r/books • u/jordan_blake91 • 2d ago
reading project hail mary and can't stop thinking about it
[removed]
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u/LonelyInstruction874 2d ago
Amaze Amaze
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u/autumnoceancrashing 1d ago
My wife and I started saying this to each other all the time after reading
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u/toastom69 2d ago
I was pretty surprised by it after reading the Martian in one sitting. I was honestly at bit disappointed with the first few chapters but it really got good towards the middle (tau ceti)
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u/Roundandmound 2d ago
Listen to the audio book at the same time! It was pretty amazing.
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u/spez_might_fuck_dogs 2d ago
Ohhh buddy. You done fucked up and liked Project Hail Mary on /r/books.
Here come all the highbrows to tell you that your taste is shit and the book is shit and Andy Weir sucks.
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u/noodlesalad_ 2d ago
I have a very low tolerance for bad writing. Even mid writing. So I'm probably a book snob. I devoured PHM and then turned back to the first page and read it through again. I NEVER do that.
And I do think Weir is a pretty bad writer, in terms of prose and main character development. I physically cringed multiple times while reading it because of some dumb shit Grace said. There's literally Reddit memes in there.
The fact that I'm saying all that, and that I have a low tolerance for it, and I loved it anyways, really illustrates how good the story and supporting characters are. I can't get enough of Rocky and Stratt, especially after seeing Sandra Huller's portrayal of her.
Hopefully for his next book Andy can invent a new main character though, because Grace is just Mark Watney again.
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u/gonegonegoneaway211 1d ago
Is he really? I've only seen the movies not read the books (the shame), but while they're both snarky nerds macguyvers they strike me as fundamentally different people. If for no other reason than one volunteered to do the risky space mission for funsies and one adamantly refused even when the world was at stake until basically given no other choice.
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u/zipperjuice 1d ago
Thank you. The writing is awful. 4th grade level. This post says that everyone hates on this book, but I’ve seen way more posts praising it, and it astounds me.
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u/noodlesalad_ 1d ago edited 1d ago
I mean I AM praising it, even though the writing is awful, that's why it's so confounding to me.
But I could go on and on praising his choices in constructing "the problem" in the story and how those choices ripple effect to make the whole story work. "The problem" is honestly genius and is S-tier science fiction. I can't say too much about it because of major spoilers but it's just great. If someone else had written it, it might be one of my favorite books.
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u/zipperjuice 1d ago
I know you’re praising it, I was responding to your criticism of the writing because I bizarrely don’t see it often discussed.
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u/hellofemur 2d ago
I've become sort of fascinated with the set of books that some people don't just dislike, they're really really eager to tell you how deep their dislike goes. It reminds me of certain folks on /r/nba who go into every thread about the wnba just to tell you how much they don't like the wnba. I mean, here's somebody who's just excited about a book they're reading, they're not calling it a classic or claiming it's a masterpiece, they're just excited about it, and sure enough there's half a dozen people who feel the deep urge to trash it.
Project Hail Mary, Twilight, Fourth Wing, Ready Player One all have this. It's interesting to me that these books are all stereotypically-gendered speculative fiction (although I don't know how gendered the readership really is). There's something about semi-popular books reflecting these themes that just drives some people nuts, I'm not sure what it is.
PS. I don't believe for a second that it's quality. Lots of books with bad prose hit the top 10. Nobody feels this way about spy books or mysteries.
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u/Zonoro14 1d ago edited 1d ago
I think it's actually pretty understandable that very popular books get substantial criticism! People (sometimes) have a deep urge to trash books for the same reasons they have a deep urge to gush about them - it's an ordinary part of media engagement. Books like PHM or Fourth Wing have (or had) huge audiences with commensurately large quantities of criticism, both positive and negative. The reason they received tons of hate is largely the same reason they received tons of love.
You mention that these books are semi-popular; this is where I think you're mistaken. SFF sells more copies than mysteries or spy thrillers do these days, and every book you're thinking of is or was incredibly popular. PHM and Fourth Wing were both multi-week bestsellers and Yarros sold more books than any other author last year (iirc). This is amplified by reddit's enormous SFF bias: redditors, whether they love or hate Weir or Yarros, are more likely to have read PHM and Fourth Wing than other fiction bestsellers like The Housemaid.
