Project Hail Mary by Andy Weir

Summary

Zero to Well-Read – Book Riot Podcast

Episode: Project Hail Mary by Andy Weir Date: March 3, 2026 Hosts: Jeff O’Neal and Rebecca Schinsky

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Main Theme: Reinventing the “Competence Porn” Space Thriller

In this lively and irreverent discussion, Jeff and Rebecca dive deep into Andy Weir’s 2021 bestseller Project Hail Mary, a book known for its gripping lone-wolf-in-space premise, hard science explanations, and a unique interspecies buddy dynamic. The episode explores what makes the book such an accessible, entertaining, and broadly appealing read, as well as its resonance as a blockbuster adaptation (with Ryan Gosling in the imminent film). The hosts unpack the plot, Weir’s brand of hopeful, detail-driven science fiction, and what both casual and discerning readers can take away from the adventure.

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Key Discussion Points and Insights

1. Why Project Hail Mary is a Sensation

• Four Quadrant Appeal: The book is a rare case of “four quadrant” science fiction—equally compelling to devoted genre readers and general audiences. It balances wonky technical detail and layman-friendly explanations with brisk pacing and humor. (21:25)
• Andy Weir’s Brand: Weir’s success is likened to Michael Crichton and Dan Brown, with a focus on science as optimism and problem-solving—never the threat, always the solution. (19:16)
• Accessible Hard Sci-Fi: Even readers who don’t gravitate toward “hard science” fiction find themselves swept along by Weir’s charm, brisk action, and humor. (33:38)

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2. Plot Recap and Structure

(06:46 – 09:54)

• Premise: Dr. Ryland Grace, middle school teacher and molecular biologist, wakes up on a spaceship with amnesia. Earth's sun is infected with an energy-sapping space algae, threatening humanity’s extinction in 30 years.
• Mission: Grace is the only survivor on a desperate journey to Tau Ceti, attempting to find a cure.
• Early-Twist Alien Contact: He discovers Rocky, an alien from a similarly imperiled planet. Their communication and problem-solving become the emotional and scientific core.
• Narrative Device: Amnesia allows for gradual exposition via flashbacks, revealing not just the science but also Grace’s reluctant recruitment and ethical dilemmas.

“As the main character tells us, there is a sort of space algae growing on the sun and Earth is in danger because less sun means Earth is going to cool, and that causes all kinds of problems.” — Rebecca (06:46)

• Science and Problem Solving: The dynamic between Grace and Rocky is rooted in their ability to learn from each other—each bringing unique knowledge from their home worlds.

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3. Standout Literary and Audiobook Qualities

(22:33 – 24:40)

• Audiobook as Event: The audiobook, performed by Ray Porter, leverages Rocky’s musical language for a unique listening experience—winning the 2022 Audie Award and becoming a top recommendation from the hosts.

“In the audiobook, you actually hear the like deedlee deedle dee… anytime that Rocky is speaking… It is so fun and so singular.” — Rebecca (23:02)

• Voice and Tone: The hosts highlight Weir’s “competence porn”—the drama and delight of seeing characters solve problems through ingenuity, science, and mutual aid.

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4. Andy Weir’s Path: From Self-Pub Success to Mainstream Brand

(16:59 – 28:45)

• Self-Publishing Roots: The Martian started as free chapters on Weir’s website, then 99-cent Amazon Kindle uploads, before agent interest and a major traditional deal.
• Not Just a Fluke: After the disappointment of Artemis, Project Hail Mary cemented Weir’s reputation and viability.

“He’s really dotting the I’s and crossing the t’s on the made up molecules. It’s so detailed… But this is a Titanic success story.” — Jeff (16:59)

• Trappings of the Genre: Unlike Crichton’s “science as threat,” Weir’s fiction is “science as solution.” Both hosts agree Weir’s work is remarkably optimistic compared to his supposed predecessors.

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5. Reading Experience: Science, Humor, and Heart

• Glide Ratio on Sci-Tech: Even technical or hard sci-fi-averse readers are swept along: dense sections are typically kept short, with cliffnotes for the non-specialist. (36:57)
• Comparisons: The book’s structure and feel evoke the adventure and cleverness of Dan Brown, but with much more heart and humor.
• Amnesia as Plot Device: The chosen narrative trick is justified, both for plot (unraveling mystery) and for character growth.

