While Kim Stanley Robinson is perhaps best known for his hard science fiction works Red Mars, Green Mars and Blue Mars, the epic trilogy exploring ecological and sociological themes involved in human settlement of the Red Planet, his contributions to utopian and science fiction are diverse and numerous. Along with aspects of sociology and ecology in the Mars trilogy and other topics, these essays examine Robinson's use of alternate history and politics, both in his many novels and in his short stories. While Robinson has long been a subject of literary criticism, this collection, which includes five new essays and is drawn from writers on four continents, broadens the interpretive debate surrounding Robinson's science fiction and argues for consideration of the author as an intellectual figure of the first rank.