Andy Weir's 2017 follow up to The Martian, Artemis follows the story of a young woman, Jasmine "Jazz" Bashara who works as a porter on the lunar city of Artemis.
As with The Martian, much of the novel comes down to timing and problem solving, but unlike his first work, a clear man vs. nature story, Weir has created an entire society with Artemis, working to outline its economy, class structure and characters ranging from the porter/smuggler protagonist through to city leaders, technical staff, the police and others.
The story moves along quickly and with a great sense of tension as Jazz takes a simple job that quickly becomes complicated and then moves straight into some truly dangerous and exciting territory.
A really fun read and well worth the look.
On Thursday this year's Oscar nominations were announced, and as I spend the rest of my year watching films featuring Zombies, Spaceships, or Unicorns, I tend to spend January and February watching a number of critically acclaimed Dramas.
This year, having already watched Mad Max: Fury Road, The Martian, and the delightful Brooklyn, I've only got five musts, The Big Short, Bridge of Spies, The Revenant, Room, and Spotlight. Afterwards, I tend to work my from most to least nominations, in terms of films I plan to see.
I'll do my best to review the films as I see them, and hope to see at least the eight films nominated for awards that I haven't already seen.
So for those of you who haven't gotten around to seeing The Martian yet, here are a few simple reasons why you should.
1) Considering it's all fancy graphics and high concept designs, this is a really great example of old school science fiction. In science fiction from the forties and fifties, authors often were scientists themselves and worked incredibly hard to make sure the science they used in their stories was as realistic as possible. In the film, astronaut Mark Watney is injured and left for dead on Mars and has to figure out how to survive in an entirely hostile atmosphe. Basically, think of the story as a man trapped in a shrinking box attempting to find his way out before it kills him.
2) The human side of the story is simply fascinating - seeing how people deal in times of extreme stress has always been great drama - think disaster movies, war movies and indeed, survival stories. Part of why The Martian works so well is to simply see how people work together with the tools at hand to get a job done.
3) The movie is definitely one for the big screen. With visuals set on a colossal scale, this is the kind of movie that deserves to be seen on the big screen, rather than on your television or, God help us, your smartphone.
In the end, The Martian works wonderfully as a survival story, but more importantly, as a human one.
So let's talk about The Martian, by Andy Weir.
I actually first came across this book in a local book store on the Staff Picks wall. Having never heard of Andy Weir (who actually e-published this book a few years back), I simply looked at the cover and thought - you know what? I don't read enough contemporary science fiction. I'm pretty great at classic SF, but the recent stuff is all sort of hit and miss with me.
So I cracked open this book on Saturday morning and within about ten pages I was hooked - think (minor spoiler here) Castaway mixed with Apollo 13 and you can get a pretty good idea what to expect from the novel.
The novel itself focuses on a Botanist/Engineer accidentally left behind on a Mars mission (again, sorry for the mild, chapter 1 spoiler), and his attempts to survive on Mars until he can be rescued.
First of all, considering the book is pretty much the definition of hard SF (Science fiction focusing on scientific or technical detail) I was really blown away by just how readable the book was, it felt an awful lot like Scalzi's Old Man's War or Wilson's Robopocalypse for sheer page-turning enjoyment.
If you haven't picked up any SF in a while, it would really be a pretty great place to start, the story is fun, fast paced and definitely thrilling. I will absolutely be keeping an eye out for what Mr. Weir comes out with next.
