'Terraforming: Ecopolitical Transformations and Environmentalism in Science Fiction is the first study to trace the historical development of environmental science fiction, and it convincingly frames this development within the genre’s representation of planetary adaptation...Pak’s is a very good book.' Professor Eric Otto, Florida Gulf Coast University 'Pak’s magisterially complete history of the idea of terraforming marks an important milestone in ... Read morescience fiction studies. He rightly sees the terraforming concept as the ideal test-bed for an astonishingly wide range of crucial gedankenexperiments in many fields. His analysis of the social, political, philosophical, spiritual, and moral dilemmas that the terraforming genre offers—humanity’s place in nature only the most obvious
makes this a book of importance far beyond the science fiction community.' Frederick Turner 'Terraforming is a solid contribution to exploring the global weirding elements of speculative fiction and ecological futures—catastrophic, wonderful, and mundane.' Andrew Hageman, Paradoxa 'Terraforming is an eminently readable, enjoyable, and a well-informed criticism of selected science-fiction narratives.' Andrew Rowcroft, The British Society for Literature and Science 'Pak’s volume is indispensable to the study of terraforming stories. Both science fiction scholars and environmental theorists will find in this book a broad history of a complex idea expressed clearly and cogently. Pak explores an impressive number of texts and traces the development of terraforming sf with a deep understanding of its complexities, its social origins, and its philosophical import. This is a timely study that will surely become seminal to future scholars of terraforming stories.' James Hamby, Journal of the Fantastic in the Arts ‘Pak's Terraforming certainly rises to the challenge, making a strong case for ecological science fiction not simply as an important subliterature worthy of attention by English specialists but also as a mode of creative mythopoesis.’ Gerry Canavan, Science Fiction Studies ‘This is an important book and will be essential reading for scholars of ecocriticism and of the development of ideas in SF.’ Anthony Nanson, The BSFA Review ‘Such a wide-ranging examination inevitably runs the risk of becoming unwieldy, or of collapsing under the weight of its own ambitious scope. Pak’s grasp of his material, however, is hugely impressive, and he moves with confidence through the whole of twentieth-century sf.’ Thomas Connolly, SFRA Review ‘Pak’s decades-spanning analysis of terraforming is an impressive work. It finds in sf an opportunity for a“disciplined thought experiment” (Pak 8)—a space for speculations about the future, yes, but also and especially for reflections on the present.’ Benjamin R. DeVries, Fafnir—Nordic Journal of Science Fiction and Fantasy Research Show Less