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6. Ethics, Politics, and Subtext

(30:32 – 31:49)

• Weir and Meaning: Weir claims to aim for “pure escapism” with no subtext, but the podcast argues that themes around sacrifice, collective survival, science advocacy, and even social values are everywhere (“…there are some sort of political and values based things that show up…” — Rebecca, 31:04).
• Allegory of Collaboration: Grace and Rocky’s mutual respect and cooperative problem-solving are read as humanist and social values-by-example.

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7. Memorable Quotes & Notable Moments

– Character Dynamics and Humor

“Good, proud. I am scary space monster. You are leaky space blob.” — Rocky, as recounted by Jeff (57:27)

“I have all of the authority.” — Dr. Strat, as quoted by Rebecca (53:43)

“I don’t have time for this. I have an alien thingy to catch.” — Ryland Grace, as quoted by Rebecca (56:17)

– The Human and the Universal

“Science as the only truly universal language. And shared language means shared possibility.” — Jeff (80:11)

“Sometimes this stuff we all hate ends up being the only way to do things.” — Grace on big meetings, as quoted by Rebecca (59:58)

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8. Readalikes and Cross-Genre Comparisons

• The Martian by Andy Weir: The canonical readalike.
• The Andromeda Strain by Michael Crichton: Shares the “science thriller” energy but is more fear-oriented.
• Contact by Carl Sagan & Arrival (Ted Chiang’s The Story of Your Life): For those who like communication problem-solving and first contact narratives.
• Bourne Identity: For the gradual, amnesiac-unraveling-mystery dynamic.

“None of these are as fun as an Andy Weir book. That’s the one thing… This is my entertaining escapist.” — Jeff (79:14)

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9. Stray Thoughts & Fun Observations

• Naming Quirks: Ryland Grace is “a Colleen Hoover ass character name.” — Rebecca (45:50)
• Color-Coded Science Passages: Jeff wishes hard technical bits were color-coded, like ski runs, for reader comfort. (47:16)
• Elective Comas: Both hosts joke about wanting this speculative medical technology for rough days or the news cycle. (52:44)

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10. Notable Listener Takeaways & Cocktail Party Facts

• Andy Weir is reportedly a nervous flyer and never visited the set of The Martian—but overcame this to participate more in Project Hail Mary’s adaptation. (70:48)
• The most popular quote on Goodreads:

  “I penetrated the outer cell membrane with a nano syringe.” “You poked it with a stick?” “No… well, yes, but it was a scientific poke with a very scientific stick.” (70:08)

• Buddy aliens: Rocky is poised to join the “alien cultural representation pantheon”—a combo of ET and Spock. Merch, anyone? (75:57)

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Timestamps for Key Segments

• [06:46] – Plot synopsis, world-building, introduction to main character and inciting incident
• [09:54] – Introduction of Rocky, first contact dynamics; “buddy movie” tone set
• [22:33] – Audiobook highlights and cultural impact
• [16:59] – Weir’s self-pub journey & genre context
• [30:32] – Are these books “pure escapism” or more?
• [41:27] – Character arcs, amnesia device, and unwilling hero trope
• [53:43] – Quotes: Authority, humor, and relatable moments
• [77:27] – Further reading and genre companions
• [80:11] – Key thematic takeaway: “Science is the only universal language”
• [81:02] – Zero to Well-Read Scoring

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Zero to Well-Read Scoring (81:02–84:47)

• Historical Importance: 3/10 (may rise with film success)
• Readability: 10/10
• Current Relevance: 6/10 (science funding, climate, collective action)
• Book Nerd Read Cred: 3/10 (more popular than niche)
• Oh Damn Factor: 5/10 (unique achievement for fun, hard sci-fi)

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Conclusion: Who Is This Book For?

• For Anyone Who Likes a Good Time: This is a “Swiss Army recommendation”—hard to go wrong unless you dislike fun, buddy dynamics, or any technical language at all.
• If You Fear Being Lost in Science: Don't worry—dense parts are brief and usually smoothed over for non-technical readers.
• Bonus: Works both as a book club pick and popcorn adventure—read it for the fun, re-read for the cleverness.

