In addition to anything you brought in your personal stores, each married couple will be issued forty condoms. The pill will be reserved for a subset of women for whom it provides additional therapeutic effects. The rest of your will need to find workarounds."

There is a great sense of 'could-have-been' when reading this. Why weren't women early astronauts? Well of course we know why, given the male arrogance and dominance in the workplace (it so happens I recently watched the movie Hidden Figures on a cross country flight which helps remind me of our shameful past.)

I can't recommend the book or this series highly enough.

Looking for a good book? You don't need to have read any of the other Lady Astronaut books to fully enjoy The Martian Contingency by Mary Robinette Kowal, but you're surely going to want to read everything once you finish this.

I received a digital copy of this book from the publisher, through Netgalley, in exchange for an honest review.

4-1/2 stars

* * * * * *

The Martian Contingency

author: Mary Robinette Kowal

series: Lady Astronaut Universe #4

publisher: Tor Books

ISBN: 9781250237040

hardcover, 400 pages

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