A lone astronaut must save the earth from disaster.
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 crew mates dead, his memories fuzzily returning, he realizes that an impossible task now confronts him. Alone on this tiny ship that's been cobbled together by every government and space agency on the planet and hurled into the depths of space, it's up to him to conquer an extinction-level threat to our species.
And thanks to an unexpected ally, he just might have a chance.
Having loved watching The Martian and loved reading Artemis, I was really looking forward to jumping on Andy Weir's latest book nice and early. I'll admit, while eager I was also a little anxious about diving into something more science-focused, since Artemis was more heist-centric, and I haven't read The Martian yet for that very reason. I mean, I'm not anti-science by any means, but I did avoid it as much as I could by getting a BA in college. So with my excitement balanced with a healthy apprehension, I took the plunge.
I really shouldn't have worried. Weir has been praised for bringing the science back into Sci-Fi, but he's still shelved in the pop-fiction section for a reason. While he certainly does include a lot of science in this book—mostly having to do with calculating angles and velocity for space flight, a bit of biology having to do with algae and breeding, and a bit about elements, light physics, and general experimentation techniques—its delivery is tempered by both his easy-to-read style, and his characters. As someone who only took 1 biology class in high school, and completed her science requirement with Physics 101 in college, I still found everything covered very easy to comprehend, and anything that went over my head wasn't essential to understanding the story.
It also helps that his main character in this story, Ryland Grace, is a middle school science teacher, who prides himself on being one of the accepted few "Cool" teachers. While this fact is hinted at in early chapters—when his newly awoken brain is still fighting off amnesia—with his refusal to swear, it also plays a big part in both his general approach to tackling experiments, as well as his natural ability of conveying information in simple or relatable terms. For example, here's a passage where he explains some of the characteristics of light:
Light is a funny thing. Its wavelength defines what it can and can’t interact with. Anything smaller than the wavelength is functionally nonexistent to that photon. That’s why there’s a mesh over the window of a microwave. The holes in the mesh are too small for microwaves to pass through. But visible light, with a much shorter wavelength, can go through freely. So you get to watch your food cook without melting your face off. [pg 83, 18%]By referencing something most people use every day, he effectively conveys a phenomenon that many of us laymen would balk at trying to understand. And his profession (teaching younger kids) makes it that much more plausible that he would think in these terms regularly, despite being a highly-trained scientist performing literal rocket science at times. It also makes his repeated admonishments to himself over switching between metric and imperial measurements both funny and believable.
Despite all the speculative and theoretical science and happenings, this book is extremely believable. Now, maybe that's me being fairly science-illiterate, but everything that happened, even the most fantastical, always seemed grounded somehow. Whether it was the sudden appearance of space-faring, sunlight-devouring alien microbes, a rushed-yet-successful space mission launched by cooperating governments, or even that unexpected ally the book's summary mentioned, everything had enough explanation behind it that I could just follow along for the ride.
Now, I don't want to spoil anything about said "unexpected ally" because I had no knowledge of them going in, but I do want to say I loved every single thing about them. I loved their unique perspective on things, the getting-to-know-each-other period, the banter, everything. Suffice it to say, Rocky will no doubt become an all-time favorite character.
But back to our narrator, Ryland. I really appreciated him for, not just his humor and easily translated intellect, but also for his fallibility. Through constant flashbacks, as he works to piece together his past after waking up alone with amnesia, we're able to see a good progression of where he started and where he's gotten to. He starts out a bit petty, wanting nothing more for himself than his current situation, but is swiftly brought on board this collective mission to save humanity and slowly grows into new roles there. At the same time, we see him on the ship as he attempts to solve the mystery of himself and his mission, problem-solving and progressing through trial and error. Between his underdog status, his wit, and his relatability, it's easy to root for him throughout his journey.
I was definitely surprised by how much environmentalism worked its way into a story about space and alien microbes. Don't get me wrong, I appreciated the discussions being had about altering Earth's atmosphere in order to counteract the damage the aliens were causing... But a lot of it felt a bit too real: The kids being worried about the problems until they were told it was probably 30 years out; the fear that their counter-actions were producing more harm for the future; the irony that global warming had created a buffer against this interstellar catastrophe... All this coming mere weeks after my home was caught in the heat dome, reaching temperatures 10°F (6°C) above previous all-time records, and while wildfires are currently covering the rest of the country in smoke. Can I please enjoy my space adventure without the existential dread for a second? At least the flashbacks are intermittent enough not to completely break my spirit.
As for the ending, it certainly wasn't what I was expecting. I appreciated it for following through with the themes of hope and perseverance, even while admitting that you can't always get what you want. Sometimes, there's just no going back to how things were, and you've got to take that for what it is. A nice, satisfyingly bittersweet note.
Overall, I can't think of anything this book did poorly. It masterfully combines mystery, space exploration, scientific study, action scenes, a character study, environmental messages, humor, and aliens all into one story, and still has room for more. I'd highly recommend it to anyone who enjoyed Weir's other works or are looking for an escapist fantasy with some science facts woven into its fiction. Now to just work The Martian somewhere into my TBR list...
Read by Ray Porter
Unabridged Length: 16.2 Hours
Listened at 2x Speed
Unabridged Length: 16.2 Hours
Listened at 2x Speed
Audible sure does know how to do a great production. Even though there was only one narrator, the auto-tune accomplished a lot in making Rocky sound as in-human as possible. Well, auto-tune or some form of post-production editing, which made the recording that much more unique. I always say how much adding music makes audiobooks that much more special, and considering a character completely revolves around it, you can bet it really made a difference. Kudos!
Mr. Porter was a delight unto himself. So many accents and inflections, I was surprised how many characters he made sound completely distinct from one another. Enough, so, that I would easily recognize them after chapters of absence. Some of the accents/voices did speed up a bit, making my 2x playback speed more difficult to maintain at times, but it was mostly fine to follow along with. And I absolutely loved how much character he gave Ryland, in even just a well-placed sigh now and then, he was that much more real—definitely a stand-out in first-person narration.
There was one part early on where I assume some math got recalculated and corrected in the ebook, because it was WAY off the audio. But other than that, the two were a lot closer than many of the audiobooks I've experienced recently. The Chinese and Russian writing that appears in the book was presented as just that—"something written in ______"—and the music notes in the text were actual tones in the audiobook, which, as I mentioned before, was a pleasant and welcome surprise.
Overall, a great performance and production on all counts. I think the only way to improve it would be to make it a full-blown audio-play with a larger cast and sound effects, but as audiobooks go there's not much I could ask for. Definitely a great experience for audiobook regulars and newbies alike, and I'd especially recommend it to anyone who might not be comfortable with the technobabble and science terminology that gets passed around at various points. Heck, just getting to hear Rocky is enough reason in itself to give the audio a try, so what are you waiting for?
No comments :
Post a Comment
Let me hear you howl!