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Ultimate Takeaways for Your Next Dinner Party or Movie Day

• Project Hail Mary celebrates curiosity, the joy of solving problems, and cross-cultural (or cross-species!) communication: “It’s not about the glory… it’s the friends you make along the way.” (79:39)
• Science, even at its hardest, can be welcoming, thrilling, and deeply human.
• Andy Weir’s “buddy in space” formula still feels fresh—and it doesn’t hurt that the biggest surprises come from friendship, not just scientific breakthroughs.

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For more Zero to Well-Read, subscribe, review, and check out their newsletter and bonus discussions at patreon.com/0towellread and @zerotowellreadpodcast.

Transcript

[Jeff O'Neill]

This season of zero to well read is sponsored by thriftbooks.com you can find more than 19 million new and used books in addition to games, movies, gifts and other stuff to feed your mind, feed your brain, feed your life. One of those things could be today's episode topic, which is Project Hail Mary by Andy Weir. Now, this is the kind of book there's not a whole bunch of used copies. It sold very well in hardcover. It was in hardcover for a long time. There is a paperback now. It is selling very well. But people love this book because you hear us talk about the show. So people hold on to it. So probably not going to find a used one, though you might. You can set an alert there, but you can find in browse and that's one of the fun things about [e-mail] is Editions from other jurisdictions. There's a Chinese boxed one that is super cool. I may have set an alert to find out when it's available. I'm a little scared to see how much it costs, but it looks great. But you can find Project Hail Mary new or used if you get lucky over there at prices that are super competitive new with the other kind of places you would go to get a discount on new books. So thanks to Thriftbooks.com for sponsoring this season of zero to well read. Let's get into the show.

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[Jeff O'Neill]

Welcome to Zero to well Read. I'm Jeff o'. Neill. Zero to well Read is a podcast about the books you wish you'd read or maybe you have read. Maybe you're going to read, but maybe haven't. Maybe won't. Maybe want to just a little bit more. Got a nice comment from someone yesterday. It's like exactly what they wanted. Their Most recent episode, 1984. Thought they should have read it. They kind of know some things about it. Want to. They felt like the episode gave them what they wanted without having to read the book, but then went ahead and read the book. Rebecca, what do we want? More than that.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

That is exactly what we want. We've got similar comments from somebody who had never even heard about the Secret History by Donna Tartt. And then some stopped the episode halfway through so they could go read it and then pick it back up. We love to help people discover new books, which, by the way, I'm Rebecca Schinsky as we're introducing ourselves. And today, speaking of discoveries, we're gonna invite you to put on your jumpsuits, to brush up on your space lingo and to strap in for an interstellar adventure. Cause we're talking about Project Hail Mary by Andy Weir, which is the book that inspired the new movie with Ryan Gosling coming out later this month.

[Jeff O'Neill]

And the buzz is hot. Rebecca, we've been excited about this movie for a long time. We'll talk about as we get into the episode. We are, we're Wearians. Weirdites. We're just weird, I guess, at this point. And when this book came out I thought it was terrific and I immediately started wondering and we heard very quickly that probably even before the book hit streets, it was already in development. Ryan Gosling was attached to and I think we can talk about some of the reasons why this is such an attractive part. And you have a nice note, a cagey note about Weir's writing style and approach for Project Hail Mary, at least as we can perceive it. But it should be a fun episode, a really fun book.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

Yes.

[Jeff O'Neill]

And I'm sure Vanessa Diaz, our managing editor who writes our newsletter, curates our newsletter, assembles it, constructs it, she keeps the spaceship together and floating through interstellar space over there, can link click a link in the show notes to sign up for that free newsletter or become a member of the to get early ad freed episodes and bonus content. That's patreon.com 02 well read. And while you're clicking around on stuff, go rate and review the show wherever you're listening. Spotify, Audible, the YouTube channel. I don't think you can rate and review stuff there. Give it a like, give it a follow, give it a subscribe. And then of course, if you've got thoughts about this episode or past episodes or anything else you'd like to tell us, shoot us an email@zero to well read bookriot.com One thing that's cool about Andy Weir for us especially is we've got to go on the Andy Weir journey together. I don't think we've had another author so far. I didn't think of it until just this moment, Rebecca, where we were There reading together for work for the Martian.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

That's right.

