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I haven't read or watched The Martian, Weir's most well known work and its movie, but I did listen to Artemis. From that experience, I came to Project Hail Mary hoping for fun science exploration and nerd talk and fearing simplistic characters.
In I way, I got exactly what I expected, but also, I got much more from it than from reading Artemis.
PHM puts us in the mind of a man waking from a coma, alone, in a spaceship, amnesiac and far from earth. From there, a tale of scientific investigation and experimentation with the highest of stakes is told. The central character - Ryland Grace - is, predictably, a funny nerd, overexcited with a lot of what he discovers, but as his past is "revealed" he's given some layering and it's in this that the novel veers from the expected and safe. The exploration of the idea of self, of how our personality can be a reflection of our experiences and changeable with what we live through (or forget we've lived through), to the point of thinking of ourselves as capable and smart or incompetent, as heroic or cowardly, as intrepid explorers or blundering fools, permeates PHM, if superficially, interspersed with the hard sci-fi lingo and ideas.
There are two other characters that merit reference here, but speaking of them is unavoidably spoilery: Rocky and Stratt. The idea of Stratt is better than the execution, her position as a believable wallfacer - yes, one often thinks of Three Body Problem, although the books are so very different - is interesting, but the strong woman with no scruples turns to an unidimensional boss up until the last second and even then. Rocky is fun. Rocky is actually very fun. But he is also too human and young cool dude archetype to honor his place as a proper first alien contact representative, even if his spidery and mineral descriptions do try to alienate him from us. He's a sidekick if I ever read one. Serves all those functions so predictably well that I almost started looking for the comic book vignettes. Anyway, as a sidekick he works well, some of his moments with the main character had me smiling.
While on spoilers, the ending was bittersweet and, if quite unbelievable - if one's suspension of disbelieve survived the atmosphere fishing -, still appropriate for the main character. I found myself liking it despite my own instincts.
Weir's prose, excepting the hard science moments, is simple, as is his dialogue. The plot is well structured and serves the story well, as does the analeptic telling of the origin of PHM and Grace's participation in it.
Weir's book ends up working well. Its simplicity isn't a shortcoming if what the readers takes from it is fun, some science brain-poking and comforting problem-solving. Personally, I'd have liked to believe more and to see some depth in specific points, but I had a great time listening to Ray Porter and devoured it in a few days. I'd read more from Andy Weir, but would rather it be something in a different setting.
I am not a science fiction girly at all - but this was SO GOOD. It was hilarious, moving, and had me at the edge of my seat. I feel like I could recommend this to anyone and they would enjoy it.
Jazz hands. Very amaze. Major fist bump.
A generational sci-fi literature.
Amaze.
I loved this so much. The characters were so fun and refreshing to read about in the face of such a perilous situation. This book will stay with me for a long time, for its end of world threat, for its demonstration of kindness in the face of fear and for its creation of a hero from a man who never thought he could be one.
Strongly suggest listening to the audiobook, the narrator makes this such a fun ride. For the first 2 hrs, i was convinced it was Tom Hanks!
Great story, really fun, but hugely science based. I personally think if i’d read the book, i may have gotten lost. Loved it though.
I absolutely adored this from start to finish, one of the best books I have ever read. You would think the concept would be boring with one man in a spaceship but Andy Weir has a way of writing Grace's monologue that feels conversational, like speaking to someone you know.
Amazing book, couldn't recommend more.
The Martian was great, and I don't think I need anything else from this guy
Andy Weir, in my opinion, has never really found a standard-novel-format voice/narration style that suits him - Martian avoided the need substantially with its format; Artemis was fairly boring in all respects, but inoffensive; this is way "richer" in terms of plot, characters And voice, but the last was annoying enough ("witty" and "irreverent" are words I imagine people that enjoyed it would use) that I dropped it 2/3rds of the way in.
such a cute, quirky, sweet read. a look into what it means to be human and how friendship comes from many places. fun science bits as well that make this a fun sci fi read
Good science, but the science becomes a bit dull when the plot line is just - life finds a way, and another one, and another one.....and another.....boy this is getting a bit old.
Would have like to see a tragic plotline that stuck for more than a few chapters at least :////
I understand that Mr. Weir wants the book to be accessible, but the writing is very elementary and deteriorates from the reading experience.
Very good
The book is very much written like a script and is quite predictable.
Good book entertaning, nothing special, good math
An absolute masterclass in storytelling.
This is probably my book of the year. Absolutely perfect.
Very good, a nice plot twist, got me emotionally invested in the characters whilst doing the normal Andy Weir play of nerdy details throughout, enjoyed it very much.
Such an amazing book to read. Loved every bit of it.
