Building Mars

The Red Planet Beckons! Not far into the future, the first steps have been taken on Mars. A corporation named NewSpace has landed a crew of six on the plains of Arcadia Planitia.Many other companies have pitched to the investors and recruited their teams, and are building the systems and technologies they will need for a lasting settlement in unforgiving conditions.Nowal No'man is the CEO and majority shareholder of Sabir Space Industries. Her goal is to build an independent settlement on Mars where humanity can begin again. She is recruiting a band of explorers and dreamers, experts and cast-offs, students and scientists and engineers and astronauts, while struggling to keep her company out of the heavy hands of billionaire investors.But even from within her own company and from among her relatives the threat comes quicker than she had expected. Is it possible to keep the dream alive?Crew selection is one of many thorny problems that keep Nowal from sleeping. Which of these candidates should be on that first SSI rocket?Don Luther, PhD, lectures in Planetary Science at the University of Washington, Seattle, while researching the climate history of the Red Planet. He would love a chance to research the climate and geology of Mars first-hand and even to settle the big questions of life on another planet. But his wife has made it clear she isn't going along with his dreams.As a member of the last crew on the ISS before its decommissioning, Anastasiya Vladimirovna Komarova faces a dead end in her career as a cosmonaut. She can't stomach Earth-bound life, but SSI is desperate to find an experienced commander. Working with novices drives her crazy, and her crewmates find her leadership style to be less than smooth. What could possibly go wrong?The Brazilian Marco DaSilva, engineering prodigy, is finally selected for the first SSI crew. Faced with leaving all he has known, the self-doubt begins. Will he survive the Red Planet, or will his impulsive genius destroy the mission?Abdul Qawi is many things, but stupid isn't one of them. Crazy, maybe. After struggling out of a life of poverty and petty crime in war-torn Yemen, he now finds a chance to work with his distant relative, Nowal No'man, in Dubai, using his energetic self-educated intellect to solve technical problems. The ultimate challenge of exploring Mars beckons irresistibly, but he doesn't seem to have the right skill set to work his way onto the crew. Is there a way to beat the system? And what would it cost him if he did? Follow the stories of these and other characters as the first SSI crew trains and launches, and lands on Mars at last. Of course, landing is just the beginning. It doesn't get any easier from here onwards. In fact, death is always just one small accident away. But for those who survive and thrive, a new world is beckoning.