[Jeff O'Neill]

That's right. And then through the Artemis. And so we know the interstellar pathways that this has traveled together and. And we're so thrilled to be able to talk about Andy Weir and project he'll marry today.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

This is such a fun one. His body of work is so fun. I rewatched all the trailers for the movie this morning and I am fully like, I'm wearing my space jumpsuit. Like put it in my van.

[Jeff O'Neill]

You are future girl. You do. Always throwing on a cape and a jetpack. I don't know where Andy Weir stands on jet packs. I'm sure at one point a character in Andy Weilbrook will need to construct a jetpack out of sort of leftover ammonia or whatever canisters or whatever they got laying around. But it's super fun. And the Martian was a wonderful adaptation. I think that's another reason that we're so excited about Project Hail Mary as an adaptation. Project is the Martian was a great. It's one of the great adaptations of like modern cinema, as far as I can tell.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

Yes, it's a great movie by itself and a terrific adaptation of a wonderful book and really a four quadrant hit. We'll talk more about that and also how that relates and it makes the appeal of Project Hail Mary really come alive. This is one of the moviegoing events of the year and I really, really hope it becomes one of the reading events of the year too. There's a whole bunch of people who are gonna go see this who will probably just be finding out it's based on a book when the like credits splash across the screen at some point. And it's a wonderful reading experience. So if you're thinking about it, you've still got some time as you're listening to this episode to read it before you go see it. And you know, we support either direction book then movie, or movie then book. But it's a great reading experience and it moves quickly for 500 pages long.

[Jeff O'Neill]

Yeah, I don't know. I mean, I tend to like to read the book first just because I don't know that I have a recommended pathway here. We don't really have a section here for changes we think they might make. Maybe we'll talk that as long as we go. But the essential core pieces of this will be the same. There's not a lot of pieces you can do without radically undoing the project of Project Hail Mary. And I guess that gets us into synopsis time. But this is Pretty plot heavy in a lot of ways, and it's the most complicated narrative structure Weir has used. So, Rebecca, why don't you walk us through what actually happens in the book project.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

Okay. So, as the main character tells us, there is a sort of space algae growing on the sun and Earth is in danger because less sun means Earth is going to cool, and that causes all kinds of problems. Scientists have projected that if the phenomenon continues at the current rate that they've discovered it, the climate change that's caused by a cooling planet is going to result in famine, mass extinction of all kinds of species, the collapse of civilization within about 30 years, and then the eventual end of humanity. So everyone is very concerned about this.

[Jeff O'Neill]

Seems bad, Rebecca. Yeah, pretty bad. I'm not sure about you, but seems pretty bad. Yep.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

Governments around the world then are working together. The UN has spun up a bunch of things and have decided they're going to tap any and all experts who might be able to help. Like anybody who's ever done anything related to science that they think could be useful in figuring out what's going on with the space algae and how they could stop it. So that brings us to our main character, Dr. Ryland Grace. He is a molecular biologist turned middle school teacher who wakes up one morning as the book is beginning in a spaceship. And he has amnesia as the book begins. But he's the sole survivor on the Hail Mary. It's the ship. He is one of only three crew members that survived. Or he's the only one of the three crew members to have survived the 13 year trip to another solar system. And it's Earth's last ditch effort to save humanity. So as he's coming to from this induced coma, he's trying to piece together his memory, figure out what the hell he is doing in space and how he is supposed to go about saving the planet before he dies on what he eventually realizes has been a suicide mission all along. And then Jeff, it turns out he's not alone in space.

[Jeff O'Neill]

Not alone. He's not alone.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

He's not alone.

