When an amateur astronomer discovers that the sun is getting dimmer, forecasting the next ice age and the end of all life on Earth, the world’s scientists are put to work to understand why in Andy Weir’s latest sci-fi, Project Hail Mary.
It soon becomes clear that our sun is not the only one affected. In fact, there’s only one similar star that doesn’t seem to be losing its shine and humanity needs to go there to investigate and hopefully find answers. The trouble is, it’s really far away. So far away that the brave crew who goes there will be signing up for a one-way journey.
Fortunately, when the world is about to end, humanity doesn’t just fall to pieces, they club together, conscripting the best and brightest, showering them with unlimited budgets and resources to try and science themselves a solution. It’s odd then, that humanity’s last hope is Rylan Grace, a school science teacher who has no interest in sacrificing his life to save the world.
It’s even more disconcerting that when we meet Grace at the beginning of the book, he’s alone on a spaceship hurtling at near lightspeed to destinations unknown with no memory of who he is, or why he’s there…
With exposition told mostly through flashback, Project Hail Mary uses the amnesiac narrator trope to great effect, pacing the book perfectly, allowing the reader to unpack information in just the right order and although it can often sail uncomfortably close to spoonfeeding plot devices, it’s still a welcome meal. This is in part due to the Heinlein levels of scientific accuracy. Project Hail Mary is as much a scientific thesis paper/doomsday guide as it is a gripping sci-fi disaster adventure.
Weir has taken great pains to base the threat to humanity and their salvation in real science, giving the reader a tangible buzz of near-future-realism. This dedication to grounding and accuracy can, at times, have an awkwardly inverse side effect and there are traces of the author writing himself into a corner and needing characters to be smarter or more capable than seems credible. Fortunately the plot itself is so engaging with enough dramatic twists that you can forgive some of the more necessary fantastical leaps.
Coming off the back of The Martian, a story of a lone scientist stranded on Mars in a desperate attempt to survive, Project Hail Mary feels like a very comfortable follow-up for Weir. It also appears that after the success of the Matt Damon adaptation of The Martian, Hollywood is keen to see more of Weir’s worlds as Project Hail Mary is already destined for the silver screen with Ryan Gosling attached.
This is apt, really, as Project Hail Mary feels very much like a popcorn sci-fi (if there is such a thing in the book world), with cinematic scope, inspirational characters and an, albeit imagined, epic score… Project Hail Mail is fun, fast and oh so factual. It’s perfect if you’re a fan of smart people solving their problems by being smart, while still being inconceivably charismatic and a little neurotic.
Project Hail Mary is a book that will undoubtedly be seen circling the book clubs and coffee tables of even the most casual fiction fans, but that shouldn’t detract from the fact that it is a passionate sci-fi, where even the most hardcore readers can enjoy its bounty of philosophical predicaments and technical takeaways.
Project Hail Mary by Andy Weir is out now. Read our interview with Andy Weir here.
