Antarctica

De: Kim Stanley Robinson

Narrado por: Adam Verner

The award-winning author of the Mars trilogy takes listeners to the last pure wilderness on Earth in this powerful and majestic novel.

It is a stark and inhospitable place, where the landscape itself 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 which protects the continent is about to dissolve, clearing the way for Antarctica’s resources to be plundered, its eerie beauty to be savaged. As politicians wrangle over its fate, major corporations begin probing for its hidden riches. Adventurers come, as they have for more than a century, seeking the wild, untamed land even as they endanger it with their ever-growing numbers. And radical environmentalists carry out a covert campaign of sabotage to reclaim the land from those who would destroy it for profit. All who come here have their own agenda, and all will fight to ensure their vision of the future for the remote and awe-inspiring world at the South Pole.

©1998 Kim Stanley Robinson (P)2021 Blackstone Publishing

not his best work by a lot

it seems to me like he took way longer to wrap up the ending then what it should have taken. but then again that's just me and I'm not professional author. was never really interested in a couple of the main characters, especially 'X'.

Vast

The comprehensive coverage of this book is most remarkable. It created an appreciation of a place which had previously held little interest to me. The story woven as a method to deliver a wealth of information was excellent. This d very representative of Mr Robinson’s Mars series.

White Mars

Could easily be a prequel to the Martian Trilogy by Kim Stanley Robinson. There are many similarities:
- long descriptions of desolate landscapes,
- call for harmony between settling the alien land and adjustment to its alien original form to keep it as unchanged as possible,
- long deliberations about utopian social orders necessary for settling an alien land.

Only here Mars is Antarctica. Blue sky, white ice. The plot moves forward like a tectonic plate. Gray sky, white ice. Ten hours of descriptions of the Antarctic landscape, captivating like looking through the window on a monotonous terrain for an entire day. White ice, black water. I'm not kidding, that's the rhythm of this book. Crevasse here, crevasse there. And black mountains on the horizon. Blue sky, black peaks. Probably a gem for aspiring polar explorers, keen to read bits and pieces of stories about Amundsen, Scott and Shackleton.

Positives: the characters are less irritating and immature than in the Martian Trilogy. Or maybe one does not expect temporary Antarctic residents to be up to the same psychological standard as astronauts.

The science behind the storytelling.

I like everything about this narrative. The voice was good and clear. The story was well thought out.

Cold and beautiful

I love the feel of the novel. You feel the cold and the beauty of Antarctica . The characters' love of the continent.

Shenanigans at the South pole

Kim Stanley Robinson’s Antarctica describes strange happenings at a scientific research station in Antarctica. Offering multiple perspectives, a Congressional staffer, a low-level grunt, and an experienced guide, piece together the disappearance of equipment and uncover a covert group of squatters, while running into an unfolding case of eco-terrorism.

Robinson spins a fanciful tale with plenty of south pole history as well as a generous helping of environmental aspects relevant for this unique climatic niche. There is also a healthy dose of economic and political angles impacting the region.

The narration is superb with excellent character distinction. Pacing is smooth and brisk.

Incredible

This is the second KSR book I’ve read, the first being Aurora. It takes a little while to come to terms with his style of writing, but once you do he shows what an incredible talent he is. Antarctica is presented with such beautiful imagery and the characters are fantastically developed. This is not only a good story, but full of history from the early days of Antarctica exploration. I’m genuinely sad that this book is over, however I’m looking forward to reading more KSR. HIGHLY RECOMMENDED.

This is a good place.

Kim Stanley Robinson is the hardest of hard science fiction writers. He will joyfully spend 2/3 off his book creating a world, and just letting his characters inhabit it. And it is entirely worth it to go along with him. In this case, he describes Antarctica, with its real science stations, and their contractors, and its fictional adventure treks and fossil fuel explorers, he describes Antarctica in so much detail, one would almost imagine that he himself has spent many field seasons there. It’s a labor of love, and we will fall in love with this future continent along with Ex and Val and Wade, and Carlos, and all the ferals determined to call it home.

Narrator ruins an otherwise interesting book.

I cannot stand Adam Verner's narration. His phony melodramatic nonsense falls squarely in the uncanny valley of never quite believable emotion and is weirdly a bizarrely over-sympathetic on every sentence, most of which require no sympathy. Its like listening to someone wax nostalgic about a science text.

Excellent Despite a Dearth of Penguins

Reading KSR's Antarctica was kind of like crossing the Drake Passage to the Antarctic Peninsula. Trying to keep us occupied during the 48 hour trip while thirty foot swells rocked our ship, the crew taught us about the history, geology, ornithology, biology, ecology, climate, economics, and politics of the continent.

Set around the other side of Antarctica at McMurdo Station and the Ross Sea (and briefly at the South Pole), this book tackles many of the same issues in equal or greater detail in the context of a quartet of major point of view fictional characters: a jaded D.C. political aide, a jaded trek guide, a jaded philosophy obsessed handy man, and an optimistic Chinese Feng Shui vlogger.

The plot is thin during the first half of the book when we learn about all of these subjects as well as these characters. Some might find this overlong, awkwardly structured to thinly veil the fact that it's really just a series of lectures. But not me, having loved my visit to Antarctica and eager to learn more. And the character development is good.

The plot kicks in over the latter part of the book after environmental saboteurs cripple human operations, endangering our protagonists and their companions out on the frozen Antarctic wilderness that is so vividly brought to life as the most important protagonist by KSR. For me, this is the part that is truly overlong as the survival story gets worse and worse.

Published in 1997, this book is at once dated and prophetic. Some of the issues, like the Antarctica Treaty and the impact of science and tourism, have been adequately addressed. Mineral exploitation has not been a problem (yet). The energy and population crises that were all too real at that time have been overcome, at least to the point of being downgraded from crises to problems.

On the other hand, KSR certainly nailed the growing climate crisis. That may be more important, especially given the political and economic climate that goes along with it, which KSR likewise nails. And imagining a vlogger, though of course he had no way on naming it that, was right on the nose.

But let's be honest, the really big problem here? Not enough penguins!