The Planet On The Table is Kim Stanley Robinson’s first short story collection, published in 1986. It consists of an introduction and 8 short stories, all of which were previously published in magazines. It contains the following stories:

• Venice Drowned
• Mercurial
• Ridge Running
• The Disguise
• The Lucky Strike
• Coming Back to Dixieland
• Stone Eggs
• Black Air

The title of the collection shares its name with the 1953 poem from Wallace Stevens.

Today it is considered to be no longer available.

Publication History

• Tor Books, hardcover, July 1986
• Tor Books, paperback, July 1987
• Futura, paperback, August 1987
• J’ai Lu, as La Planète Sur La Table (French translation), May 1988
• Bastei-Lübbe, as Geschöpfe der Sonne (German translation), 1988
• Editorial Caminho, as O Planeta sobre a Mesa (Portuguese translation), 1989
• Tor Orb, included in Remaking History And Other Stories, August 1994
• J’ai Lu, as La Planète Sur La Table (French translation), January 1999

Reviews

• Locus #302, March 1986, Debbie Notkin
• Fantasy Review #90, April 1986, Wendy Bousfield
• Publishers Weekly, May 1 1986
• The Washington Post, May 25 1986, Gregory Frost
• The New York Times, July 29 1986, Gerald Jonas
• Isaac Asimov’s Science Fiction Magazine #111, December 1986, Baird Searles
• Science Fiction Review #61, Winter 1986, Fernando Q. Gouvea
• Foundation #40, 1987, Roz Kaveney
• Paperback Inferno #68, October 1987, Colin Bird
• The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction, November 1987, Orson Scott Card
• Thrust #28, Fall 1987, Pascal J. Thomas
• Fiction #402, October 1988 (France), Pascal J. Thomas
• Short Form #3/4, 1989, Judy Geary

Resources

• The Planet on the Table at The Internet Speculative Fiction Database
• The Planet on the Table at Google Books

 

Escape From Kathmandu is a collection of four short stories that are loosely connected. Three of the stories had been previously published; the collected volume was published in 1989. Because of the similar characters and setting in the stories, Escape From Kathmandu could be considered as a novel.

The stories follow the humorous and fantastical adventures of two American expatriates in Nepal who are mountain climbers. It contains the following stories:

• Escape from Kathmandu
• Mother Goddess of the World
• The True Nature of Shangri-La
• The Kingdom Underground

Structure

“Escape From Kathmandu” is composed of four novella-length stories and could be considered a collection. However, all four stories have the same two leading characters, are arranged chronologically in the events they describe and each story somehow builds up from the previous one (in the latter two in particular), in terms of how the characters become aware of larger social problems in Nepal. As such, “Escape From Kathmandu” could also be considered as a novel.

The stories are told in first person narration, travelogue-style (three of them by George, one of them (the third) by Freds).

Setting

They involve a great deal of humor, often at the culture shock resulting from Westerners being immersed in an Asian culture, or from the (lack of) development of the Nepali administration of the time — but never making fun of the Nepali people and their culture.

Also, there are many fantasy elements: subjects covered include very real Buddhist practices, but also the mythical/crypto-zoological yeti, the mythical hidden kingdom of Shamb(h)ala/Shangri-La/Xanadu/Agharti and the associated mythical/crypto-historical underground network of tunnels connecting different places on Earth. The book opens with a quote by Alec Maclellan, from his 1982 book “The Lost World of Agharti”.

The stories take place concurrently to their writing, in the late 1980s, and are solidly anchored in Nepali history: references (and appearances!) are made to the Ranas, King Birenda, Nepali social movements, the development of Kathmandu and retired US President Jimmy Carter.

The main characters are based in Thamel, a part of Kathmandu that was made popular as an “alternative” tourist district in the 1970s. At the time Nepal was a kingdom under King Birenda; it was so until the Nepali Civil War of 1996-2006, after which a Republic was established (even though Nepal still experiences political tensions and government overthrows).

Plot synopsis

Beware of spoilers!

