Written 50 years ago, Part I (consisting of the first nine chapters) was commenced in my teens and then stowed in a box until resuscitated when my granddaughter expressed an interest.

Part II (Cliffdwellers of Mars) is a sequel commencing with Chapter 10. Written in 2012, it was followed by Parts III (Valley of the Moon) which starts with Chapter 21, and Part IV (Kobol), Chapter 31. All willl be posted as continuous chapters, though I consider each a novella on its own.

So, suspend your disbelief and enjoy!

LARA OF JASOOM

FOREWORD

It is nearly a hundred years now since John Carter made his first improbable crossing of the great void between Earth and Mars. In this year 1968 Earth is on the brink of space travel. Soon a manned craft will reach our satellite and it will not be long before Mars is reached and its secrets discovered.

What will happen then? Mars' few warlike peoples are no match for Earth's overwhelming billions. It grieves me to think that this mighty, ancient culture could be destroyed even as were the Greeks, the Romans, and the Incas.

However that is in the future, and my concern in writing this journal is with the present and immediate past. I think I am the first woman to have reached Mars – at least, if there are others I have not heard of them, nor have John Carter or Ulysses Paxton.

For those who would hear more of Barsoom and her remarkable people, here is my tale.

I am a teacher, though I have done many other things in my lifetime. It is a long lifetime, too, for I have lived more than a century. Unlike John Carter, however, I do remember my childhood, around the time of Confederation in Upper Canada. My parents were well-to-do and sent me to school in England. Returning home as a young woman, I began to teach. Periodically, during those early years, I travelled far and wide across Canada and the United States. My parents died within a year of each other near the turn of the Century and I moved away from Ontario. I had to keep moving every ten or fifteen years because I discovered that I never aged. At this writing, as I begin my second century of life, I look the same as I did at 25. Obviously I dared not let my friends suspect lest I be regarded as a scientific freak.

I was living in a remote British Columbia town when the miracle occurred. I lived alone in a small but comfortable cottage beside a lovely lake, commuting daily by car the several miles to the small country school where I taught all twelve grades. I had lived there longer than any other place because I loved it so, but the time was nearing when I knew I would have to move on. I wore glasses and affected a severe hair style to alter and age my appearance, but I could not change my fresh complexion, youthful body, or reduce the abundance of my red hair.

The thought of leaving this beloved home depressed me. I sat on my porch late one June night, savouring the warmth and and softness of the spring air. Apart from the eternal whistling of the crickets, the night was absolutely still and quite, quite dark. On an impulse I decided to have a swim. The water was refreshing and I swam out some way from the shore. When I floated on my back to rest momentarily, my eyes alighted on a brilliant red star, directly overhead. Mars. A powerful longing came over me – the same irresistible urge described by John Carter and Ulysses Paxton – then something snapped, there was a moment of unbelievable cold . . .

I do not know what happened to my earthly body. Suffice it to say that within a short time I opened my eyes on a world far from Earth. I knew it was Mars.