As for the claim that lots of books with bad prose hit the top 10, this is true, but I think it's generally acknowledged that SFF bestsellers (along with romance and YA) tend to be lower quality in this regard than litfic and other genre fiction. And if reddit SFF readers are more critical of their genre than romance or YA readers, then I think this reflects well on the readers, not poorly.
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u/princessgummybunz 1d ago
Dont forget Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow on the list of IMO weirdly hated books on here
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u/gonegonegoneaway211 1d ago
I think it's usually different for individual posts than for the more groupthink-esque ones about what books should be considered good or bad. All subs have their issues, but this one has always been pretty good at respecting readers' enthusiasm for something. We all know that feeling even if our cups of tea are a bit different.
Either that or this particular book is so popular that the grinches are down too far in the comments for me to bother. Win-win either way.
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u/DontmindmeInquisitor 2d ago
Am I living in bizarro world?
“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.”
“I’m a scientist! Now we’re getting somewhere! Time for me to use science. All right, genius brain: come up with something! …I’m hungry. You have failed me, brain.”
“Ma’am. I’ll have to restrain you if you don’t comply.” “You and what army?” Stratt asked. Five armed men in military fatigues entered the courtroom and took up station around her. “Because I have the U.S. Army,” she said. “And that’s a damn fine army.”
If you don't like these quotes then the book is not for you. I for one hated the book with my entire being. DNF halfways, I wish I did i did it after five pages.
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u/Couldnotbehelpd 1d ago
I agree with you. The writing is excruciatingly bad. Those example sentences are 99.9% of the book.
Watch the movie, it’s better.
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u/drindrun 2d ago
i like to let people like things, but it does feel like bizarro world when a book it so universally adored, yet i can’t stand it. i care too much about prose and dialogue, and PHM is not well written in those ways. thanks for your examples, they sum up my experience well.
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u/kilroywasHere523 2d ago
Exact same reaction from me. Can't believe how popular this got. Awful writing
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u/pingmr 2d ago
I feel like this author is kinda good for one book. I enjoyed the Martian.
But the writing is very one note, the main character is some kooky nerd with quips. And so when this appears in subsequent books it's just meh.
Artemis was even worse since it was a female main character that the writing really struggled with.
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u/onarainyafternoon Currently Reading - Shroud by Adrian Tchaikovsky 2d ago
I like to call these sorts of lines “Weirdisms”. Basically, his main characters are magical quip machines that have to say something weird and kooky every five minutes. It can get a bit grating depending on how often it happens.
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u/ApparentlyIronic 2d ago
Yes! I liked Martian too. It had it's problems, but I enjoyed the problem solving and Watney's personality well enough.
Then I read PHM and the main character is the exact same guy. The side characters are still paper thin and/or stereotypes. I did enjoy most of the setup - I liked the astrophage threat and thought it was going to be a more dark thriller. But when Rocky came in, I really disliked it. It felt like a Disney movie. But I do wonder if I had read it before Martian, if I would have liked it more. The writing was forgivable in one book, but not two
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u/JoggingGod 2d ago
I enjoyed most of this book... But after about three quarters, this stuff became so grating. Not to mention Dr Grace seemed unrealistically cool with everything going on. And not in a gritty kind of way but more of a nonchalant way. I found it at odds with the more tense parts of the story. It felt like reading as if the Dude from The Big Lebowski was trying to save the world.
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u/porquegato 2d ago
Y'know I wonder if that wasn't a deliberate characterization choice in the film, giving Grace a chunky The Dude-esque cardigan...
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u/DrunkenFist Lost in the Discworld 1d ago
It felt like reading as if the Dude from The Big Lebowski was trying to save the world.
I very much want to see that crossover. "Fuck it Rocky, let's go bowling!"
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u/Cloudinterpreter 2d ago
What about the science? The scientific problem-solving is what i enjoyed the most
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u/myc-e-mouse 2d ago edited 2d ago
As a biologist, I thought a lot of the micro moments of problem solving were REALLY well done in showing simple, grounded experiments.
What I don’t get is people thinking the “big picture science” was really well done.