This book reminds me a lot of The Martian. Not the story, but the goofy, self-narrative that is almost half of the book, not that I mind about it. It gives Ryland Grace, the main character, a little bit of humbleness and humanness that we can't all be scientific and serious at the same time. We can be stupid, telling ourselves stupid jokes and think that we can get away with it, when we're ALONE. Yes, he's alone. In Space. Familiar? Ryland Grace woke up in a spaceship all alone (although he didn't reveal much in the start, but there's a chart of a spaceship on the beginning of the book and that you know the book is about space, so not much clue wasted there) and he had no clue where he was going or how he ended up there. But he gained his memory little by little and what he remembers will shock you! HAHA, enough with the clickbait, get on reading...
i love sci fi
Wow. Just wow. I was reluctant on reading Project Hail Mary because I have never been interested in the Sci-Fi genre and boy am I ever glad I gave it a shoot. This my first space oriented book and my second ever sci-fi book after Dark Matter and it did not disappoint. The main character has so much charm and likability! And the other articulated science I would have never understood on my own incredibly well. I thought the ending was perfect and had me making audible noise of despair and excitement. I do have to say it felt a little long, but it's still a 5 star rating for me. The hype is real - I would recommend Project Hail Mary to anyone who's on the fence like I once was.
Part interesting, part meh. Narrator's tone was pretty annoying even though the science was interesting. I'm glad that I finished it but not feeling compelled to read more.
Highlights
“Intelligence evolves to gives us an advantage over the other animals on our planet. But evolution is lazy. Once a problem is solved, the trait stops evolving. So you and me, we’re both just intelligent enough to be smarter than our planet’s other animals.” “We are much much smarter than animals.”
It’s a simple idea, but also stupid. Thing is, when stupid ideas work, they become genius ideas.
“How did you do it? What killed it?”
“I penetrated the outer cell membrane with a nanosyringe.”
“You poked it with a stick?”
“No!” I said. “Well. Yes. But it was a scientific poke with a very scientific stick.”
»Tja, jetzt bist du nicht mehr allein, Freund«, sage ich. »Wir sind beide nicht mehr allein.«
🫶🏼
Also bin ich ein Mann Mitte dreißig, der allein in einem kleinen Apartment lebt, ich habe keine Kinder, aber ich mag Kinder sehr. Mir gefällt nicht, wohin das führt... Lehrer! Jetzt erinnere ich mich! Gott sei Dank. Ich bin Lehrer.
Ganz dünnes Eis war das gerade
Antarctica used to be a jungle. For millions of years it was as lush as Africa. But continental drift and natural climate change froze it over. All those plants died and decomposed. The gases from that decomposition—most notably methane—got trapped in the ice.”
It’s rare to find a scientist who is also a good administrator
For fifty thousand years, right up to the industrial revolution, human civilization was about one thing and one thing only: food. Every culture that existed put most of their time, energy, manpower, and resources into food. Hunting it, gathering it, farming it, ranching it, storing it, distributing it…it was all about food
And just like that another climate denier is born. See how easy it is? All I have to do is tell you something you don’t want to hear.
It’s a weird feeling, scientific breakthroughs. There’s no Eureka moment. Just a slow, steady progression toward a goal. But man, when you get to that goal it feels good.
Gravity doesn’t just “go away” when you’re in orbit. In fact, the gravity you experience in orbit is pretty much the same as you’d experience on the ground. The weightlessness that astronauts experience while in orbit comes from constantly falling. But the curvature of the Earth makes the ground go away at the same rate you fall. So you just fall forever
Jazz hands
No one ever talks about the really hard parts of first contact with intelligent alien life: pronouns. I'm going to go with "he" for now, because it just seems rude to call a thinking being "it."
There's no interplanetary symbol for supplication. I don't know if he understands, but he unclenches his fist.
Broadly speaking, the human brain is a collection of software hacks compiled into a single, somehow- functional unit. Each "feature" was added as a random mutation that solved some specific problem to increase our odds of survival.
I stood and shuffled out of the room. I don't thinkI even said goodbye. It's a dark and depressing feeling to have all your closest colleagues get together and decide you should die.
The hardest part about working with aliens and saving humanity from extinction is constantly having to come up with names for stuff.
"So here I am. Environmental activist. Climatologist. Antiwar crusader." He looked out to sea. "And I'm ordering a nuclear strike on Antarctica. Two hundred and forty-one nuclear weapons, courtesy of the United States, buried fifty meters deep along a fissure at three-kilometer intervals. All going off at the same time"
The math of famine is actually pretty easy. Take all the calories the world creates with farming and agriculture per day, and divide by about fifteen hundred. The human population cannot be greater than that number. Not for long anyway.
I’d have to do the math to know for sure but--I can't help it, I want to do the math right now.