Project Hail Mary by Andy Weir - GUEST Kevin's REVIEW

*We received this book as an eARC from Random House via NetGalley. We voluntarily read and reviewed an advanced copy of this book. All thoughts and opinions are our own.*

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Title: Project Hail Mary
Author: Andy Weir
Release Date: May 4, 2021


Synopsis: 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 crewmates 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.

Part scientific mystery, part dazzling interstellar journey, Project Hail Mary is a tale of discovery, speculation, and survival to rival The Martian--while taking us to places it never dreamed of going.

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Review: This review is a guest post from my husband, Kevin Shah. He really enjoyed The Martian and dived into this book and read it very quickly. I'm hoping to read it soon, but here's his review:

I had enjoyed reading Martian by Weir. Project Hail Mary is true to the format of Martian (even in the feel of the ending). Project Hail Mary was a book I could not stop reading once I started. It was visually vivid in my head, and I was engaged from the first sentence. My journey with the book enhanced my love for science by making complex scientific concepts that were hard to understand in school and college accessible. Understanding and learning chemistry, physics, biology around a story that is plausible and through the approach of problem solving was so incredible. I wish I was taught science through the lens of such stories. As we run into a problem in the story, we all could all come together to research solutions and recommend options, and the science behind each of those. Its simple – the why helps us understand better. I especially recommend all teachers read this book and see how we can approach education through problem solving.

I kept imaging this story as how Star Trek would have started. How Earth was able to go beyond our solar system and how our survival was the catalyst and not space tourism. The story reminded me of parts of the movie Arrival as well. My favorite aspect of the story was that empathy was ultimately fundamental in human survival. The only part that felt unbelievable to me was humans from all over the world coming together and making such a mission happen. But that is my pessimistic lens based on our current reality.

I highly recommend this book. It will be hard to stop. 5/5

--PAUL