The Martian Almanac presents a 669-sol almanac of the coming Martian year, drawing from writings of the 19th and early 20th centuries, when it was widely believed that the planet Mars harbored an advanced civilization, and “first contact” was thought to be only a few years in the future. It features observations by Percival Lowell and other early observers of Mars as well as newspaper reportage, including accounts of Tesla’s and Marconi’s attempts to communicate with Martians by radio and spiritualists’ claims of astral travel to Mars. Serious reports and satirical editorials from this all but forgotten past will thrill and amuse the reader, and make plain that the vision of an optimistic and exciting future of humans engaging with sentient extraterrestrials preceded Star Trek by a century… a future that was imagined to be just around the corner!
The book also celebrates the birthdays of early astronomers, science fiction authors, artists, film contributors, and musical performers, the release dates of science fiction publications, films, and television programs, and describes sol by sol the events of past exploration flybys, orbiters, landers, and rovers.
The Martian Almanac is richly illustrated with the drawings by early astronomers documenting what they thought they saw on Mars… but what were that actually looking at? Computer-generated graphics are presented alongside these ancient depictions to show the Martian surface features that were turned toward Earth at the time astronomers drew them.