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Nicholas E.
You can definitely read it on its own. The only advantage to reading it after the first book is that you know what happened to ship that left with the main character's mother on it, while no one else in this book knows.
Glen
The timelines of the two books really don't intersect, even though Planetfall happens 40 years before this one. Neither book has spoilers for the other. Reading After Atlas right after completing Planetfall might save you some very minor confusion at the beginning and maybe make some connections at the end, but even when there is overlap, the focus is on different things in the two books.
Angela
I think this book can stand on it's own, but you will get another layer of knowledge out of having read the previous book.
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