The Martian Contingency

Lady Astronaut, Book 4

By: Mary Robinette Kowal

Narrated by: Mary Robinette Kowal

Mary Robinette Kowal returns to Mars in this latest entry to the Hugo and Nebula Award-winning Lady Astronaut series.

Years after a meteorite strike obliterated Washington, DC—triggering an extinction-level global-warming event—Earth’s survivors have started an international effort to establish homes on space stations and the Moon.

The next step–Mars.

Elma York, the Lady Astronaut, lands on the Red Planet, optimistic about preparing for the first true wave of inhabitants. The mission objective is more than just building the infrastructure of a habitat–they are trying to preserve the many cultures and nuances of life on Earth without importing the hate.

But from the moment she arrives, something is off.

Disturbing signs hint at a hidden disaster during the First Mars Expedition that never made it into the official transcript. As Elma and her crew try to investigate, they face a wall of silence and obfuscation. Their attempts to build a thriving Martian community grind to a halt.

What you don’t know can harm you. And if the truth doesn’t come to light, the ripple effects could leave humanity stranded on a dying Earth ...

• Lady Astronaut
• The Calculating Stars
• The Fated Sky
• The Relentless Moon
• The Martian Contingency

©2025 Mary Robinette Kowal (P)2024 Audible, Inc.

Another great addition to the Lady Astronaut series

I loved this one just as much as the previous three books. the author is an amazing narrator too. One of my favorites!

The escapism needed

MRK continues to thrive in creating alternate history. The Lady Astronaut series adds the perfect dose of humanity to science fiction, and the details of this installment feel particularly relevant at the start of 2025. Hatred and silence are themes throughout.

I personally love the evolution of the Drs. York; maturity in their love, communication strengths and glaring weaknesses, aging bodies, authenticity of self within the marriage, hard fought resolutions.

Love it!!!

Love it!!! So amazing! Thank you so much for this new book. I have been anticipating it for years.

I loved the calendar motif

This is a great addition to the lady astronaut series. Throughout the book, she talks about trying to intertwine the calendars and celebrations of the different ethnic groups on Mars. I just loved how she worked social issues into the book. I hope someday the world can become become more unified as they did on Mars.

Loved the whole series!!

Love love loved this series.

Perfect blend between science and outer planetary dreams. I hope there are more to come!!!!

Wonderful!

YAY! I am so glad that this was so good. The First Lady Astronaut book was so good that it had me believing the author was a pilot and failed astronaut, like me. It was like she looked straight into my soul and described things that I have never been able to explain, despite my communications skills as a scientist and teacher. I was afraid that maybe this one would disappoint me, but it did not. I hope the next one can be this good. Thank you, Lady Astronaut.

MRKs voice

I truly love the story of this book. I struggled through the first couple of chapters recognizing how different the author’s voice sounded this time around. I don’t know if it was the heaviness of her personal losses the year that she wrote this, or the time since the last audiobook was recorded, but her southern accent was so much more southern. It was also deeper, and so it threw me and became a distraction over the story. I got used to it over time, but in case anyone else hasn’t started listening, and had recently listened to all of the other books before this one, be aware that is just a bit different.

Great story, but…

I really wish Kowal had worked with someone Jewish on how to pronounce the words. It was so distracting in the first book when she kept pronouncing the word, kibbutz as “kibbitz” which means something completely different. But I cannot finish listening to this chapter on Passover as she mangles almost every single Yiddish or Hebrew word. Is it so hard to ask a Jew if you’re going to write a story from a Jewish perspective?

A great addition to the series

I enjoyed catching up as the astronauts began to colonize Mars. Robinette does a great job of building back stories and showing the tension between long time
friends and adversaries.

The best book I’ve read in years. My new favorite!

Characters are complex and exceptionally well drawn; had me in tears time and again. Plot is griping and ambitious and so well researched that it achieves a complex verisimilitude that is rare stuff.