1. Escape From Kathmandu

Bored on the off season in Kathmandu, George steals an unopened letter from his hotel and embarks on an adventure. He meets Nathan, a zoologist, and his friend Freds, both American expats and mountaineering enthusiasts. During a science trip in the Nepali highlands, Nathan made contact with the yeti! This event sprang an expedition to capture one of the yetis, an expedition headed by Phil, Nathan’s rival for the heart of Sarah, a beautiful ornithologist. George, Freds and Nathan realize that the yeti has been brought to Kathmandu and is to be smuggled to the USA in secret. The trio is joined by Sarah in the rescue of the yeti from Phil’s hotel, a rescue rendered difficult by the simultaneous visit by Jimmy Carter. The yeti, now nicknamed Buddha, proves to be very intelligent and human-like, even capable of weaving a necklace and utter “Namaste”, and overall a very nice fellow; Buddha comes to dress perfectly as a human, shake Jimmy Carter’s hand, assist George in cycling through the Kathmandu streets and be offered a baseball cap. While Freds lures their pursuers away, George and Buddha go on a bus and air trip in order to bring Buddha back to the wild.

2. Mother Goddess Of The World

Over tea, George meets Kunga Norbu, a Buddhist tulku and Freds’ personal guru. George and his Sherpa Laure start guiding their team: four English trekkers and an American documentary filmmaker who is all over the place, Arnold. The English are lured in by Kunga and Freds’ stories that the lost bodies of two historic English climbers (Mallory and Irvine, who disappeared in 1924 while attempting to be the first ones to reach the top of Mount Everest) are being sought to be brought back in England — a sacrilege for climbers! they should be left at their resting place in the Himalayas — and Arnold jumps on the chance to film their quest. What Kunga didn’t say is that before he can become a full lama, he has to accomplish a secret task: climb the highest mountain of the Himalayas. So George is pulled into events however he may try to resist, the Brits try to avoid the annoyingly pressing Arnold, they eventually find and bury the bodies, and Kunga, Freds and George end up climbing Mount Everest illegally and spend the night in the cold, experiencing Kunga’s heat-releasing tumo technique. The group returns safely and pretend they didn’t know where they were to the authorities, and the Brits destroy Arnold’s incriminating (and voyeurist) tapes.

3. The True Nature of Shangri-La

Shambala, the mythical but very real secret Buddhist city (also known as Shangri-La), is in danger of being discovered because of a road development project underway that would flood the area with tourists. Freds alerts George who would have none of it, so Freds has to pull George into an almost perilous journey, involving less-than-comfortable bus rides and trekking in the Himal, close to the Nepal-China border, to Shambala — which proves to be like any other Tibetan village. With time, George comes to care deeply for the people of Shambala and gets involved in assisting the local doctor with the children’s health and food problems (and tries to deal with gastric problems of his own). Back to Kathmandu, Freds and mainly George put all their forces in investigating who is behind the road development. George gets lost in an endless series of bureaucratic redirections, inefficiencies, obscure chains of command, political game-playing and general corruption. Completely exhausted, George has to give up. George and Freds then embark the Shambali on another plan: conduct simultaneous attacks on military garrisons on both sides of the border, and retreat through secret underground tunnels. The surreal attack leaves George in the hospital and as he recovers, the geo-political ramifications of his plan have Nepal, China and India accusing each other, ultimately resulting in the road project being cancelled and the Shambala valley saved.

