The
Martian
By Andy Weir
Now, if you were left behind on Mars by your crewmates
and knew you had to wait for the next planned Mars expedition, in FOUR years, would
you even try to survive? Or would you assume there was no way in hell for that
to happen?
“So, that’s the
situation. I’m stranded on Mars. I have no way to communicate with Hermes or
Earth. Everyone thinks I’m dead. I’m in a Hab designed to last thirty-one days.
If the oxygenator breaks down, I’ll suffocate. If the water reclaimer breaks
down, I’ll die of thirst. If the Hab breaches, I’ll just kind of explode. If
none of those things happens, I’ll eventually run out of food and starve to
death. So yeah, I’m fucked.”
So why doesn’t he just take the easy way out? Well, at
the moment, he’s alone but he has everything he needs. He’s in no hurry. The
thing is - he’s someone who rises to challenges and likes to figure things out,
so he wants to do that. He figures out how much soil he’ll need and how to turn
the soil he has, plus his own shit along with Martian soil, into something he
can grow crops in.
“This isn’t a
new concept I just came up with. People have speculated on how to make crop
soil out of Martian dirt for decades. I’ll just be putting it to the test for
the first time. But in the end, if everything goes to plan, I’ll have 92 square
meters of crop-able soil. Hell yeah I’m a botanist! Fear my botany powers!”
Mark Watney is pretty smart but he’s also totally an
extrovert, the class clown, the one who provides the lubricant between all the
really smart introverts. He’s also an extrovert who only has his journal to
talk to.
I think that’s part of why he comes across as more of
a real person to me, not a type. We all have geeky sides, and sporty sides and
act like kids at times, and get excited and angry and scared.
“I’ve been so
busy staying alive I never thought of what this must be like for my parents.
Right now, they’re suffering the worst pain anyone can endure. I’d give anything
just to let them know I’m still alive. I’ll just have to survive to make up for
it.”
He’s stuck with thumb drives of things his shipmates
brought for entertainment.
“Disco. God damn it, Lewis.”
A large part of the book is him reacting to problems,
thinking through them and coming up with a solution. He’s so perfectly imperfect.
Like any good hero, he causes his own trouble, and he laughs at himself so
well.
“Turns out the “L” in “LCD” stands for “Liquid.” I
guess it either froze or boiled off. Maybe I’ll post a consumer review. “Brought
product to surface of Mars. It stopped working. 0/10.”
Right, who knew? Um, everyone.
My biggest criticism is that I felt like the ending
was abrupt. We’re rocking along then . . . boom, it’s done. I feel like the author
should have given us a little more warning that THIS was the goal. Oh well.
It’s a FUN book. Try not to take it too seriously. It
is action, and science, and humor. I really, really liked it.
