Interview with the author

Sarah Stewart Johnson

Why is Mars such a promising place to look for life?

Around the time life was getting started here, Mars was also warm and wet, at least episodically, with streams and lakes and perhaps a deep northern ocean. There was a thicker atmosphere, a protective magnetic field and abundant sources of energy. It also had all the right chemical elements and organic building blocks for life. But what excites me most is the idea of a separate genesis on Mars – we could find a kind of life that’s totally unlike life as we know it here on Earth.