Flash fiction review: The Martian by Andy Weir

The Martian by Andy Weir
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Ripped through this like a, er, home-made bomb in an airlock. Like The Expanse series, like Neal Stephenson's Seveneves, Weir does a great job of relaying nerdy space science, while keeping the story rolling along and it helps that his main character, Mark Watney, is pretty likeable and full of dorky humour. Weir may not win any prizes for Great Literature but he sure knows how to put the fiction into science fiction.
In Watney you have an irrepressible, loveable dude stuck on Mars all alone who keeps it light as he goes about problem solving and improvising and disaster-management with minimal materials to stay 'less dead' for a very long time while NASA works out to save him - 'yay!'.
Some of the NASA characters came across as a bit hammy to me, and perhaps conveying the emotional side of what was going on was not Weir's greatest strength, but the other stuff is awesome, I especially enjoyed the problem solving sequences; the detail shared really puts you down on Mars with Watney as he logically and creatively deals with some pretty horrendous circumstances. And the nerdy NASA stuff was great as well.
Well done Mr Weir!

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