Rating: 
Summary: Wow, what a future . . . !
Review: A desert planet with an ancient history of very un-Earth-like life, a frontier world that mixes social conservatism and radical experimentation, this is Mars in the late 22nd century. Casseia Majumdar is, she thinks, an ordinary person just trying to find her niche in life, beginning with student rebellion against Statism and progressing through her emergence as a key leader in a redesigned Martian political system. Parallelling her own development is the rise of Charles Franklin, her first lover and theoretical physicist extraordinaire. In its theme and style, this story reminds me most of John Varley's _Steel Beach_ and Heinlein's _The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress_ -- but while it has all the exciting detail and deep, rich texture of the former, it's far more subtle and sophisticated than anything Heinlein ever managed. The feel of the world's overwhelming strangeness and almost unimaginable complexity 175 years from now is accomplished very smoothly, almost sneakily, without ever overexplaining things. The physics "feels" right. And the characterization is always spot-on. And the title of this thing should be taken literally. Putting it simply and baldly, this is a perfectly marvelous book. It is by far the best thing of Bear's I've read and it's one of the best sf novels I've read by *anyone* in several years.
Rating:
Summary: It's all about the ideas
Review: Fresh after reading Darwin's Radio, I decided to give Moving Mars a try. As many reviewers have mentioned, the first 200-300 pages of the book are slow and sometimes unbearably so. However, I chose to focus more on the setting Greg Bear was developing rather than what was actually going on. I think Bear was trying to do two things here: Show the reader how Casseia functions and how the world around her functions as well. The book is written through Casseia's viewpoint. Bear sets up Casseia as a person completely unaware of her abilities and slowly transforms her into a revolutionary. She goes from being a naiive spoiled child to a very responsible woman over the span of the book. We are also shown a colonial and very backward (in comparison to Earth) Mars and a fantastic Earth. Earth is dominated by nanotechnology and a dataflow culture. Knowledge and data are everywhere and completely dominate life on Earth. The moon is also colonized but the book completely ignores it. The book moves between science (physics and some biology) and politics and how both are influencing and driving each other. Overall, the book presents a believable future and a credible scenario mixed in with some very fuzzy physics.
Rating: 
Summary: Not Bear's best work, in fact it's downright awful
Review: Greg Bear's MOVING MARS was nominated for the Hugo Award in 1993, sold well, and was acclaimed by some reviewers. I loved every word of Kim Stanely Robinson's Mars trilogy, and wanting to learn more about the Red Planet, I read MOVING MARS. I was nearly instantly disappointed.MOVING MARS concerns a rebellion of the people of Mars against a hostile government on Earth. Central to this event is the discovery of a small team of Martian scientists that space-time is malleable and objects can be easily converted into energy or moved across immense distances. The inhabitants of Mars decide the solar system is no place for them and move Mars 10,000 light years away. The plot is somewhat reminiscent of Poul Anderson's risible Future History (beginning with HARVEST OF STARS) in which Earth is evil and oppressive and only the libertarian spacers can save humanity. Prior to the publication of MOVING MARS Greg Bear was an excellent writer. His 1985 work EON and its wild sequel ETERNITY were innovative, well-written classics of science fiction. In MOVING MARS, on the other hand, none of Bear's talent is visible. The characters are unrealistic, and the writing is as bad as a mass-market paperback you'd find in an airport. Two of the most crushing blows concern the plot and the science behind it. The plotting is badly done. It is one thing for a writer to develop a plot and then introduce a surprise ending, but Bear doesn't even expose the plot until the last 100 pages, meaning that the reader has been forced to waste his time for three hundred pages. Bear's physics are also loopy, rather odd considering that he is trained in physics and his former novels wielded this training well. In MOVING MARS, however, the basics of Bear's science are not necessarily implausible, but the physicists go from discovery to implementation in an unrealistic amount of time. There are a number of nonsensical developments in the book. Why is being bound to Earth necessarily bad? The Martians rebel against a Terran government that shows itself only benevolent, How can Casseia find herself VP of Mars at the age of 30, especially when she has no legitimate political experience? Also, how could Bear write a novel about Mars and hardly mention its landscape and the issue of terraformation? MOVING MARS is a juvenile work that can't stand up against science fiction classics. For an excellent work on Mars, check out Kim Stanely Robinson's epic Mars trilogy (RED MARS, GREEN MARS, and BLUE MARS). Robinson's superb prose describes the beauty of the landscape like a Gary Snyder poem. If you want to try a Greg Bear novel, try EON and ETERNITY instead of MOVING MARS
Rating: 
Summary: Matian Revolution
Review: Mars doesn't like to be treated like a colony. Problem is, Earth runs everything. How do you break free of Earth's grip without risking interplanetary war? Moving Mars has a great mix of politics and tech. The book takes place in the same universe as Queen of Angels and Slant. It helps to read the other two first but it's not essential.