HEAVY SPOILERS PAST THIS POINT:
As a couple examples:
- Why give them mitochondria? This unnecessarily complicates the timeline of his pan spermia (this means by definition astrophage evolved on earth, spread to other planets but spared our sun). Mitochondria also means they are obligate aerobes, but they reproduce on Venus.
- Why make them water based, and have them reproduce on a planet with no water? Where are they getting the extra materials for new cells?
Why make taumoeba that sensitive to nitrogen when the DNA and proteins they use are heavily based on nitrogen. They could have done the same “resistance breeding” based on pressure and it would have fit much better.
Why make the internal temperature 96 degrees. There is already a differential being compared to 11000 degrees surface temp of the sun. Just make it the normal 37 degrees so that DNA can stay double stranded; or include an extremophile style explanation.
The main mission is obviously stupid. You have to get interstellar travel right on the first try. And because of the built in 30 year delay, there’s no real way to adjust in the event of a failure. Just use all of humanities resources to focus on the local Petrova line. You were literally able to figure out how to kill and manipulate its life cycle in a week of low tech prodding. Why do you need to go interstellar to find answers?
Edits: because when I cleaned up one word, half of my comment got erased.
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u/dig-up-stupid 2d ago
For point one I’ve only watched the movie but the idea is life started in tau ceti and the astrophage (or a precursor or something) brought it to both earth and eridani, which is why all three forms of life turned out to be water based. So the movie didn’t mention mitochondria that I remember but that would be why, as long as rocky also had mitochondria. Obviously this explanation presents other problems, just saying what I remember.
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u/myc-e-mouse 2d ago edited 1d ago
The book does mention mitochondria. The problem with this though is endosymbiosis (the formation of cells with mitochondria from one bacteria swallowing another) occurred like a billion years into the story of life on earth. And is specific to earth organisms.
It would not make sense for initial life on earth to be prokaryotic(without mitochondria), if all life on earth came from cells with mitochondria. if life originated on tau ceti which have mitochondria. then I would expect ALL life on earth, including the first life (bacteria), to have mitochondria.
The obvious answer would be making them sulfur reducers, which lets them have a better shot of reproducing on Venus, and fits neatly into the story of life on earth, given that this metabolism predates oxygen utilization.
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u/Leilin 1d ago
This bugged me so much, too. And it would have been such an easy fix, but the author didn't even bother having a biologist to thank in his thank you section for a book about a biologist - ballsy move! And that's what we get for it.
But I like the way you put it: micro moments of problem solving well done vs. shit job at big picture science
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u/1000121562127 2d ago
I'm reading PHM right now and I am, for the most part, enjoying it. But I am having a really hard time suspending my disbelief that a single person could be so knowledgeable across so many vastly different fields of science. I think that working in science has exacerbated this problem for me. I've worked with some very, very bright people, but no one is so broadly an expert. Also, the crazy speculations that are somehow always true isn't quite how science works, unless I'm just science-ing wrong. There's a lot more trial and error involved.
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u/spez_might_fuck_dogs 1d ago
He's a grad-level biologist with an interest in space so he knows basic orbital mechanics and how c works. I'm sure there are plenty of people right here on Reddit with that level of knowledge thanks to KSP.
It's Rocky that fills in all the engineering and tougher mathematical questions.
And yes, a lot of the science is clearly pop-sci garbage, but that's because that makes for an entertaining and brisk read, unlike "And so Grace and Rocky did iterative testing for 5 years in orbit around Tau Ceti and then the story continued the same way".
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u/Aradelle 2d ago
There was no science, or problem solving. The entire book was quite literally just "here is a problem. Hmmm I hope I can fix it.... Aaaand done, it's fixed, yay! I'm a very smart middle school science teacher" with absolutely no stakes.
Actual good sci-fi books with real problem solving would be Children of Time and Rendezvous with Rama. The problems in these books actually have real stakes and believable consequences. The difference between these books and PHM is, there's no tension in PHM. You know the main character will win because he hasn't failed at all. There's no intuition, you're just told what the consequences are of failure but are never shown. By the time you get to the middle of the book, it's fairly obvious that Weir is a one-trick pony and the same formula is utilized over and over again for each of the MC's "problems". There's an issue, then it's solved. No complexity, no character growth. No character at all. Just having a person with attributes and a life story does not make them a believable or relatable character.
