Which C.S. Lewis novel follows Elwin Ransom to the planet Malacandra?

Out of the Silent Planet follows Elwin Ransom to the planet Malacandra. C.S. Lewis published the science-fiction novel in 1938 as the first book of his Space Trilogy.

Ransom is a philologist who is kidnapped and taken into space by Weston and Devine. He escapes on Malacandra, a world whose inhabitants and cultures challenge the assumptions of the human captors. The novel combines planetary adventure with questions about language, morality, and humanity’s place in the universe.

Lewis used “Malacandra” for the planet that humans call Mars. This sometimes causes confusion because later books in the trilogy use different planetary settings and names. Perelandra, published in 1943, takes Ransom to Venus, while That Hideous Strength returns the action largely to Earth.

The novel was influenced by Lewis’s conversations with J.R.R. Tolkien about the value of imaginative science fiction. Its publication helped establish Lewis as a writer beyond academic criticism and Christian apologetics.