Antarctica

"Forbidding yet fascinating, like the continent it describes...echoes Jon Krakauer'sInto Thin Air."
--People

"[Antarctica] should be included in any short-list of books about the frozen continent....Compelling characters...a rich and dense story...Robinson has succeeded not only in drawing human characters but also in bringing Antarctica to life. Whatever happens in the outer world,Antarctica--both the book and the continent--will become part more >>

"Forbidding yet fascinating, like the continent it describes...echoes Jon Krakauer'sInto Thin Air."
--People

"[Antarctica] should be included in any short-list of books about the frozen continent....Compelling characters...a rich and dense story...Robinson has succeeded not only in drawing human characters but also in bringing Antarctica to life. Whatever happens in the outer world,Antarctica--both the book and the continent--will become part of the reader's interior landscape."
--The Washington Post Book World

"Theepic of Antarctica. This is the James A. Michener novel of the South Pole. If the meaty one-word title didn't give it away, the writing would. The whole human history of the continent is here."
--Interzone

"Antarcticawill take your breath away."
--Associated Press

"A gripping tale of adventure on the ice."
--Publishers Weekly

"Passionate, informed...vastly entertaining."
--Kirkus Reviews

"Robinson writes about geography and geology with the intensity and unhurried attention to detail of a John McPhee."
--The New York Times Book ReviewFrom the award-winning author of the Mars Trilogy comes a thrilling new novel....

Kim Stanley Robinson, author of the Hugo and Nebula award-winning Mars trilogy, is one of the most original and visionary writers of fiction today. Now, in his latest novel, he takes us to a harsh, alien landscape covered by a sheet of ice two miles deep. This is no distant planet--it is the last pure wilderness on earth.

A stark and inhospitable place, its landscape poses a challenge to survival; yet its strange, silent beauty has long fascinated scientists and adventurers. Now Antarctica faces an uncertain future. The international treaty that protects the continent is about to dissolve, clearing the way for Antarctica's resources and eerie beauty to be plundered. As politicians and corporations move to determine its fate from half a world away, radical environmentalists carry out a covert campaign of sabotage to reclaim the land. The winner of this critical battle will determine the future for this last great wilderness....Kim Stanley Robinson is the author of the Nebula and Hugo award-winningMarstrilogy,Red Mars, Green Mars, andBlue Mars, as well asThe Wild Shore, The Gold Coast, Pacific Edge, A Short, Sharp Shock, and other novels. He lives in Davis, California.Author's Note

Dear Reader:

When I was researching my Mars novels in the early 1990s, I kept running across references to Antarctica.  It was the part of Earth most like Mars, and scientists studying Mars often went to Antarctica to do research.  I had read about the classic Antarctic explorers when I was young, and now, reading about it again, my interest was rekindled.  And in the acknowledgments of one book, the author said "Thanks to the National Science Foundation for sending me down to Antarctic as part of its Antarctic Artists and Writers' Program."

That caught my eye.  I made inquiries, and the administrators at NSF told me that the artists and writers they sent south had to be doing art or literature that was specifically about Antarctica.  They would not, for instance, send me down there to do research for a book about Mars (I asked).  So, I thought, I'm going to have to write a book about Antarctica.

I made a proposal; the people at Bantam were agreeable, and NSF selected me for their program in 1994.  In October of 1995 I finishedBlue Mars, and within two weeks was flying to New Zealand, to wait for an LC-130 Hercules flight to Ross Island, Antarctica.

In the months preceding my trip I had contacted various Antarctic scientists who had helped me with my << less