Birth Of Fire is a 1976 science fiction novel written by Jerry Pournelle

Jerry Pournelle

Jerry Eugene Pournelle is an American science fiction writer, essayist and journalist who contributed for many years to the computer magazine Byte and has since 1998 been maintaining his own website/blog....

 and first published by Laser Books

Laser Books

Laser Books was a line of 58 paperback science fiction novels published from 1975 to 1977 by Canadian romance powerhouse Harlequin Books. Laser published three titles per month, available by subscription as well as in stores. The books were limited to 50,000-60,000 words. They were numbered as a...

, later published by Baen Books

Baen Books

Baen Books is an American publishing company established in 1983 by long time science fiction publisher and editor Jim Baen. It is a science fiction and fantasy publishing house that emphasizes space opera, hard science fiction, military science fiction, and fantasy...

. It is related to the books Exiles to Glory

Exiles to Glory

Exiles to Glory is a short science fiction novel by Jerry Pournelle, published in 1978. It is a sequel to the stories in the collection High Justice. As with those stories, it weaves the story of pioneering individuals in space with considerations of the technical and financial challenges facing them...

and High Justice

High Justice

High Justice is a 1974 collection of science fiction short stories by Jerry Pournelle. It was republished in a omnibus edition with Exiles to Glory in 2009 as Exile -- and Glory....

, and with those two, form a starting point for the CoDominium

CoDominium

-The CoDominium series:*A Spaceship for the King *He Fell into a Dark Hole *The Mote in God's Eye...

series.

Plot summary

The book starts out in a year sometime between 2000 and 2050. It begins with Garret Pittson, a respected gang member who hasn't found his path in life, caught in the middle of a gang war and then caught by the police. He is sentenced to prison for twenty years but takes up his lawyer's offer of being shipped out to a colony on Mars where the conditions are rough and the pay unfair.

Once arriving the events stir up and he ends up playing a prominent role in a revolution led by a group of farmers out on the 'rim' of a large crater in Mars southern hemisphere. Garrett is noticed as an excellent student by Commander Farr, who tells him to go to the city, and wait for someone to find him. Someone comes up to him and gets him suited to a P-Suit, he learns to farm and the two travel to a friend's farm where they meet Erica. Garrett has private time with her and they kiss, before she says they should wait, after multiple more trips, the two spend more time together and fall in love.