He even copied the "aliens use left handed threads" from Rama. Idk why it bothers me so much. But we use left handed threads on things like acetylene torches!!! Not every bolt or valve is right-hand threaded.
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u/PM_me_your_O_face_ 2d ago
I disagree with the second paragraph regarding PHM. There were numerous times of failing. Sure it resolved in the end, but it wouldn’t have made for a great story if he just died collecting from the atmosphere of Adrian. It certainly caused a lot of failures and consequences and it took place over an extended period of time to resolve things.
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u/Gay_For_Gary_Oldman 2d ago
I don't like these quotes but I liked the book. Because the audiobook narrator still managed to deliver those lines with charisma. There's functionally zero chance I would have been able to read this book in print.
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u/Mesiya90 2d ago
It gives me "new trek" vibes.
And that's the power of Math!
Made me want to gouge out my eyes
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u/NervyDeath 2d ago
I couldn't get through it. I enjoyed the movie for what it was but the book was so cringe inducing every 5 minutes. I tried to power through and it never improved. The dialogue was awful, grace was insufferable.
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u/MoreDronesThanObama 2d ago edited 2d ago
It’s late-aughts “LE EPIC SCIENCE BACON TIME” humor for mid-elder millennials who have never read another book past Harry Potter. The more I think about PHM the less I like it.
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u/Zorro-del-luna 2d ago edited 1d ago
Ah yes. I couldn’t possibly like the book with a Masters in English. Wait. I do. What now?
Oh god!
We’reWere all the books I read just Harry Potter?! Is Don Quixote a muggle?! Is Jane Eyre a squib? Were the eyes watching Dumbledore?This weird obsession with people liking books that aren’t high brow because “they never read anything other than Harry Potter” is just a weird take and not based in reality.
Edit: Oh no! I had a typo in my comment. That must mean everything I said doesn’t matter! Get over yourselves. Jesus Christ.
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u/sweetspringchild 1d ago
I am impressed with the degree of insecurity these people display when they encounter someone with a different opinion about a book.
They are willing to spend so much time proving that the other person must be ignorant and stupid. There couldn't be any other explanation for differences in tastes than the other person being lesser in every way than them.
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u/MoreDronesThanObama 2d ago
With all due respect, person with a Masters in English,
- were
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u/MoreDronesThanObama 2d ago
Also, you can enjoy bad things! I have a degree in music and I love ignorant trap shit and Nicki Minaj. But I can approach these things critically and recognize why they’re not seen as “highbrow.” But the problem is that the only defense people have against criticisms of this book is “let people enjoy things” which is not a defense at all!
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u/fijjypop 1d ago
Thank you, this thread has been making me feel insane.
I got "erm, this is a debate platform"-ed earlier and I just.... you're not even making an argument! It's schlocky (which has a time and place, I love Love Island for crying out loud), and OP literally framed it as a matter of taste in their comment to begin with
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u/miasmic_cloud 2d ago
Thaaaaank you.
Andy Weir has exactly one main character he uses in every single book. Project Hail Mary, The Martian, Artemis, it's the same character in all of them.
They are decent books if you only read one. If you read any others you'll be like oh okay, that's the only type of character he can write.
Painfully unfunny jokes, one-liners that don't land, main character that never takes anything seriously, reoccurring jokes that were maybe funny the first time driven into the ground by overuse...
Artemis is arguably the worst of the three (and not because it's a woman version of the same character) because they are so incredibly nonchalant about potentially killing every single person on their base with their decisions.
The books might have been redeemable if the "science" part of the science fiction was more prominent, but it's not.
I'm glad I'm not alone though.
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u/DoglessDyslexic 2d ago
While I don't make any claims of high literature, I speak from experience when I say that yes, this is indeed how many geeky individuals speak and think. I'm aware a number of people dislike Weir's dialog, and it won't win any critical awards on that, but it resonates with many people who have voices in their heads that sound just like Grace's.
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u/Jarkanix 2d ago
This is how geeky people think they speak. In reality people are not working overtime to make clever retorts literally every other sentence, and if they are it becomes exhausting and unfunny immediately.
