PROJECT HAIL MARY

Reviewed by Steven H Silver

Project Hail Mary, Andy Weir's third novel, places his character in solitude on a spaceship, separated from the rest of the human race, much as Mark Watney was separated from humanity in Weir's debut novel, The Martian. However, the circumstances are completely different, with the main character in Project Hail Mary finding himself on a spaceship in deep space, waking up in a coma from which the other two crewmembers fail to awaken.

Although the character who wakes up not knowing anything about their circumstances is a cliche in writing that allows the author to reveal their world and its background to both the character and the reader, Weir manages to use it to good effect in Project Hail Mary. Even before Ryland Grace can remember who what his name is, he begins to remember where he is and details about the mission he is on, although it remains unclear how he wound up on the mission, which actually is one of the biggest mysteries in the novel, and one which is eventually revealed. There is little enough tension in the book that retaining that piece of information allows Weir to keep the reader guessing about its resolution.

Both Grace and the reader eventually learn that a dimming of the Earth's sun has led to concerns that the Earth will quickly become uninhabitable. Grace's reasonably comfortable life teaching elementary students is interrupted because Eva Stratt, a bureaucrat who has been given tremendous power as the head of a project to save the human race, discovered a widely derided paper Grace had previously published arguing that life does not require water to exist. Stratt is significantly intrigued by his arguments that she wants him to study the phenomenon that leads to the sun's dimming and, eventually, gets him fully involved in the project.

The majority of the book deals with the various scientific puzzles that must be solved in order to stop the dimming sun, whether they are faced by Stratt and her ever-growing team or by Grace, a dozen light years away from Earth. Weir brings the concepts of the scientific method to life while not neglecting the emotional and political toll their activities take. Although the story could easily have been a dry retelling of Grace's experiences, Weir manages to make the character and his actions not only come to life also to be engaging.

In Project Hail Mary, Weir does an excellent job of depicting the curiosity that can drive humanity as it attempts to solve puzzles to help achieve its own survival. Given the amount of discord in the world over even the most basic ideas, the novel does come across as a little too optimistic. However, if the reader can suspend their disbelief for Weir's other speculations, a world which can pull together shouldn't be too much of a stretch. In fact, Project Hail Mary is a perfect example that science fiction does not have to be dystopian, but instead can be a literature of hope and aspiration.

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