[Jeff O'Neill]

This is a real. I mean, we do spoilers on this show because that's part of the. Tell people what it's about, what's going on. This was one of my big questions about the marketing is what are they gonna do about Rocky? And because you want people to go see the show. But also it's one of the great reveals of my reading experience and like the whole thing is there and you get it unfolding and you don't get much, but you know, there's something else, and I think the thing that will still be a delightful surprise for people who have read the book is the nature of that relationship, how they work together, Rocky's personality, where he comes from, and everything else like that. But that's about halfway through the book. I should have marked this.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

Oh, less than that. It happens earlier than I remembered that another ship turns up on the radar and it reaches out to Ryland Grace's ship, because whatever is impacting Earth's sun is also coming for stars in other solar systems, apparently. And the people from this other planet have launched a similar mission. So that ship makes contact with Grace, and from there we're really off on this, like, interstellar, interspecies bromance where he's bonding with you, said Rocky, who is the alien who's piloting the other ship, who's also the sole survivor of the mission that he's on. And the two of them then problem solve their way through physics and engineering. And this really, I think, one of science fiction's most satisfying examples of competence porn and great buddy vibes. Like just a super fun buddy movie.

[Jeff O'Neill]

Yeah. And Rocky, I guess we should say we don't know that Iridians have gender as long as we know them. So it's a. It. It's a day. I don't know that we're actually told how that works necessarily, but it is certainly a two folks figuring out together across some xenonite barriers that you may or may not understand. Don't worry about it at this point. But I think the most thrilling part of the book for me are these early overtures when they are trying to figure out how to be in conversation with each other. How to be in conversation about being in conversation, I think is probably the most fun 10 or 12 pages of this whole book.

[Sponsor Announcer]

Yeah.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

How to figure out each other's language and then how they build their vocabulary and then eventually can communicate about math and science and technical concepts they can learn from each other. There are ways that the Iridians, which is Rocky's planet, they're more advanced than we are. And then there are many ways that our science is more advanced than theirs and how those complement each other and then how these two characters are able to support and compliment each other through, like, really all kinds of ups and downs. This is a roller coaster of a story.

[Jeff O'Neill]

Yeah. And luckily, Rocky seems to have almost exactly the same personality as Rylan Gray. So, you know, I'm just talking a little bit more about Andy Weir and writing A voice and character a little bit. When I talk about his middle book, Project Not. Sorry, Project Artemis, just called Artemis. But this is largely like the Martian. One guy in space with communication problems with the people around him. Either you can't communicate to Earth or they're dead, or there are different species and there's limitations to that. And I think it's pretty interesting to think about that. Project across the Martian and Project Hail Mary. I'll talk about a book where Weir tries to do more interpersonal stuff a little bit later. Also, notably when Riley. We get. I guess the narrative difference here is we get flashbacks as sort of Grace is having memories come back to him of what led him to be in the ship. And his primary relationship there is with a Dutch. He's Dutch, right?

[Rebecca Schinsky]

I believe so, yes.

[Jeff O'Neill]

Dutch scientist who's in charge of the whole apparatus. Right. She's basically a supreme commander of Allied Forces astrophage, and she is gruff and to the point. And they have communication, but not really a relationship highlight. This is not a relationship movie unless you're at a remove with the person. That's very interesting to me and very relatable, I would say, at some point at the same time.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

Yeah, they get like several years go by on Earth after they discover the space algae before this mission can launch. And Grace is flashing back the whole time that he's up there working with Rocky to fill in his own memory, but to fill up on how he ended up being the guy on this mission and what the thinking is behind all of the science there. Because it takes 13 light years to get to. He's in by Tau. Ceti is the other star. It takes 13 light years to get there. He experiences like, four years of time passing on the journey because of how relativity works. But then it would take 13 years for any more information or communication to get back. So unlike the Martian, there is no

[Jeff O'Neill]

option, no possibility of even delayed communication.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

If you could just fix the comms, then they could help you out. That's not a possibility. Hey, folks, I'm here with a podcast recommendation for you if you're enjoying what we're doing at zero to, well, read the deep dives, the context, the what's really going on here? Energy. We want to share some friends of our show who have a great podcast of their own. It's called the Secret Life of Books. It's a really smart and deeply engaging weekly podcast hosted by Princeton English professor Sophie G. And former BBC arts director Johnny Claypool. Each episode, they take on an iconic book to ask what's the story behind the story? Who shaped it? What were the stakes and what meanings might we have missed? Right now, they're in the middle of a special Toni Morrison miniseries. Y' all know we love Toni Morrison here at Zero to well read, and they're taking four episodes to explore her work with the kind of close reading, literary history and sharp insight that we know you'll appreciate. If you like taking great books seriously without taking yourself too seriously, which I assume is true for you, because here you are. Go check out the Secret Life of Books. Wherever you get your podcasts, you won't be sorry.

