The Martian by Andy Weir

The Martian

by Andy Weir

#1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • “Brilliant . . . a celebration of human ingenuity [and] the purest example of real-science sci-fi for many years . . . utterly compelling.”—The Wall Street Journal
 
The inspiration for the major motion picture
 
Six days ago, astronaut Mark Watney became one of the first people to walk on Mars. 

Now, he’s sure he’ll be the first person to die there.

After a dust storm nearly kills him and forces his crew to evacuate while thinking him dead, Mark finds himself stranded and completely alone with no way to even signal Earth that he’s alive—and even if he could get word out, his supplies would be gone long before a rescue could arrive. 

Chances are, though, he won’t have time to starve to death. The damaged machinery, unforgiving environment, or plain-old “human error” are much more likely to kill him first. 

But Mark isn’t ready to give up yet. Drawing on his ingenuity, his engineering skills—and a relentless, dogged refusal to quit—he steadfastly confronts one seemingly insurmountable obstacle after the next. Will his resourcefulness be enough to overcome the impossible odds against him?
 
NAMED ONE OF PASTE’S BEST NOVELS OF THE DECADE

“A hugely entertaining novel [that] reads like a rocket ship afire . . . Weir has fashioned in Mark Watney one of the most appealing, funny, and resourceful characters in recent fiction.”—Chicago Tribune 
 
“As gripping as they come . . . You’ll be rooting for Watney the whole way, groaning at every setback and laughing at his pitchblack humor. Utterly nail-biting and memorable.”—Financial Times

Reviewed by sa090 on

4 of 5 stars

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An awesome technical book about survival, I really enjoyed reading it and the couple reasons it got a 4 instead of a 5 from me were because of Mark's somewhat childish outlook to all of this and the fact that it didn't feel dangerous at all. The only time I was actually on the edge of my seat was when the final arc so to speak came along and they were picking him up but other than that it felt kind of lacklustre in that department.

Other than those two reasons I really enjoyed it, it took a while to read though because I'm lazy. I enjoyed the possibilities and plans both NASA and Mark came up with to counter what's happening, the author clearly put a lot of thought into this and the amount of detail in describing each little thing made it easy to follow.

Overall though it's a really good book!

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Reading updates

  • Started reading
  • 10 September, 2015: Finished reading
  • 10 September, 2015: Reviewed