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temymm's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
5.0
Graphic: Death and Fire/Fire injury
Minor: Animal death, Suicide, Cannibalism, and Alcohol
Cannibalism notes: it’s not really cannibalism -kathrynok's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
5.0
Graphic: Confinement, Death, Suicidal thoughts, Medical content, Grief, Alcohol, and Injury/Injury detail
toopunkrockforshul's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
5.0
Graphic: Confinement, Death, Drug use, Suicide, Vomit, Medical content, Grief, Fire/Fire injury, Abandonment, Alcohol, and Injury/Injury detail
Minor: Child death, Cannibalism, and War
thecrimsoncorsair's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.5
Graphic: Body horror, Confinement, Death, Gore, Panic attacks/disorders, Suicidal thoughts, Violence, Excrement, Medical content, Kidnapping, Grief, Cannibalism, Medical trauma, Fire/Fire injury, Alcohol, War, and Injury/Injury detail
lunar_witch's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
5.0
Graphic: Alcoholism, Confinement, Cursing, Death, Suicidal thoughts, Medical content, and Injury/Injury detail
Moderate: Sexual content, Blood, and Alcohol
Minor: Addiction, Animal cruelty, Cancer, Misogyny, Excrement, and Abandonment
mlwe's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
4.5
"What's two plus two?"
"What's two plus two?"
"Incorrect. What's two plus two?"
Do you know the answer? Because the protagonist of Project Hail Mary certainly doesn't; he can't even remember his name! Thus, we are taken on an adventure. Who is this character? Where did he come from? And, maybe more importantly, where is he going? As pieces of events and flashes of memory return (in the form of non-chronological storytelling), the readers begin to construct the plot, returning to the present to affirm conclusions with the protagonist. As reality begins to take shape for the protagonist, the readers must confront the best and worst parts of humanity, and how we have both the ability to save our world and the power to destroy it all.
My Thoughts:
The author excels at creating passionate, well-rounded characters that are easy to love (and hate!). I read the book fairly quickly, as the plot is constantly developing. The slowest parts of the book are the first chapter, since we are thrown in media res, and a couple of pages of world-building which are needed to foreshadow later events. The time jumps are clearly illustrated (new chapters, section breaks, explicitly stated), and they do not cause confusion or pull the reader away from the story. The science is well explained. Although it is a significant portion of the story, readers could skim the explanations and rely on the protagonist's summaries, if desired.
Some complaints include all the plot lines. While the story reached a definite conclusion, I was not satisfied with all the resolutions. <Specifically, I felt navigating the ups and downs of life and water was ultimately unnecessary. Likewise, discovering Stratt's criminal actions and learning about Grace's teaching on Erid felt rushed.> Therefore, the ending was a bit of a miss for me.
I'll reread the book one day, if only to meet Rocky again.
Moderate: Death and Suicide
Minor: Drug use, Medical content, Grief, Medical trauma, Fire/Fire injury, and Alcohol
emfield's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
5.0
Moderate: Death and Medical content
Minor: Sexual content, Suicidal thoughts, Violence, Alcohol, and War
mariposa517's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.5
Graphic: Death, Suicide, Medical content, Medical trauma, and Murder
Moderate: Cursing, Drug use, Sexual content, Alcohol, War, and Injury/Injury detail
Minor: Confinement and Gun violence
bomenvernietiger's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
1.5
There's a really interesting and well thought out plot, but it's massively dampened by the many little mistakes and plot-holes, prose that sounds like it came from a drunk text message, an overly light-hearted and casual tone that doesn't fit the story, a boring main character, events that are often way too plot-convenient, annoying humour, cheesy dialogue, and Andy Weir's stubborn unwillingness to explain or do research into anything that doesn't adhere to his highly specific personal interests. This last flaw is clear from his refusal to get into any substantial world politics even though a third of his book is supposed to be about international cooperation, and his _extremely_ half-assed attempt to conceptualise a pitch&harmony-based alien language, which contained mistakes which could only be possible if Weir did not consult a single semi-professional musician or musicologist before publishing.
This could have been an amazing hard scifi that teaches people about physics and astronomy, but it's written in such a way that the science never really matters; whenever there's a plot issue Weir's science can't solve, it's either glossed over or splattered with plot convenience sauce (aka 'xenonite'). It could have also been a nice, silly, emotionally deep, feel-good soft scifi, but the characters and the prose are way too dull for that, and anything heartfelt about the book is drowned in constant scientific explanations. Both of these ideas would have been great stories, but they were smashed together and the result is a mess.
This is extra sad considering Andy Weir can write something as good as The Martian. But looking back, the Martian already contained the cracks in Weir's storytelling which became full-on rifts
Graphic: Fire/Fire injury
Moderate: Cursing, Death, Suicide, Violence, Blood, Medical trauma, Suicide attempt, Alcohol, and War
Minor: Cancer, Pedophilia, and Pandemic/Epidemic
petsuka's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.0
At first it was a quite exciting read and I devoured the first half of this book. The authors speciality in describing physics, space and science shows a great understanding and is a delight for science buffs. But after reading hours and hours of it I just couldn't take it anymore.... another experiment, another fun of of the box physics thing he does in space.... I don't know it took all the fun for me away and I tried to speed read these parts and skipped pages of this book just to finish it.
Love rocky though and enjoyed every encounter with him. <3
Moderate: Confinement, Drug use, Self harm, and Alcohol