BigEnk
4/2/2025
I think this book does a few things well, and more things terribly.
First, the positives.
I love how much realistic appearing science was used. Weir makes a book about wild science-fiction ideas seem very grounded in reality. Whether or not they actually are, I'm not sure. I'm guessing not.
I connected well with Rocky. He was funny, relatable, and charismatic. Something that can not be said of Grace.
Now, the negatives.
I personally did not find any of the humor to be actually funny, or fit well within the context of the story, but I understand that's a personal preference of mine. Whenever Grace had pun or sarcastic remark to pop out, I cringed. Totally took me out of the moment.
I found none of the human characters to be believable. I found the dialogue, especially during flashbacks, to be written like the script of an action focused movie. Which is fine I suppose, but it left me feeling unattached to anyone, even after 400+ pages.
At times I found the pacing to be rather weird. I think this comes down to my personal preferences, but there were big sections of time skipped for obvious reasons that were separated by only a mere sentence or two. I guess I wished that there were either more chapters, or that the chapter spacing timing was different.
I also found the ending to be rather anti-climatic and sudden. In fact, I found only few moments in the book to be suspenseful/tension-filled. Perhaps this comes down to the protagonist not reacting in a way that I personally read as real. I had no idea how dire certain situations were, because there was hardly and emotion behind his reactions. It also became clear to me through the constant cycle of problem-despair-science solution and then back to problem that there was little reason for me to be worried about the fate of Grace.
I think I can see why most people really like this one, but I guess it just wasn't for me. It was good at points, but mediocre more often than not. It left me feeling that I don't need to dip in to Weir's other works, as I've heard that The Martian is very similar in a lot of ways.