4. The Kingdom Underground

Since his last adventure, George has been very much pained by the poor situation the Nepali are in and was seeking the best way to help them. He is confronted to an impossible choice when two of his friends ask him his assistance. Because of his previous experience with the palace administration, Nathan and Sarah ask him to help them promote and finance a program of sewage works; this would have tremendous beneficial effects on Kathmandu sanitation. Freds asks him not to, and he has to reveal why: below Kathmandu, and in fact everywhere below Nepal and Tibet, lies a vast secret network of underground tunnels connecting significant Tibetan locales. A faction of the opposition’s Congress Party, which hopes to subvert the corrupt Panchayat Raj government of the Ranas, eavesdrops on the Palace intrigues and cooperates with the Shambali. George has the idea to have this unified Nepali resistance movement condemn the tunnels that would intersect with the planned sewers and dig up new ones. The plan goes through safely, up until George can no longer cope with the Ranas’ corruption going on right on top of his head, and breaks through to the Palace and kidnaps the King. George, Freds and Bahadim end up being chased by Palace guards in the underground tunnels, all the way to an exit in the Nepali jungle.

Characters

• George Fergusson: An American expatriate in Nepal, George works as a mountain guide for “Take You Higher, Ltd.”, and when he doesn’t, he hangs around Thamel idly. In a difficult situation, everyone expects from him to be the one to come up with an ingenious plan. Hypochondriac and wary of all Nepali food.
• George “Freds” Fredericks: Used to study biology in the USA, became enamoured with the Buddhist culture and settled in Nepal. He is the Buddhist apprentice of Kunga Norbu, thanks to whom he has been let in to some of the secrets maintained by the Tibetan population.
• Buddha: a yeti in the Himalayas. He and his kin occasionally help the Shambali in case of need.
• Kunga Norbu: a climbing lama and a tulku, originary from Shambala. Disciple of Dorjee Lama, who set him out to accomplish a certain task before Kunga could become a guru of his own right: to climb the Everest. Practices tumo and lung-gom-pa.
• Bahadim Shrestha: journalist for the Nepal Gazette, specialist of the inner politics of the Nepali Panchayat Raj and associated occult financing. Also, a secret member of the Nepali Congress Party.

Quotes

• [Nathan’s letter] I reached the source of the stream – a spring-fed pool at the bottom of a talus slope – and stood watching it pour down into the world. One of those quiet Himalayan moments, where the world seems like an immense chapel. (p.19)

Text Variants

In chapter 13 of the first publication of Escape from Kathmandu in Isaac Asimov’s Science Fiction Magazine (September 1986), Freds refers to “Buddhist guerrillas”; this was changed in subsequent printings to “Hindu guerrillas”.

In the first publication of Mother Goddess of the World in Isaac Asimov’s Science Fiction Magazine (October 1987), Kunga Norbu’s first incarnation is named Naropa, and Kunga Norbu’s guru is named Tilopa. In subsequent printings, these names are changed to Tsong Khapa and Dorjee respectively.

Editions

Single stories

• Escape From Kathmandu – dos-à-dos anthology with James P. Blaylock’s Two Views of a Cave Painting & The Idol’s Eye; cover by Donna Gordon; Axolotl Press, 1987

Reviews

• Val’s Random Comments
• cascoly – HubPages

Resources

• Excerpt at Macmillan.com
• Escape from Kathmandu at The Internet Speculative Fiction Database
• Escape from Kathmandu at Google Books

The Martians is a companion volume to the three volumes of the Mars trilogy, published in 1999. It is a short story collection, consisting of stories, poems, in-universe article excerpts, essays, and even meta/autobiographical stories (“Purple Mars“). Some of the stories were published before. Some stories do not take place in the same universe as the Mars trilogy; some others, while they share the same characters, are evidently alternate timelines to the trilogy.

It consists of the following stories:

• Michel In Antarctica
• Exploring Fossil Canyon
• The Archaea Plot
• The Way The Land Spoke To Us
• Maya And Desmond
• Four Teleological Trails
• Discovering Life
• Coyote Makes Trouble
• Michel In Provence
• Green Mars
• Arthur Sternbach Brings The Curveball To Mars
• Salt and Fresh
• The Constitution Of Mars
• Some Worknotes And Commentary On The Constitution, by Charlotte Dorsa Brevia
• Jackie On Zo
• Keeping The Flame
• Saving Noctis Dam
• Big Man In Love
• An Argument For The Deployment Of All Safe Terraforming Technologies
• Selected Abstracts From The Journal Of Areological Studies
• Odessa
• Sexual Dimorphism
• Enough Is As Good As A Feast
• What Matters
• Coyote Remembers
• Sax Moments
• The Names Of The Canals
• The Soundtrack
• A Martian Romance
• If Wang Wei Lived On Mars And Other Poems
• Purple Mars

Synopsis

Michel In Antarctica

Michel on Earth continuity. In Antarctica, psychologist Michel Duval evaluates the First Hundred candidates for the Mars mission.

