Red Mars by Kim Stanley Robinson

The first novel in Kim Stanley Robinson's massively successful and lavishly praised Mars trilogy. 'The ultimate in future history' Daily Mail Mars -- the barren, forbidding planet that epitomises mankind's dreams of space conquest. From the first pioneers who looked back at Earth and saw a small blue star, to the first colonists -- hand-picked scientists with the skills necessary to create life from cold desert -- Red Mars is the story of a new genesis. It is also the story of how Man must struggle against his own self-destructive mechanisms to achieve his dreams: before he even sets foot on the red planet, factions are forming, tensions are rising and violence is brewing! for civilization can be very uncivilized.