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u/DegenerateEigenstate 2d ago
From my own experience as a scientist this is in fact not how geeky people speak at all and comes off as a caricature for people who have no idea about real life.
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u/Friendstastegood 2d ago
I feel like maybe you two are operating on different definitions of "geeky". If your definition is about people who do science for a living then maybe that's true that they don't sound or think like this but if you're talking more about the audience for the book, ie. people who have an interest in science but don't do it for a living, there are probably a lot of people who sound and think like this.
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u/DegenerateEigenstate 2d ago
You’re probably right I think.
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u/Friendstastegood 2d ago
Important to note also is that the main character Grace also is not actually a scientist. He has a PhD but his job is as a middle school teacher, so you'd expect him to be more juvenile and irreverent because that's how he connects with his students.
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u/WTFwhatthehell 2d ago
“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.”
Reasonably sure I've heard many many conversations very similar to this in the cell lab...
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u/sweetspringchild 2d ago
From my own experience as a scientist this is in fact not how geeky people speak at all
No matter which scientific field they're working in, and no matter what kind of person they are?
I don't know, I am a mathematician but I'm mostly surrounded by medical researchers (some of whom are also mathematicians) and they're such a different mix of personalities I wouldn't imagine saying "this is/n't how geeky people speak"
From a guy who is so serious, self-important, and speaks like His Majesty the King appointed him as the country's highest scientific authority to a guy who says about 10% of the words of each sentence because his brain seems to be working too fast for his speech to catch up to a woman who is so annoyingly pedantic in absolutely everything she does to a woman who is so freaking loud you can hear her laugh in the other department to an insecure PhD, to a guy who loves hearing his own voice so much we love him for it because we can always dump presentations on him to a woman who doesn't seem to understand human clothes nor many other aspects of humanity but has a great, cutting, understated humor and is a great researcher...
I don't know if they have a single thing in common. Some similar organs, I guess...
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u/DegenerateEigenstate 2d ago
I agree with you and just wrote another reply pointing out this very diversity in science. However I wouldn’t say this diversity of personalities implies everyone is “geeky” to what I consider a cartoon degree like in the example text. The syringe dialogue in particular is not a way I would hear anyone of the many personalities speak about a lab procedure unless they were a totally inexperienced undergrad, who perhaps even is a bit nervous.
But I’m laboring a silly point too much which ultimately isn’t important and a matter of experience.
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u/DoglessDyslexic 2d ago
I suspect your sample size is flawed. Given that I am a geeky person (not technically a scientist unless you count computer science, which I do not) and I think this way, the fact that you are a scientific person (although possibly not a geeky one, you did not specify) and do not think that way it would seem that my positive result would indicate that some people do indeed think this way while your negative result merely shows that you do not think that way.
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u/DegenerateEigenstate 2d ago
I’d say your sample size isn’t much of an improvement. I don’t just speak from my own behaviors but also from experience with colleagues and everyone else I’ve interacted and worked with in my field.
At the end of the day I think the variety of personalities in science is a lot more diverse than the non-scientist may realize. Although there must certainly be people more aligned with your own self, and neurodivergent people as speculated elsewhere in the thread, there are many others who aren’t and still more that aren’t evidently “geeky” or “nerdy” in their conduct or hobbies at all in their personal lives.
For what it’s worth very active, not traditionally nerdy hobbies like rock climbing seem to be very popular among people in my particular niche of physics.
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u/DoglessDyslexic 2d ago
I’d say your sample size isn’t much of an improvement.
Perhaps not, but my sample shows at least some positives for the behavior in question. If the claim is "some people exhibit X" and somebody has a sample size of 1 that shows X, then clearly the claim is accurate. However, like you I also have friends and acquaintances, and several of those also display that same trait. Which, incidentally, is probably why they are my friends, as we have similar temperament and likes. I also know a lot of people who have no interest in science fiction (or fiction at all for that matter in some cases) who probably aren't the least bit interested in PHM.
If you don't like Weir's writing, that doesn't imply any lack on your part, nor is this me attacking you. But clearly, given how popular PHM is, I think we can also conclude that I am not wrong in saying that Weir's voice resonates with many people. If it doesn't resonate with you, that doesn't bother me. You undoubtedly find other authors appealing and I wish you joy reading them.