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[Rebecca Schinsky]

Be there.

[Jeff O'Neill]

I think I would do very poorly in Most space environments, but I do especially in poorly in this one. I'll just put it that way.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

Yeah, I do not want to be an astronaut. I don't. Yeah, definitely not the last person standing in what's already a suicide mission. You know, I think we would have gotten around to some Andy Weir on this podcast even if we weren't getting a Project Hail Mary adaptation. Absent the adaptation, we probably would have started with the Martian. But I want to talk about both why this book is important and the Andy Weird of it all as well.

[Jeff O'Neill]

Yeah, I mean, so this is his third novel and 2011's the Martian was the breakout. And I remember it catching on like wildfire amongst our staff and our readers and the wider public. And then there's a Ridley Scott movie and Matt Damon and the whole thing and really blew up. But there's a couple things going on here. This is one of the great self publishing success stories. It doesn't quite. It doesn't get, it doesn't get lumped in and maybe there's reasons of gender or science or genre or what that go into it. I would believe all of those things with say Colleen Hoover or Freedom McFadden or some of the romance authors that have come, you know, even E.L. james. Right. There's a different kind of model here, largely because there was like kind of one book and unlike some of those other authors, he's. He doesn't have 15 or 20 books. It doesn't have a self publishing cadence where there's a whole bunch of them. And the reasons for that, I think after you read an Andy Weir book would make sense, is he's really dotting the I's and crossing the t's on the made up molecules. It's so detailed. He's so thoroughly. He cares so much about getting it as right as humanly possible within the confines of making an interesting story and having some speculative elements to it. But this is a, this is a Titanic success story. We'll talk a little bit about that. You have some good notes about how it came to be. But I also think that when you. I guess I have this question for you because I have a question mark in parentheses here about really only the second best selling author in the quote unquote science thriller category. Oh, after Michael Crichton, who I think is the first, but I think he's one of two in this science thriller category. And the voice is quite different. Yes, one of. I'll talk about my Michael Crichton pick as a read alike a little bit later. But this is not, this is not afraid of science. This is not. Science is scary, Jurassic park style. This is science is useful. Science is always presented as the solution to the problem as not the problem itself. Now that may or may not be fair in a lot of categories, but in this particular one it is. And sometimes you get a one of one that creates a new sensibility or a new subgenre, a new feeling of how to read. The closest one I can really think of, it's like, it's sort of like what Dan Brown did with Da Vinci Code.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

Yes, a great example.

[Sponsor Announcer]

Yeah.

[Jeff O'Neill]

I prefer the Andy Weir books by quite a bit though. I really do like the Landon books as an entertainment bike. If I had to pick, I get a new Langdon book or a new Weir book, I'm picking a new weird book every time right now.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

A hot take from you.

[Jeff O'Neill]

Okay, well, some of it's scarcity, I don't know.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

Yeah, that's true. We get these a lot fewer and that does. I think we are maybe coming up on due for a new Andy Weir book because The Martian is 2011. Artemis was 2017. That's about a heist on the moon. That book was not very successful. Artemis didn't sell very well. The reviews were pretty middling to pretty bad, honestly. And so what Project Hail Mary was going to be and how it would be received was a really big question mark when the book came out in 2021. And it felt like Andy Weir's author future was hanging in the balance of like this is your third go and can you replicate something that's as good and big as the Martian or somewhere close to it? Or was the Martian going to be a one hit wonder? And so Project Hail Mary is important for having sort of established him as an ongoing successful author in the genre. But this is also the rare four quadrant work of science fiction. And I think some of it's connected to what you were saying about that, the science thriller, but where science is the solution and where science is fun and exciting and he, he really works to make it accessible. The books are super wonky and very detailed, as we were saying. But Weir also has this magic trick of making it possible to glide over that if you don't care. And then also giving real quick summaries for the civilians of what's going on so you can understand what's going on and find yourself still inside the story and invested and you understand what's suspenseful about each of the experiments that they're gonna conduct or each of the solutions that they're going to. But this kind of book works for almost any kind of reader. And I mean, that's part of the reason that a movie studio has acquired it and put a bajillion dollars behind it and Ryan Reynolds or Ryan Gosling on screen starring in it, is that it's going to appeal to just about everybody in the audience.

