Project Hail Mary by Andy Weir #bookreview #scifi #thriller #TuesdayBookBlog

On By Teri PolenIn Book Reviews

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. 

The Martian absolutely blew me away when it was released (I loved the movie, which can always be hit or miss with adaptations), so I immediately requested this book when I saw it on NetGalley.

This is a difficult review to write without revealing spoilers, but I’ll do what I can. The reader is just as clueless about what’s going on as Ryland is when he wakes after a long coma, and I liked that. You feel his frustration and surprise through flashbacks as his memory returns, and the story is revealed. And what an incredible story it is! So much tension, so many life-threatening situations – I literally couldn’t put the book down. I held it in one hand to read while stirring something on the stove with the other.

Some of the plot points are awe-inspiring, jaw-dropping, and thought-provoking. I experienced a gamut of emotions. Admittedly the math is so far out of my lane it’s incomprehensible, but the author explains it as much as possible. I wouldn’t say there are quite as many humorous moments as in The Martian, but it’s not without some comedic relief after some heavy situations.

At its core, Project Hail Mary is about sacrifices, friendship, acceptance, and self-realization. I enjoyed the hell out of this book and would highly recommend it to sci-fi fans. I’m really hoping for a movie out of this one – they’d better not screw it up.

I received a complimentary copy of this book from the publisher through NetGalley.  Opinions expressed in this review are completely my own.

25 thoughts on “Project Hail Mary by Andy Weir #bookreview #scifi #thriller #TuesdayBookBlog”

  5. Mischenko

    I just saw this one on Tessa’s blog this morning. Glad to see you both enjoyed it! I’m looking forward to it. Excellent review, Teri. 😃

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply

  6. I said the same – hard to review without giving away spoilers. But otherwise I think our reviews really complement one another. I loved the friendship theme most of all – love for a friend can make heroes out of cowards ❤️

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply

Leave a Reply

Fill in your details below or click an icon to log in:

Gravatar
WordPress.com Logo

You are commenting using your WordPress.com account. ( Log Out /  Change )

Facebook photo

You are commenting using your Facebook account. ( Log Out /  Change )

Cancel

Connecting to %s

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.