The Martian has been on my wishlist for about 5 years! And last November I finally bought a copy. Of course I didn’t read it right away haha. But recently I picked the book back up and I’m happy to say I finally read the whole book. And today I want to share some of thoughts with you all. So let’s dive in.

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Six days ago, astronaut Mark Watney became one of the first people to walk on Mars.
Now, he’s sure he’ll be the first person to die there.
After a dust storm nearly kills him and forces his crew to evacuate while thinking him dead, Mark finds himself stranded and completely alone with no way to even signal Earth that he’s alive—and even if he could get word out, his supplies would be gone long before a rescue could arrive.
Chances are, though, he won’t have time to starve to death. The damaged machinery, unforgiving environment, or plain-old “human error” are much more likely to kill him first.
But Mark isn’t ready to give up yet. Drawing on his ingenuity, his engineering skills — and a relentless, dogged refusal to quit — he steadfastly confronts one seemingly insurmountable obstacle after the next. Will his resourcefulness be enough to overcome the impossible odds against him?

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The Martian by Andy Weir
Published by Crown on 11/02/2014
Pages: 369
Goodreads

“Everything went great right up to the explosion.”

Cover

I have the orange cover with an astronaut on out. And I think it’s a pretty good cover. The color scheme is beautiful and fits the story very well. Putting an astronaut on there together with the title ensures that you know roughly what this is about right away.

“Yes, of course duct tape works in a near-vacuum. Duct tape works anywhere. Duct tape is magic and should be worshiped.”

Review

Mark Watney is on a mission to Mars, but after 6 days on Mars it all goes wrong. His team leaves Mars and leave what they think is his dead body behind. Turns out, he wasn’t dead yet. And now he has to do everything in his power to stay alive. This book was also turned into a movie with Matt Damon as Mark Watney and I will have to watch that soon. I’ll admit I kept seeing Mark as Matt but I can’t really complain about that ;).

There was one main complaint I had with this story. It’s not surprising but we get a lot of technical stuff in this one. While it is necessary and the author did a pretty good job overall to write it in an accessible manner it did get a bit boring at times. I wanted to skim over some technical sentences, especially in the second half of the book. And that’s a shame because apart from this issue, the book could never be described as boring.

“Me: “This is obviously a clog. How about I take it apart and check the internal tubing?” NASA: (after five hours of deliberation) “No. You’ll fuck it up and die.” So I took it apart.”

Most importantly, this book is FUNNY. When looking at some quotes to put in this review I just kept laughing and laughing because there are so many funny ones. I really enjoyed Mark’s commentary on his stay on Mars and think that’s what made the book so good. Even when getting past the boring parts I would get to something funny in no time at all. Not only Mark as the narrator was funny. We get some other POV’s as well and they were funny too. I laughed out loud so many times while reading this book. Hopefully they conveyed this in the movie!

“I started the day with some nothin’ tea. Nothin’ tea is easy to make. First, get some hot water, then add nothin’.”

The book is a pretty fast read and there is a clear plot. I think it’s a good way to try a science fiction if that isn’t your usual genre. Like I said, the book is incredibly funny and I don’t think it very difficult since the plot is very clear. Yes, there are some technical terms in there that might not make sense to you (or me to be honest) but that didn’t take away from my enjoyment too much.

Overall, this was a very enjoyable read! I laughed a lot while reading and would definitely recommend The Martian. The book is less that 400 pages and afterwards you can watch the movie ;). I’m glad I have this one on my shelves and will pick up another book by Andy Weir for sure. Have you read or watched The Martian yet? What did you think? Tell me about it in the comments!