Desolation Road
E451731
Desolation Road is a science fiction novel by Ian McDonald that follows the intertwined lives of settlers in a strange, isolated town on a terraformed Mars.
All labels observed (3)
| Label | Occurrences |
|---|---|
| Desolation Road canonical | 7 |
| Desolation Road series | 2 |
| the town of Desolation Road | 1 |
How this entity was disambiguated
This entity first appeared as the object of triple T4543570 — resolving that mention is where its identity was fixed. The disambiguator weighed these candidate entities and picked the highlighted one (or “None”, minting a new entity). This is how homonymy is resolved: the same surface form can point to different entities.
NED1
Entity disambiguation (via context triple)
gpt-5-mini-2025-08-07
Target entity: Desolation Road Context triple: [Ian McDonald, notableWork, Desolation Road]
-
A.
Sunken Road
Sunken Road, later known as Bloody Lane, was a crucial defensive position and the site of some of the fiercest fighting during the American Civil War’s Battle of Antietam.
-
B.
Hell’s Highway
Hell’s Highway is the nickname for the main Allied supply route used during Operation Market Garden in World War II, running through the Netherlands and including key crossings such as the Son bridge.
-
C.
Diablo Road
Diablo Road is a main local thoroughfare in Contra Costa County, California, providing access to the unincorporated community of Diablo and surrounding residential areas.
-
D.
Sunrise Road
Sunrise Road is a scenic mountain roadway in Mount Rainier National Park that climbs to the Sunrise area, one of the park’s highest and most popular viewpoints.
-
E.
Badwater Road
Badwater Road is a scenic highway in Death Valley National Park that provides access to the famously low-lying Badwater Basin and other desert landmarks.
- F. None of above. chosen
- G. Unsure - the case is ambiguous/there is not enough information to decide.
NED2
Entity disambiguation (via description)
gpt-5-mini-2025-08-07
Target entity: Desolation Road Target entity description: Desolation Road is a science fiction novel by Ian McDonald that follows the intertwined lives of settlers in a strange, isolated town on a terraformed Mars.
-
A.
Sunken Road
Sunken Road, later known as Bloody Lane, was a crucial defensive position and the site of some of the fiercest fighting during the American Civil War’s Battle of Antietam.
-
B.
Hell’s Highway
Hell’s Highway is the nickname for the main Allied supply route used during Operation Market Garden in World War II, running through the Netherlands and including key crossings such as the Son bridge.
-
C.
Diablo Road
Diablo Road is a main local thoroughfare in Contra Costa County, California, providing access to the unincorporated community of Diablo and surrounding residential areas.
-
D.
Sunrise Road
Sunrise Road is a scenic mountain roadway in Mount Rainier National Park that climbs to the Sunrise area, one of the park’s highest and most popular viewpoints.
-
E.
Badwater Road
Badwater Road is a scenic highway in Death Valley National Park that provides access to the famously low-lying Badwater Basin and other desert landmarks.
- F. None of above. chosen
Statements (47)
| Predicate | Object |
|---|---|
| instanceOf | science fiction novel ⓘ |
| author | Ian McDonald ⓘ |
| countryOfOrigin | United Kingdom ⓘ |
| coverArtist | Chris Moore ⓘ |
| criticalReception | generally positive ⓘ |
| firstPublicationYear | 1988 ⓘ |
| followsLivesOf | settlers in an isolated Martian town ⓘ |
| genre | science fiction ⓘ |
| hasCharacterType |
Martian settlers
ⓘ
family members across generations ⓘ mechanics and engineers ⓘ political figures ⓘ |
| hasElement |
alternate history motifs
ⓘ
magical realism ⓘ terraforming ⓘ time travel ⓘ |
| hasNarrativeStructure | interlinked stories about town inhabitants ⓘ |
| hasSequel | Ares Express ⓘ |
| hasWorkInSameUniverse | Ares Express ⓘ |
| includedIn | Ian McDonald bibliography ⓘ |
| influenced | later works blending magical realism and SF on Mars ⓘ |
| isbn | 9780575042722 ⓘ |
| language | English ⓘ |
| literaryForm | novel ⓘ |
| literaryMovement | New Space Opera-adjacent British SF ⓘ |
| mainLocation | the town of Desolation Road on Mars ⓘ |
| mediaType |
hardcover
ⓘ
paperback ⓘ print ⓘ |
| narrativeScope | multi-generational ⓘ |
| narrativeStyle | ensemble cast ⓘ |
| notableFor |
depiction of terraforming on Mars
ⓘ
magical realist elements in science fiction setting ⓘ |
| pageCountApprox | 300–400 pages ⓘ |
| partOfSeries |
Desolation Road series
ⓘ
linked to:
Desolation Road
|
| placeInAuthorCareer | early novel by Ian McDonald ⓘ |
| publisher | Gollancz ⓘ |
| setting |
Mars
ⓘ
terraformed Mars ⓘ the town of Desolation Road ⓘ
linked to:
Desolation Road
|
| targetAudience | adult readers ⓘ |
| theme |
colonialism and frontier life
ⓘ
community building ⓘ family and relationships ⓘ fate and coincidence ⓘ technology and progress ⓘ |
| timePeriodOfFiction | far future ⓘ |
How these facts were elicited
The pipeline generated the facts above by prompting gpt-5.1 with this entity's name + description and the instruction below.
Instruction
You are a knowledge base construction expert. Given a subject entity and a description of it, return factual statements that you know for the subject as a JSON list of dictionaries(triples), where keys must be "subject", "predicate" and "object". The number of facts may be very high, between 25 to 50 or more, for very popular subjects. For less popular subjects, the number of facts can be very low, like 5 or 10. # Requirements - If you don't know the subject at all, return an empty list. - If the subject is not a named entity, return an empty list. - Include at least one triple where predicate is "instanceOf". - Do not get too wordy. - Separate several objects into multiple triples with one object.
Input
Subject: Desolation Road Description of subject: Desolation Road is a science fiction novel by Ian McDonald that follows the intertwined lives of settlers in a strange, isolated town on a terraformed Mars.
Referenced by (10)
Full triples — surface form annotated when it differs from this entity's canonical label.
linked to: Desolation Road
linked to: Desolation Road
linked to: Desolation Road