Exploring Fossil Canyon

Eileen Monday and Roger Clayborne continuity. First published in 1982. A group of hikers finds what look like fossilized sea shells in a Martian canyon.

The Archaea Plot

Martian folklore. Ancient native Martian life forms plot to retake the planet from human settlers.

The Way The Land Spoke To Us

Martian terrain and what it means for people traversing it.

• The Great Escarpment
• Flatness

Maya And Desmond

Maya and Desmond’s relationship throughout the years, as it was kept hidden from the Mars trilogy reader, as friends and occasional lovers.

• Finding Him
• Helping Him
• Helping Her
• The Years
• Helping Him
• Losing Him

Four Teleological Trails

Four tales of a hiker, musing on the significance of a trail, of reaching a trail’s summit, of finding and losing a trail. Takes place in Crommelin Crater.

• Wrong Way
• Mistakes Can Be Good
• You Can’t Lose the Trail
• The Natural Genius

Discovering Life

Not found in first editions; in all editions since the Bantam Spectra paperback edition of 2000. A NASA press conference on the finding of life on Mars by robotic probes.

Coyote Makes Trouble

A day in the life of the Coyote, where he sets up a visible banner protesting against the UNTA in a tented city.

Michel In Provence

Michel on Earth continuity. After a stay on Mars, which consists of scientific settlements with rosters instead of full colonies, Michel returns on Earth and rekindles his relationship with Maya.

Green Mars

Eileen Monday and Roger Clayborne continuity. First published in 1988. Climbing Olympus Mons. See main article: Green Mars (novella).

Arthur Sternbach Brings The Curveball To Mars

Eileen Monday and Roger Clayborne continuity (possibly?). An American teaches a native Martian how to throw.

Salt and Fresh

Martian folklore. The little red people and the water from terraforming.

The Constitution Of Mars

The text of the Martian constitution of the Second Martian Revolution.

Some Worknotes And Commentary On The Constitution, by Charlotte Dorsa Brevia

Some notes on the above by Charlotte.

Jackie On Zo

Memories of Jackie on giving birth to and raising Zo.

Keeping The Flame

While hiking, Nirgal comes across Edvard Perrin and George Berkovic in a Greek-style temple carved in the memory of Phyllis Boyle. They give a reading of past history presenting Phyllis as a force of “good”, an alternate reading compared to the account the reader got in the trilogy. They hint at a possible reversal of terraforming in the future (a plot?).

Saving Noctis Dam

The dam over Noctis Canyon encounters geological and weather difficulties.

Big Man In Love

Martian folklore. On Big Man, his amputated penis, John Boone and Zoya (a clone of Zo).

An Argument For The Deployment Of All Safe Terraforming Technologies

Surfing on Mars and dealing with global cooling that started in the 2210s decade.

Selected Abstracts From The Journal Of Areological Studies

A collection of abstracts dealing with the possible discovery of life on Mars. Sax Russell is among the authors.

Odessa

Memories of living on the Martian Odessa.

Sexual Dimorphism

A scientist observes similarities in human and dolphin DNA and observes how dolphins adapt to a changing environment; he draws parallels with his observations of women and his own relationship with his partner.

Enough Is As Good As A Feast

Idyllic life in a Martian agricultural commune inside a crater. Hints of a shift towards a cooler climate.

What Matters

Eileen Monday and Roger Clayborne continuity (possibly?). Peter Clayborne meets Roger Clayborne and have dinner together, talking about history and personal action.

