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Rocket Summer
The first chapter is pretty short, as it is barely even a page long. The chapter describes citizens of Ohio anticipating the launch of a rocket. At the end of the chapter, the rocket launches into space. -
Ylla
The book introduces at Ylla and Ill, an unhappy couple that lives on Mars. The two used to be in love. Ylla does the housework while Yll ignores her. She then starts to have dreams about a man from Earth named Nathaniel York. Ylla gives away secrets about how the Earth Men are coming while she talks in her sleep. So Yll leaves with his gun telling Ylla he's going "hunting." -
The Summer Night
This chapter is another interchapter with a similar length to the first one. Martians all over Mars are acting strange. They are singing songs and reciting poems from Earth; especially ones from the American 1940's. -
The Earth Men
In this chapter, a three-man crew from Earth land on Mars. The martians they meet don't seem very impressed with their amazing trip however, and are mainly focused on other normal martian things. There was one group of martians that did find the Earthlihgs' trek facinating, so they threw a party for them. Turns out these martians are crazy and telepathic, so they somehow end up confusing themselves, and Mr. Xxx, kills all three people from Earth, and himself. -
The Taxpayer
This chapter is about a character from Earth named Pritchard, who is known as the taxpayer. He is constantly anticipating a nuclear war and believes that him paying taxes will allow him to leave Earth on a spacehsip before this war. He believes that he pays the taxes that supposedly have build the spaceship. But instead he goes to jail. -
The Third Expedition
Captain John Black comes to Mars with 15 men. The men land on Mars to find a normal, American, Midwestern town. Even weirder is that they begin to find dead famlily members. Little do they know these family members are actually telepathic martians, who eventually kill them. Isn't this story just lovely! -
And The Moon Be Still As Bright
When The Fourth Expidition lands on Mars they discover that the Martians have died out from chickenpox. Spender is amazed by the Martian culture left behind, but Biggs decides to get drunk and poop all over their civalization. Spender leaves, but then comes back to murder the crew members. Captain Wilder then tells the remaining crew to kill Spender. Wilder and Spender then have a talk, where eventually Wilder kills Spender. -
The Settlers
In another short interchapter, the settlers on Mars are very lonely. Even lonelier than they were at the start, after Spender nearly wiped them all out. -
The Green Morning
In this chapter a new character is introduced, Benjamin Driscoll. Benjamin is having an extraordinarily difficult time breathing in the thin, Mars atmosphere. So, he plants some trees. The trees fail to dry due to the drought that is Mars. But suddenly, one morning, they have sprung up after overnight rain. -
The Locusts
In this chapter, the Earth men are compared to locusts, as they invade Mars like the pesky bug. As several humans from Earth settle in Mars they build houses similar to the ones on their home planet. -
Night Meeting
In this chapter, Tomas Gomez meets an old man who embraces the planet that is mars. The man tells Gomez that time is crazy on Mars. Tomas then meets a Martian named Muhe Ca, who appears to be from a different time than Tomas. They can't touch eachother, but they can talk with and see eachother. The two get along, and talk about how great their respective times are. -
The Shore
In another short chapter, the first group of people are able to settle on a frontier in which Martians were on before. The second wave of settlers from Earth however includes people from urban backgrounds looking for a more spacious environment. People that prefer a more Earthly environment might find it hard adapting to living here. -
Interim
The Earthlings on Mars have now built a civilized town with building such as churches, and it is starting to feel like a normal midwestern down. Since they have no resources on the planet itself however, supples such as lumber have to be sent from Earth. This could prove to be a difficult way to get supplies in the long term. -
The Musicians
In this chapter, some young boys that live on Mars decide to go hiking. On their trek they play with dead bodies of Martians. They have to play with them now because the "Firemen" will soon burn all of the Martian bodies. This seems like a dangerous thing to do, especially in a foreign planet. Let's just hope these dead Martians don't rise from the dead to seek revenge on these kids. -
Way In The Middle of the Air
