The Original. Great Stories, Great Narrator.

Would you recommend this audiobook to a friend? If so, why?

The Martian Chronicles is a classic for a reason. In recent years editors have monkeyed with the stories, changing the timeline of the story and removing some stories/adding others. This is the original lineup, with a great narrator.

You should be aware, though, that most of the core stories were written in different years and published in pulp magazines first, and not in the order they appear in the book. This leads to little inconsistencies that are bothersome if you try to view the stories as a coherent whole. Instead, you should think of each story as happening in a slightly different dimension from the last one. Appreciate the stories on their own and don't get hung up on little differences.

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Best Narrator

The Martian Chronicles is a collection of short stories that are beautifully woven together to make for a haunting read.

The over-arching story takes place in the future when earth is amidst chaos and nuclear war is about to erupt. Earth men make many expeditions to the red planet to escape and search for life. You'll have to listen to find out what happens when they get there.

Mark Boyett does an amazing job with the narration. I've listened to some of the other narrators for this book and Boyett does it best! <3

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Masterful Storytelling

Would you recommend this audiobook to a friend? If so, why?

I would only recommend this audiobook to fellow Ray Bradbury fans. He is not everyone's cup of tea because he is more of a short story writer. He wove these martian stories together to tell a compelling collection of stories within an overall narrative arc.

What was one of the most memorable moments of The Martian Chronicles?

My two favorite stories were "Way in the Middle of the Air" when blacks fled the South for Mars and "Usher II," Bradbury's ode and tribute to Poe's story "The House of Usher." Bradbury showed he was at the top of his game in creativity and insight into human behavior.

Which scene was your favorite?

The two aforementioned stories were my favorite scenes.

Did you have an extreme reaction to this book? Did it make you laugh or cry?

Yes, this book made me laugh at many points, but what struck me was the poetry of Bradbury's prose. He is a beautiful, passionate writer. His prose is vivid and feels like a long prose poem.

Any additional comments?

Mark Boyett does a masterful job at performing all of these characters, both human and Martian. I can see and hear them. I had the great pleasure to meet Bradbury at book signings in Los Angeles. He was my favorite writer as a teen, and I still love him. Thank you, Ray, for sharing your passion and for giving us the gift of your stories.

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... a talent for ruining big, beautiful things.

“We earth men have a talent for ruining big, beautiful things.”
― Ray Bradbury, The Martian Chronicles

For the last couple years I've been dipping into some of my favorite books as a kid. Re-reading Bradbury's Martian Chronicles as an adult, like earlier reads of The Illustrated Man and Dandelion Wine, was totally worth it. Each read of Bradbury elevates him in my mind.

As an adult, I see the stories in bigger terms. Less about big "s" Space or Mars or martians, and more about race, colonialism, environmentalism, war, loneliness, isolation, family, death. It feels more relevant today than it did when I read it 30-years ago, and more relevant perhaps than it did when it was originally published (some stories over 70-years ago). Obviously, a lot of this is because of my experiences during the last 30 years, and some of these stories were VERY relevant when first published. I'm thinking of "Way in the Middle of the Air", published in 1950. Bradbury's take on race and racism was sharp and clean. The story carried a punch.

Anyway, Bradbury is/was a literary light and treasure.

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Stirring.

Dated, yet timeless; beautifully narrated. I was almost disappointed when it ended. I want to somehow know more.

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If Conestogas Were Rocket Ships

Like so many classics we should have read in school, Ray Bradbury’s fantastic portrait of an alien world is a welcome discovery, even now. Most of its 28 episodes were published earlier, in science fiction magazines, and a few were created for the book in 1950.

They are exquisitely constructed little stories. Almost every one could be a novel in itself. At first they seem disjointed—disparate pieces that gradually take shape as a coherent and compelling whole. In roughly chronological sequence, and with occasional recurring characters, the people of earth flee a devastating war and seek to colonize Mars, with disturbing similarities to a younger America’s conquest of the West and its native people. There are the earliest rocket trips, most of them fatal to the newcomers, who are no match for the wily, telepathic Martians. Then settlers in greater numbers take hold, and finally, “the old ones” arrive, with a flourish of Bradbury’s evocative descriptive powers:

“And what more natural than that at last, the old people come to Mars, following in the trail left by the loud frontiersmen, the aromatic sophisticates, and the professional travelers and romantic lecturers in search of new grist. And so, the dry and crackling people, the people who spent their time listening to their hearts and feeling their pulses, and spooning syrups into their wry mouths; these people who once had taken shared cars to California in November and third class steamers to Italy in April, the dried apricot people, the mummy people, came at last to Mars.”

The diversity of settings and subjects in these scenes is dizzying: the explorers lured into a Martian insane asylum, a “Johnny Appleseed” character determined to make the Red Planet green with trees to pump oxygen into the thin atmosphere, small boys exploring a dead Martian city and playing music on white xylophones that are really bleached rib cages, and a bigoted town in the American South, whose entire black population suddenly drops everything to embark on a fleet of rockets to Mars. There is even a man who gets even for government book-burnings by building a working replica of Poe’s House of Usher, a nod to Bradbury’s later classic, “Fahrenheit 451.”

The stories are original and intriguing, but together they paint a gloomy picture of colonization in which humankind can’t settle in a new place without changing it to seem familiar. One rocket crosses the expanses of space loaded with lumber to build houses just like the ones back home. As someone who happens to live abroad, it made me squirm.

Kudos to Mark Boyett for a smart, expressive narration. He embraces fascinating characters and plot twists, and breathes life into a brilliant but slightly stilted midcentury writing style.

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A Thoughtful series of Tales

The narration was superb and at many times reminded me of the appropriate era of acting. (Captain Kirk came to mind when the stories' captains were taking charge.)

As the title suggests, this is not one story, but a series of stories throughout the early human colonization of Mars. Some of the tales are loosely linked, whereas others are stand-alone short stories that happen to take place in the setting of the book.

A great read/listen for any sci-fi fan or simply a fan of good literature.

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A mixed bag - still, Bradbury

A collection of loosely tied short stories, some haunting, some absurdist, some suspenseful - all carry with them that dash of Bradbury poetry - something often dreamlike ... I enjoyed this “novel” overall less than Something Wicked, Fahrenheit - or even Dandelion Wine ... still, one could do worse than spending a few hours in any Bradbury world - even if that world is an oddly vague one on Mars.

Now, if you want to read the basic idea of humanity exploration of space to entirely different level - read Isaac Asimov's Foundation.

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Worth it

There is so much to learn from these stories- about colonization, racism, censorship, fascism, immigration, civilization, and technology. There are multiple parallels in these stories to events that have occurred in our own history, and the stories make space for some meaningful conversations. My only critique of Bradbury's stories is a notable absence of women characters with substance.

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Fantastic tales, fantastic narrator

Absolutely worth it. Some of these stories are real jaw droppers. Can't get enough Bradbury for sure. Got this after listening to The Illustrated Man - also highly recommend.

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