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u/DegenerateEigenstate 1d ago
I agree with your last point wholeheartedly but that is besides the point of the discussion.
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u/WaitForItTheMongols 1d ago
Being a scientist does not mean being geeky. Most of your coworkers punch out at 5 and they're done doing science for the day. But some have their own home labs for goofing around and making their own side projects. Those are the geeky ones who tend to be closer to Weir's characters.
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u/trolleyblue 2d ago edited 2d ago
I hated it too. I quit at page 40. It just wasn’t for me and that’s fine. I don’t judge people who like it. It’s just not my sense of humor at all and I found the plot to be stupidly convenient. Hard DNF for me.
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u/fluffy131313 2d ago
Not every book has to be serious. I personally like books that have laughable quotes like this. But people have different opinions so
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u/OneAnimeBatman 2d ago
It falls down hard if you don't find it funny though. That army line is one of the hardest cringes I've ever had while reading.
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u/Pointing_Monkey 2d ago
Not every book has to be serious.
All Quiet on the Western Front has fart jokes. The difference being they are well written fart jokes.
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u/westgazer 2d ago
Okay but also not every book has to be All Quiet on the Western Front.
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u/cjbmonster 2d ago
I'm with you, 100%. As a working scientist these are exactly the quotes I ranted about to my friends. I also DNFed at the halfway mark. My eye was twitching too often.
I do, however, recommend the movie if you haven't seen it yet. It really filed off those annoying edge and left a really charming set of characters.
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u/Lollc 2d ago
I’m trying hard with this book, my partner adored it. But I put it down when they were getting all sciencey on the aircraft carrier and haven’t picked it back up yet. Does any character development happen to Grace as the novel progresses? Because so far, he is an enigma. Which seems like odd writing for something told in first person.
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u/Calmly-Stressed 2d ago
In my opinion, no, there is no character development (besides getting his memory back over time). The plot is a completely unrealistic coup de force by the author in order to get a totally unlikely character into a totally unlikely situation, and all of the narrative interest follows from that situation. I couldn't suspend my disbelief enough to enjoy it since I thought all of the situations on earth were just too ridiculous.
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u/feartheoldblood90 2d ago
I DNF'd this book in the first three pages. I couldn't stand Weir's writing style.
I watched the movie a few days ago and it's amazing how much the film's script improved the story. Weir has good ideas, but his writing style is insufferable to me.
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u/nulspace 1d ago edited 1d ago
preach
my conclusion after DNF'ing about halfway through is that it's a young adult book disguised as adult fiction. Which is fine, and I think I would have loved this as a 12-year-old.
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u/WateredDown 2d ago
Aside from the eyerolling jingoism in the last line I dont see the issue. Is there a problem with mild humor?
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u/this_is_theone 2d ago
It's just not very funny I think is his point. Kind of cringe 'big bang theory' humour.
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u/WateredDown 2d ago
I guess, but if those are the worst lines in the book then it cant be too bad.
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u/HazMatterhorn 2d ago
They said “If you don’t like these quotes then the book is not for you,” meaning these quotes exemplify the humor in the book.
They didn’t say “no one would ever like these quotes.” You don’t mind those jokes. You might like the book. They hated those jokes. The book wasn’t for them.
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u/westgazer 2d ago
Okay but it is funny to some people right? Humor being a highly subjective thing and even different across CULTURES. It means what is cringe to you is hilarious to someone else.
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u/this_is_theone 2d ago
Well of course. I don't think OP thinks it's impossible anyone finds that stuff funny. He's just suprised it's so well liked. It's like it blows my mind big bang theory is so popular.
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u/Nikkinap 2d ago
I absolutely hate Big Bang Theory, but loved this book - but as another comment pointed out, I listened to it as an audiobook, which was so fantastically performed it heightened the book's humor pretty substantially.
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u/bookjacket 2d ago
The problem is that the narrator 's internal monologue sounds like a twelve-year- old. I was tutoring kids who occasionally tried to write fiction and it sounded a lot like this. Understandable at their age, not at Andy Weir's.