Coyote Remembers

Coyote reminisces about his relationship with some key Mars trilogy characters.

Sax Moments

A collection of little scenes from the point of view of Sax.

The Names Of The Canals

On the source of some place names in the Mars trilogy.

The Soundtrack

On the music listened to while writing the Mars trilogy.

A Martian Romance

Eileen Monday and Roger Clayborne continuity. An ice sailing trip. Mars is experiencing a global cooling and animal and plant life is going through a mass extinction; the older generation of Martians is living this as a tragedy, but for the new generation this is how Mars is supposed to be.

If Wang Wei Lived On Mars And Other Poems

A series of poems on life on Mars. Antarctica continuity (possibly?).

Purple Mars

KSR’s own account of his last day of writing the Mars trilogy!

Relation to the Mars trilogy and interconnections

The collection includes some stories that could be part of the main Mars trilogy continuity, or at least do not come in direct contradiction with it. These are stories that feature trilogy characters, like “Maya and Desmond” or “Jackie on Zo”, or that are more abstract or completely lack any mention of characters or place in the future timeline, like “Four Teleological Trails”.

The collection also includes some stories that are explicitly not part of the main Mars trilogy continuity. Some of them, interspersed across the collection, are interconnected: the collection results in a travelling between alternate timelines as the reader moves along. The main alternate continuities are:

Michel on Earth continuity. Consists of: “Michel in Anterctica”; “Michel in Provence”.

Eileen Monday and Roger Clayborne continuity. Consists of: “Exploring Fossil Canyon”; “Green Mars”; “What Matters”; “A Martian Romance”. “What Matters” blurs the lines with the main trilogy continuity by having the Claybornes from both continuities meet. “Arthur Sternbach Brings The Curveball To Mars” could arguably be set in this continuity, given that it includes a character first introduced in “Green Mars”. In addition, there is mention of a global cooling on Mars as time passes, which also connects this with “Keeping The Flame”, “An Argument For The Deployment Of All Safe Terraforming Technologies” and “Enough Is As Good As A Feast”. “Keeping The Flame” would also blur the lines in terms of continuity, as it includes characters from the main trilogy, but who also happen to remember events differently from the main trilogy.

Publication History

• Voyager, April 1999
• Bantam Spectra, September 1999
• Voyager, September 1999
• Easton Press, 1999
• Science Fiction Book Club, October 1999
• Voyager, April 2000
• Presses de la Cité, as Les Martiens (French Translation), September 2000
• Libre Expression, as Les Martiens (French Translation), 2000
• Bantam Spectra, October 2000
• France Loisirs, as Les Martiens (French Translation), 2001
• CNIB, audio book, 2002
• Heyne, as Die Marsianer (German Translation), September 2002
• Bantam Spectra e-Book, May 2003
• Minotauro, as Los Marcianos (Spanish Translation), October 2003
• Pocket, as Les Martiens (French Translation), May 2007
• Kabalcı Yayınevi, as Marslılar (Turkish Translation), forthcoming (?)

Reviews

• adamosf – Visions of Paradise
• Cannonball Read IV
• Fred’s Place

Resources

• The Martians at The Internet Speculative Fiction Database
• The Martians at Google Books

Vinland The Dream And Other Stories is a short story collection consisting of 14 stories selected from The Planet On The Table (1986), Remaking History (1991) and The Martians (1999). It was published by Voyager in the UK in 2002. It contains the following stories:

• Discovering Life
• Venice Drowned
• Mercurial
• Ridge Running
• The Disguise
• The Lucky Strike
• Coming Back to Dixieland
• Stone Eggs
• Black Air
• A History of the Twentieth Century, with Illustrations
• Remaking History
• Vinland the Dream
• Muir on Shasta
• A Sensitive Dependence on Initial Conditions

Reviews

• Fred’s Place

Resources

• Vinland The Dream And Other Stories at The Internet Speculative Fiction Database
• Vinland The Dream And Other Stories at Google Books
• Large cover art at Chris Moore’s site