Rating:
Summary: A fairly realistic future for the solar system
Review: I can sum up my evaluation in two parts: 1) The Fiction
This novel begins with the main character somewhere in the middle of her college career. You are given the privelege as the reader to witness her growth into a respectable and courageous leader, experiencing all of her mistakes and triumphs along the way. If I were to sum up all of the major events in the story, I would make the story sound too fantastic and unrealistic to be entertaining. However, Bear wrote the story in such a way that you cannot help but ponder his future universe-- intricately constructed around complex political bodies and detailed history--and agree that it is a realistic model. 2) The Science
Most of the actual science and technological fantasy reveals itself towards the 2nd half of the book. It took me several weeks to read through the first half, reading a few pages here and there. Then, suddenly, I finished the 2nd half of the book in a single night. Bear puts an interesting twist on physics by mixing ideas of relativity, string theory, and quantum mechanics in a hand-waving sort of way that guides the reader through the technical points smoothly, never disrupting the flow of the plot. Bear does not neglect fiction in other scientific fields. His future is a future where nanotechnology is commonplace, AI computers (called "thinkers") are necessary members of social groups, and the games of politics are the same as they always have been. For those of you who enjoy pondering the mechanisms behind possible technological constructs of the future, you will not be dissatisfied with this novel. In this age, it seems that science fiction is sometimes a reality. However, Greg Bear is successful in painting a fairly realistic picture of our very own solar system while preserving the fantasy that makes science fiction such a joy to read.
Rating: 
Summary: Ambitious ideas, poor pacing and characterization
Review: It's impossible to read Moving Mars, or any recent book which puports to be a big-picture future history of Mars, without comparing it to Kim Stanley Robinson's Mars trilogy, and Moving Mars suffers in the comparison. Of course, this is not strictly a fair comparison, since Moving Mars is an average-sized novel, and Robinson's trilogy ran to nearly 2,000 pages in its entirety; perhaps it's inevitable that Moving Mars comes off as a bit slight. Even on its own merits, though, Moving Mars doesn't work for me. The characters all seem to be ciphers. In particular, Casseia, the viewpoint character, drifts with the tide of events, as some other reviewers have noted, to the point where her eventual assumption of leadership seems almost accidental. Her decisions, in particular her romantic relationships, feel utterly arbitrary and underdeveloped. The pacing is also badly off, which makes matters worse. Periods of time that might give some insight into the opaque charcters are so underwritten and glossed over they read like outlines that were never filled in, while a long, meandering diplomatic mission to Earth that does little but establish Moving Mars as occuring in the future of Queen of Angels and Slant takes up far too much space. In the end, we come off knowing remarkably little besides surface impressions of both Martian culture and the characters who inhabit it, which is a shame. Greg Bear is capable of much better work than this.