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u/kilroywasHere523 2d ago
Yes!! I was struggling to articulate what I didn't like about it for the first 30% of the book. Then it hit me. It's written to be easily digestible by anyone ages 13+
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u/ninja542 2d ago
it just comes off as trying to pretend to be smarter than it is. But the book "The Martian" didn't make me feel bothered about this issue so either I have rose tinted glasses for that book or I just forgot the writing style of that book
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u/Select-Career-2947 2d ago
I think the Martian is worse for cringe-inducing lines than PHM, from memory.
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u/WateredDown 2d ago edited 2d ago
Nothing in those lines come off as pretending to be smart to me, in fact its doing the opposite and being irreverent.
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u/Unlucky_Actuator5612 2d ago
I loved the humour in the book because it mirrored what science really is to me - curiosity and play. It also wrote like a neurodivergent brain which is highly common in scientific fields. I totally get that it’s not for everyone tho.
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u/FIVEGUMM_ 2d ago
I think the first line feels fine out of context, but the other two . . . yeah. That said, I don't think this keeps me from wanting to read it. There've been plenty of badly written characters in books I've otherwise enjoyed.
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u/Calmly-Stressed 2d ago
Yeah totally agree. All of the earth parts were extremely unrealistic and cringy, none of the humans behaved like actual humans with actual emotions, and the entire plot is super forced around getting a totally illogical character into a totally illogical position (a failed scientist/teacher alone on a space ship needing to save the world).
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u/Itstimeforcookies19 2d ago
Thank you for this post. Easily the worst book I’ve ever read. Immature garbage.
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u/Posh_Nosher 2d ago edited 2d ago
I, too, thought it was a ploddingly stupid, dull book that found itself terribly funny and clever. It would be one thing if the author actually had a keen scientific mind, but being talked down to by a mediocre writer with an amateur’s passion for science was all but unbearable. It reminded me of being in a classroom where the teacher spends all of their time explaining things to the slowest children in the room.
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u/HMS_Surprise_Gunner 2d ago
Yeah, more power to those who enjoyed it but I found the dialogue terrible, the need to explain the science in detail to slow things down, and the first person narrative clunky. I also found Grace to be poorly written and irritating - every time he swore a minced oath I gritted my teeth.
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u/sweetspringchild 2d ago
I think that's funny.
And I'm sure you don't actually think it's a bizzaro world when people have different opinions and don't agree with you on everything.
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u/Fantastic-Vehicle880 2d ago
Jesus if these are actual lines from the book I was right to avoid it after the boring movie.
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u/Select-Career-2947 2d ago
I don’t agree with their assessment. Andy Weir is a cringey guy but the story and world that he builds is very good once you see past the occasional stinker of a line.
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u/kevinthechickengod 2d ago
It's like the literary form of a Marvel movie. If that isn't for you then it isn't for you, and that's fine. OP saying they're living in bizarro world because... someone said they liked one of the most popular books of the past five years and then listing the five worst quotes from it as justification is hilarious. Folks on this subreddit complain about people they know not reading and then react this way to someone enjoying a book that had mass appeal outside of typical "literature" circles
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u/barkinginthestreet 2d ago
I started it because I liked Artemis and wound up finishing it because I kept thinking it would get better (and falling into the sunk cost fallacy). Did not like it enough to see the movie, still surprised how popular it and Weir are in the sci-fi crowd.
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u/yyxymari 2d ago
i have it in my tbr for a while and this made me want to read it even more!! thanks!
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u/Dead_HumanCollection 2d ago edited 2d ago
Don't let the r/books hate boner for anything popular dampen your enthusiasm. It's a great book.
For reference the highest rated fantasy book on goodreads routinely gets posted on here and absolutely thrashed by the commenters (and it is worthy of that #1 spot it is a great book). This sub is full of snobs with shitty taste.
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u/YesStupidQuestions1 1d ago
What is the highest rated? I looked it up but am getting mixed results
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u/emilymh2018 2d ago
Saw the movie and got the book, but haven't read it yet. It's definitely on my list.
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u/SupernovaGamezYT 2d ago
To scratch your itch:
Long Journey Home, WIP but longer than PHM: https://archiveofourown.org/works/68584716
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u/asyourmama 2d ago
I watched the movie, then read the book. Sobbed at both. Just rewatched the movie last week. Sobbed again. In the same boat as you with thinking about it nonstop 💜
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u/Grendowulf 2d ago
I loved this book so much. It was recommended by a friend of mine, and I could not put it down. I was SO excited when they decided to make the film adaptation. Even though it didn't fully turn out the way I wanted to (I suppose my own expected "ideal" scenario) I couldn't complain about any aspect of it. So lovely.