Teece is a stereotypical sourhern man who hates African Americans and likes to see them suffer. In this chapter, Teece would become upset when he finds out that all of the black people on Eaerch are going on a rocket to Mars. So he will no longer have anyone to horrass, that is, other than his wife, Mrs. Clara. -
The Naming of Names
In this short chapter, more humans of different types arrive on Mars and new towns are formed and named. Towns that were once homes of Martians and were known for the killing of Earth men by these Martians. The humans give these towns titles such as Iron Town, Aluminium City, Detroit II, and Moss Town. After this, sophisticates began to come. And they came with rules and regulations and laws that everyone had to adapt do. -
Usher II
In this chapter, William Stendahl decides to build a haunted house on Mars, basing off of Edgar Allen Poe's "The Fall of the House of Usher." I know, I never would've guessed either. He stuffs the building with crazy robots. The prohibition of fantasy and horror on Earth about 30 years before inspired Stendahl for this build. Now Mr. Garrett is someone who helped ban fantasy on Earth and now is here to investigate. He wants the house torn down, but gets eaten by a robot. -
The Old Ones
And finally, after every social type and age group you could think of had already come to Mars, then came the old people who had lived on Earth longer than anyone else, but now were starting over just like everyone else. Let's just hope their short time on Mars isn't too short. -
The Martian
The story gets weird again in this chapter when a couple on Mars, the LaFarges, who left Earth to forget their son that had died when he was just 14, run into their son who looked just like he did when he died of pneumonia. But this is indeed another Martian in distguise. Who sort of shape shifts into a dead family member of any family when he gets close to said family. Eventually while different people are seeing him as different things, he is killed. -
The Luggage Store
In this short chapter, Father Peregrine has a conversation with the luggage owner of a luggage-store about an upcoming war on Earth. The store owner argues that this war will cause humans on Mars to return to Earth because Earth is and will always be their home. He decides to keep his store open. -
The Off Season
The story goes back to Sam Parkill, who we last saw in "And The Moon Be Still As Bright." In this chapter, he decides to start up a hot dog stand on Mars, but some of the last standing Martians bother him with it. They say that they want to tell him something, but Sam shoots one. When more Martians come, Sam tries to outrun them with his sand ship. They eventually catch up to him and tell him that they are giving him half of Mars. -
The Watchers
In another short chapter, when human colonists on Mars hear the news about the war on Earth, many of them come out to watch the Earth at night. The colonists see explosions all over Earth, and the survivors on Earth radio the colonists to come home. They end up doing so and leaving Mars. -
The Silent Towns
In this chapter, Walter Gripp is the last man on Mars, as the rest have gone back to Earth for the war. Or so he thinks. He was left because he was an isolated miner while the rockets were taking passengers to Earth. But then he hears a phone ringing, and the caller is the last woman on Mars. He automatically assumes that they should be together. Until he goes to see her and finds out she eats chocolate and watches the same movie over and over again all day. Gripp then runs away. -
The Long Years
In this chapter, we go to Dr. Hathaway. She and her family are a few others that didn't leave for Earth. They missed the rockets while on an archeology trip. Anyways, Captain Wilder comes back to Mars, after being sent to Jupiter to aviod the colonization. Dr. Hathaway visits a cemetery with 4 graves, the graves end up being her husband and 3 children. And the people she's been with are revealed as robots. Hathaway dies, Wilder and his crew go back to Earth, and the robots stay on Mars. -
There Will Come Soft Rains
In this chapter, we're back on Earth. And in Allendale, California, an automated house is doing automated things such as reading and making breakfast. There are no people there because the city is basically just radioactive rubble. Later, a strong wind comes and breaks a window, which starts a fire in the house. The house tries to contain itself from the fire, but unsucessfully. -
The Million-Year Picnic
In the final chapter, a family with 3 kids are going on a vacation on Mars. Upon arriving, the oldest son Timothy, knows something is going on. It turns out that the family is not there on vacation, but they are staying there permanently. The two younger boys are sad, but Timothy tries to see good out of it. Later on when the dad wants to show his family the Martians, he brings them to a river to look at their reflections. Yes, they are the real martians.