Rating: 
Summary: Incredibly Average
Review: "Moving Mars" by Greg Bear features a cool concept, moving the entire planet of Mars to a new star system, but the execution produced only average results. This is told in first-person through Casseia Majumdar, who starts as a confused college student and becomes the second president of Mars. The problem is that Casseia is about as interesting as I am, which is to say not at all. It is refreshing not to have a female lead that comes off as a butch superwoman, but Casseia does not come off as someone who is strong enough to run your corner convenience store, let alone an entire planet. Most annoying is that Bear glosses over most of Casseia's development from a confused young woman to a mover-and-shaker on Mars. She comes back from a failed diplomatic mission to Earth, falls in love, and next thing you know she's stumping with her mother-in-law to form a democratic government on Mars. The transition is so quick that it really is not believable to me, hence I could not buy into her becoming this awesome authority figure who decides to move an entire planet to save it from an aggressive Earth. This problem could have been solved by eliminating the first quarter of the book, which focuses on a student riot at Casseia's school. The riot does nothing to advance the plot, and its only long-term effect is to introduce Casseia to Charles Franklin, the brilliant physicist who comes up with the method of moving Mars. This could have been achieved in another way that would have left more pages to devote to Casseia transitioning from confused twentysomething to influential figure. "Moving Mars" is built on some heavy-duty science, which I don't understand and so am a bit skeptical of. I'll leave it to others who have a stronger physics background to determine if "descriptor theory" would actually work, but I find it hard to believe, even after the long, complicated discussions about it featured in the book. Overall, this book was not a total sleeper, it picked up in the last 200 pages or so, but it was not a real page-turner either. It is incredibly average, I won't recommend it, but I wouldn't say to avoid it either. Read it if you have nothing better to do.
Rating:
Summary: Solid work of Science Fiction
Review: Bear's foray into Martian colonisation borrows heavily from Kim Stanley Robinsons definitive series (Red Mars/Green Mars etc). Because of this Bear has been able to eliminate much of the world building that Robinson faced. Instead we are grounded in a Mars society which is established, a frontier colony of Earth, ruled by independent extended family groups. The basic tenets of life on Mars are told in passing, the fact that Martians have as many words for sand as Eskimo have for snow makes total sense. The reluctance of Martians to venture topside is also logical. Their foray's to the surface are similar to the Earth man's relationship with the sea. The meat of the story is in two parts. On the one hand is the perpetual struggle for power that frames all our lives. Earth based alliances are demanding a centralised form of Government on Mars to give more control over Martian activities and to simplify the processes of trade and colonisation. The Martian's, used to their independence, resist the fall into a centralised authority. But the Earth has unlimited resources, vile weapons and seems to be able to stamp it's will onto fledgeling Mars. But the other strand, the heart of the Science in this book, revolves around a way to alter the universe which opens doors to new and powerful weapons, interplanetary communications and exciting travel possibilities. Earth suspects that Mars knows something, and uses every tool at their disposal to winkle it out. Will Mars be dragged back under Earth Control? Will Earth have to destroy Mars? Will the Martians unleash damnation upon the Earth? Is there another solution. Of course the title is a bit of a give away, but the book draws you in to a will they won't they at the end. This is a good solid piece of work, with believable science and more believable colonisation of Mars and the Moon. The progress of society on Earth also makes for interesting reading. Bear has a great imagination and an ability to make possibility seem real. A really worthwhile read.
Rating:
Summary: Put me to sleep.... many times.
Review: I had very high hopes for this book. First of all, Eon was one of my favorite scifi books of all time and I felt Eternity was a very good follow up to it. Moving to Mars, however, is not what I expected. Greg Bear does a very poor job of writing the main character. In Eon I felt he did a fairly good job of writing women, in this book it seems like he tries way to hard and ends up with a woman that, though I can't put my finger on it, doesn't seem believable or likable. Truthfully, I gave this book about 250 pages to get good. While most books can set themselves up within the first 50 - 100 pages and then really get going this book never took off. Maybe the ending is spectacular but I couldn't stay awake to find out. I can see points of interest in the story but they don't seem to be leading anywhere. I also don't care for Bear's fictional Mars. Though its somewhat different it too is harldy believable and somewhat stupid. The book gave me no sense of wonder or excitement, something that other books such as Norstralia were able to do within the first few pages. Someday I may finish it, but should I risk wasting anymore hours of my life?
Rating:
Summary: moving mars - excellent concept
Review: Ive never come across a premise of "tweaking" descriptors to move matter ( and i'll say no more to spoil...). One big disappontment came from how Character Driven the story is (the reason I stopped RED MARS half way through); also, the side tracks Bear takes with virtual reality, somthing that's been done to death. But the prose is great elsewhere. The description at the end of Casseia's memorial stays in mind, & was worth it just for this.
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