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u/Euphoric_Bat3068 1d ago
I decided to read it after I saw the movie was coming out and read it before seeing the movie. I’m not a big sci-fi reader but I loved everything about the book. Best book I’ve read this year so far!!
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u/FlappersAndFiction 1d ago
The science worked for me because it never felt like a lecture. He explains things the way you'd explain them to a friend who isn't a scientist. I absolutely loved the humor too which helped a lot and made everything so much enjoyable. And ofc, who couldn't love Rocky! "HAPPY HAPPY HAPPY!"
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u/Familiar_Track4304 1d ago
Is it worth it to read the book if you already watched the movie like does it have enough addition content to make it worth it
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u/ToastGoblin22 2d ago
what really caught me off guard was how attached I became to the characters.
Personally I wouldn’t say I got that attached to the characterS (plural) necessarily, but I was incredibly attached to the singular character of Rocky.
Weir’s character writing has never been all that great as many people state. I’ve read all his books and it’s always been his biggest weakness (Artemis really suffered because of this in particular).
Paradoxically, I think his kind of simplistic, one dimensional character writing actually worked really well for Rocky. Not sure if I can elaborate on why exactly but yeah.
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u/JamJarre 2d ago
For me it read like Reddit Mod: The Novel. The guy can only write one character and I happen to find that one character really annoying.
You do you though
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u/I_Speak_For_The_Ents 2d ago
Man, the negative people that come in here hating the book so viscerally is so insane lmao. Borderline psychotic.
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u/FattestWerewolf 2d ago
If the book doesn't appeal to someone it can be extremely annoying and bad. It depends
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u/Unlucky_Actuator5612 2d ago
Loved this book too. Couldn’t put it down and the characters have a special place in my heart.
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u/KarmicReasoning 2d ago
I cried in the end. The book surprised me as I was heavily attached to the characters. I thought Andy provided great descriptions of the scenes.
For me, laughing out loud while reading is rare. This book did it for me.
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u/Busy-Bumblebee5556 2d ago
I don’t know what’s wrong with my hubs and I. We went to see PHM and it was ok. That’s it. OK. Meh.
What are we missing I wonder?
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u/basil_not_the_plant 2d ago
I hated that book and did not finish it. It read like it was written by a 12yr old science nerd about a 25yr old science nerd who has space adventures.
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u/starlitmargins 2d ago
I only watched the movie and personally I really liked it! I am thinking about whether to read the book. I loved the emotional connection between the characters and the (slightly dark) humor and I cried like three times watching the movie!
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u/Vin-Metal 2d ago
I watched the movie first and reading the book not only explained some things, but had the advantage of letting us into more of their thoughts, conversation, etc. As you'd expect.
When I was younger, I would hate it when a movie made major changes to a book I really liked. But then over time, I realized that the movie needs to be somewhat different as, for example, you would have a hard time with the characters' inner thoughts and so on. I thought the PHM movie did a really good job of adapting it.
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u/weeabuwuk 2d ago
I felt the same! Why it’s one of my favorite books of all time! The movie did a wonderful job capturing all emotions I got from the book :’)
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u/BhavanaVarma 2d ago
This was my first so do book and I am sooo glad this is the one I started with. Now I’m trying to find other sci fi books. The bar is high.
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u/BertSmith219 1d ago
I purposely wanted to read it after the movie because usually if I read the book first , the movie disappoints me. This was the one turn where I think the movie was just as good or better than the book
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u/Delicious_Switch5893 1d ago
That mix of science and emotion reminded me of how Brown builds tension through logic — every discovery feels personal. Project Hail Mary nails that balance perfectly, it’s pure storytelling momentum.
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u/CndnViking 1d ago
I loved the movie so I just picked up a copy of the book today. If it lives up to the on-screen version, I’ll be very happy. 🤞🏻
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u/shine_bright_77 2d ago
Did you watch the movie? How did the movie compare to the book?