I have no idea why I find it so hard to read anything from before 1950. Luckily this was a much easier read than others. While the main Martian in the story, Tweel, has some humanoid features, the description giving him an 18 inch beak immediately made me think of Kevin from Pixar's film UP.
The story became much more interesting when this was the image that was constantly in my head while reading it.
I did get a laugh out of a few lines of dialogue early on briefly covering how exactly not just these men, but humanity managed to reach Mars. It's said they used atomic fuel, and that the man who discovered it should rest in peace, implying that he died during his "Eureka!" moment.
The main character and Tweel come across many different species that live on Mars, and I'm always baffled at just how many intelligent, or semi-intelligent species a writer can say are native to one world. It makes me wonder how different Earth could be if we weren't the only ones to learn how to utilize our thumbs. Would we still be the dominant species? If not, who else? Probably bears. No, definitely bears.
It is cool to see hard science making its way into fiction, but my only gripe is that its not easy to organically place it in a story or dialogue. People still struggle with this today. My main issue with the film Interstellar is that it spent too much time on its science and not enough on its characters and story.
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