I had trouble getting really into this book, although the story was interesting. I guess its mostly the Gibson-esque descriptions of a future world with plenty of assumed knowledge. However, I found the descriptions of the failed Mars missions deeply satisfying, and would love to see those covered in more detail.
However, the story gets better as you go along, and I found the second two thirds of the book to be really good. It probably helped that I have an engineering background, because some of the descriptions are quite technical.
[isbn: 9780441017317]
[awards: nominee hugo 2009; nominee prometheus 2009]