‘Ryland Grace is the sole survivor on a desperate, last-chance mission – and if he fails, humanity and the earth itself will perish.
Except that right now, he doesn’t know that. He can’t even remember his own name, let alone the nature of his assignment or how to complete it.
All he knows is that he’s been asleep for a very, very long time. And he’s just been awakened to find himself millions of miles from home, with nothing but two corpses for company.
His crewmates dead, his memories fuzzily returning, Ryland realizes that an impossible task now confronts him. Hurtling through space on this tiny ship, it’s up to him to puzzle out an impossible scientific mystery-and conquer an extinction-level threat to our species.
And with the clock ticking down and the nearest human being light-years away, he’s got to do it all alone.
Or does he?
An incredibly engaging science fiction romp and buddy narrative, so replete in energy, enthusiasm and charm that we can forgive the occasional absurd plot premise and the meagre characterisation.
What I Liked
- Weir’s obvious enthusiasm for science and the creation of credible solutions to his characters’ problems
- An engaging narrative voice
- The concept of the astrophage
- The pacing of the plot
What Could Have Been Different
- Characterisation could have been more authentic: Ryland Grace was a fairly obvious Gary Stu, and basically is Mark Watney from The Martian
- The premise that a high school teacher was recruited to the project is sheer wish fulfillment
- I’m being picky but the depiction of Grace’s teaching was deeply unconvincing.
I’m going to put it out there: I do not think Andy Weir is a terribly good writer.
His language is pedestrian, his characterisation limited, his plot points strain credibility and threaten the willing suspension of disbelief. Normally, this would cause a book to hemorrhage stars in a review and yet, somehow, I found that I thoroughly enjoyed this one despite – perhaps because of – its flaws.
The novel opens with our hero – the Gary Stu to trump all Gary Stus – struggling to wake up and being harassed by a computer. Slowly, once conscious, he deduces that he is on a spaceship having woken from a coma with no memory – for many chapters, he was unable to remember his own name.
As the memories return – which allows Weit to show us a number of flashbacks – we learn that an alien life form has been discovered migrating between the Sun and Venus… and consuming enough of the sun’s energy to plunge the earth into a new ice age with its concomitant destruction of ecologies, habitats and social order. To save earth, a mission is sent to Tau Ceti, the only star that seems unaffected by the so-called astrophage. Is the cure for Earth’s sun there?
Weir has incredible fun devising ways to send astronauts over the twelve light years to Tau Ceti – aided by the plot point of having the astrophage capable of being used as incredibly potent fuel, capable of sending a spaceship across the stars. And once in Tau Ceti, Ryland Grace realises that humanity is not the only civilisation to suffer from astrophage infection, not the only civilisation to send a ship to investigate.
Weir is unabashedly geeky in his science – and the excitement of discovering alien life, of investigating the astrophage, of meeting another space ship – and later its sole inhabitatnt, Rocky – is incredibly infectious and charming. It is absurd that Grace is whisked from his high school teaching job to investigate the astrophage, however impressive his previous life in academia was. Stratt, the monomaniacal head of Project Hail Mary was a ridiculous two dimensional character. The depiction of Russians and the Chinese is stereotypical to say the least. And yet it does not seem to matter. For me, the joy was in the discovery and exploration – Grace’s attempts to meet and to understand and finally talk with Rocky – a feat that seemed to happen with absurd speed, moving from rudimentary gesture to scientific discussion within a few chapters – were more interesting than their solving of their various problems together. But again, it did not really matter: the buddy-movie vibes between Rocky and Grace were charming and Rocky was given just enough sass to avoid it becoming saccharine.
A thoroughly enjoyable read!
Overall
(One bonus star for sheer enthusiasm)
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