The Sands of Mars

Sequel to THE MOON AND THE DESERT!

Saving the Marsbase One mission made Glenn A. “Shep” Shepard a hero. Commanding Marsbase itself might get him killed.

Colonel Shepard—Earth’s first fully bionic augmentee and the man who once crossed interplanetary space to pull off an impossible rescue (The Moon and the Desert)—finally reaches Mars. His new command sits under the Eumenides Dorsum ridge on Amazonis Planitia, a city hewn into caverns where life is math and margin: closed-loop ecosystems, strictly rationed propellant, and minutes-long lightspeed comms lag.

While Shepard grapples with distance from his wife and newborn daughter on Earth, whispers of sabotage, industrial espionage, and anti-bionics prejudice begin to erode trust inside the base. Then a rival coalition’s colony ship goes off course and slams into the canyons of Noctis Labyrinthus, far across the Tharsis highlands.

There’s no shuttle landing, no cavalry—only engineering, endurance, and a commander whose augmented body can go where others can’t. To pull survivors out of the crash before Mars itself finishes them, Shepard must design a rescue that physics barely permits and politics would rather avoid.

Scientifically rigorous yet deeply human, The Sands of Mars is the high-stakes sequel to The Moon and the Desert—a novel about leadership under pressure, and the price of keeping a frontier alive.

At the publisher's request, this title is sold without DRM (Digital Rights Management).

Praise for The Moon and the Desert:

“Highly recommended for fans of classic hard sf and space drama.” —Amazing Stories

“This is hard science fiction with a vengeance.” —Publishers Weekly

Praise for Stellaris: People of the Stars, co-edited by Robert E. Hampson:

“[A] thought-provoking look at a selection of real-world challenges and speculative fiction solutions. . . . Readers will enjoy this collection that is as educational as it is entertaining.” —Booklist

“This was an enjoyable collection of science fiction dealing with colonizing the stars. In the collection were several gems and the overall quality was high.” —Tangent

Robert E. Hampson writes character-driven hard SF where space is messy, unforgiving, and achingly human. His fiction blends medical problem-solving, nuts-and-bolts engineering, and the logistics of living off-Earth—from underground Martian habitats to orbital shipyards—with an eye on plausible technology and the true costs of rescue. By day, he’s a professor of regenerative medicine, neuroscience, neurology, and biomedical engineering. By night, he digs into Mars geography, mission architecture, and bionics research so the science on the page feels lived-in and true. He is the author of The Moon and the Desert and Across an Ocean of Stars.