The novel “Ares Express” by Ian McDonald was published for the first time in 2001. It’s the sequel to “Desolation Road”.

Sweetness Octave Glorious-Honeybun Asiim 12th was born into a family that for generations has been running the Bethlehem Ares Railroads Class 22 Heavy Fusion Hauler Catherine of Tharsis, one of the trains that travel across the planet Mars. Her dream is to drive it but there are rules that prevent women from doing it and her family has combined a marriage that she doesn’t want.

Sweetness decides to leave and finds herself part of a story that embraces possible futures because reality can be fluid. There are many alternatives possibilities, managed by technologies so advanced as to be similar to magic because the line between artificial intelligences and angels can be blurred.