Vagabonds

January 13, 2020
Hugo Award–winner Jingfang’s cerebral, futuristic debut explores the interplay between societal values and individual dreams in crisp, gorgeous prose. Luoying is a member of the Mercury Group, a group of teenagers born and raised on Mars sent to study on Earth for five years as part of a cultural exchange. Upon returning to their home planet, the students feel disconnected from their people. Having spent nearly a third of their lives in the highly materialistic capitalist Terran society, they struggle to reintegrate into the serene, seemingly utopian Martian republic. As Luoying strives to find her place in her old world, she grows suspicious of her grandfather, the current consul of Mars, and his involvement in both the deaths of her parents and her selection for the Mercury Group. Luoying’s growing disillusionment with Martian society is nimbly handled, as Jingfang vilifies neither capitalism nor communism, allowing for complex political commentary grounded in her characters’ emotions. Though some readers may grow frustrated by the novel’s slow pacing, the carefully considered quality of the language mirrors the thoughtful story being told. Fans of literary science fiction will relish this challenging tale. Agent: Katelyn Hales, Robin Straus Agency.

February 1, 2020
Social science fiction: a debut novel from the Chinese author who won the 2016 Hugo Award for Best Novelette with Folding Beijing. The year is 2201. Just over a hundred years ago, the Martian colonies fought and won a war of independence against Earth, and since then, the two planets have diverged sociologically. In Hao's incisive and all-too-plausible extrapolation, Earth embodies the triumph of Western laissez faire capitalism driven by the internet's savagely competitive social media. Mars, technologically much more advanced and apparently utopian--and here the author treads more cautiously--persuasively represents what benevolent Chinese communo-capitalism might possibly evolve into. Consequently, mutual suspicion and resentment bordering on outright hostility dominate the Earth-Mars relationship. To counter this trend, five years ago a group of Martian students were sent to Earth. Now they have returned to Mars accompanied by a cultural delegation of prominent Terrans. One student, Luoying, enjoyed her time on Earth without fully grasping the ruthlessly materialistic nature of Terran society. To her now, Mars appears dull, its society rigidly stratified. As an average student, she suspects that she wasn't really qualified to make the trip. Could her grandfather Hans Sloan, currently the consul of Mars, have pulled strings to include her? How did her parents really die, and how was her grandfather involved? Hao's intricate political commentary addresses Luoying's emotional progress through dissatisfaction and disillusionment toward enlightenment. Sophisticated all this might be, but it remains commentary rather than criticism; one could wish for the author to occasionally pick up a scalpel and dissect. Often immersive, the story accretes grain by grain, like sedimentary rock formation, rather than as an orthodox narrative, and it sometimes seems nearly as slow. On a more intimate level, readers hear the thoughts inside people's heads and feel their emotions but don't come away with Martian dust under their fingernails. A thoughtful debut with ample scope for reader engagement.

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Starred review from March 15, 2020
The first of Hao's full-length novels to be translated into English, Vagabonds presents a 22nd century in which Mars has achieved liberation from Earth and functions as a collectivist society, as opposed to the increasingly media-dominated capitalist Earth. The specific focus of Hao's sprawling political narrative is on the Mercury Group, a select number of Martian students sent to Earth both as a political move and to allow them to learn about the differences between the two societies. After fives years on Earth, the returning students must now deal with their strange indeterminate state, being of both planets but also of neither. Characters are caught up in a web of political intrigue, including Luoying Sloan, the granddaughter of Mars' consul; the quiet nonconformist Dr. Reimi; and Eko Lu, a documentary filmmaker whose teacher lived on Mars 18 years ago. The true history of what happened to Luoying's parents, the future of Martian civilization, and possible war between Earth and Mars are all threads in Hao's masterful narrative. Highly recommended for fans of Kim Stanley Robinson's Mars trilogy or readers who enjoy sf with a focus on social and political themes.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2020, American Library Association.)

November 1, 2019

A Hugo Best Novelette Award winner for "Folding Beijing," Hao imagines growing tensions between Earth and Mars a century after the latter won its independence. Mars has sent a delegation of young people to Earth to calm the waters, but the Martians feel totally lost in the alien Earth environment. With a 50,000-copy first printing; note that the translator is multi-award-winning author Liu.

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