[Jeff O'Neill]

Yeah. And as you have here, it has four and a half stars on Goodreads, which, for those of you who don't really know, there's kind of an asymptotic thing that happens with Goodreads, which, the closer you get, the higher you get, the more signal there is from a 4.2 for a 4.3 or 4.4, but 4.5 stars with over 1.2 million readings, that is what we would call tall. Where I grew up, there's a lot of people that read it. And if you read it, you tend to like this quite a bit. And that's certainly been my own experience of people I recommend it to. We recommend this all this time. We have a term we use on the Book Riot podcast for our recommendation shows, the Swiss army recommendation, which you can give to a lot of different kind of people, and they'll all have. Most of them will have a positive experience, unsurprisingly. Then it won the 2021 Goodreads Choice Award for Science Fiction. It was a finalist for the 2022 Hugo. I didn't go look up to see what won for Best Novel. And then we haven't talked about it yet. And you can maybe talk about this directly. I did not listen to the audiobook in full. I only listened to parts of it because I read in print first. But as soon as I read it in print, I believe I said to you, do this in audio.

[Sponsor Announcer]

Yes.

[Jeff O'Neill]

Because I don't know if we want to talk about here, but the audiobook is one of the great audiobook achievements because of the nature of Rocky and Ryland. Grace's communication, of course, is. I mean, they're quote, unquote speaking, let's talk about it to each other. But it's through musical chords.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

Yes.

[Jeff O'Neill]

Right.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

So, yeah, Rocky's communication sounds to Grace's ears like musical chords. And when you're reading the book, and anytime Rocky speaks, it's little music notes.

[Jeff O'Neill]

Yes.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

And Grace builds software that eventually, as he understands Rocky's vocabulary, he's able to translate Rocky sounds into the English words and then his English words into Rocky sounds so that they can have conversations with each other in the audiobook. You actually hear the like deedlee deedle dee. Like you the music chords anytime that Rocky is speaking. And then along with a kind of like robotic sounding voice to communicate his words in English as they would be coming out of Grace's laptop. And it is so fun and so singular. Like, my husband and I listened to it on a road trip. We had been saving it for like whatever that thing was that we were traveling for. And like we had listened to the Martian together. Both huge fans. But this, it felt really special and we hadn't heard something like it before. And what you had said to me was like, you'll know it when you hear it. Of why this is a thing to do on audio.

[Jeff O'Neill]

Good job me giving you a little surprise to have.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

Yeah, yeah. And like I wanted to close that curiosity gap and I did. You do know it as soon as you hear it. Like first it's really exciting that there's an alien and they're making contact and then how are they gonna communicate with each other then, oh my God, it's music sounds. And it's just great. That audiobook edition was performed by Ray Porter and it won the 2022 Audie Award for Audiobook of the Year. A great win. This remains an Alzheimer. I was just telling a friend who never got around to reading this when it was first published but wants to read it before the movie. Like, do the audiobook, if that's available to you at all. Do the audiobook. It's a. It is a great time. It's just a truly special audiobook experience.

[Jeff O'Neill]

And I think, you know, with the success of Project Hail Mary, even outside of the movie, it was a huge success. It continues to sell well. I often see it on the bestselling books of the week at Powell's and some other places now. It got a jump when the trailers came out and I think it got some afterburner because of that. But it was going to be a perennial seller in this category for a long time. And the second book means you've got a brand here. And I think anything Andy Weir does in the future in the book space, at least it's going to be event when the next Andy Weir book comes out. At this point, he worked on a TV show for a while. I think there were some other properties in the meantime and I think that's one reason. And I think he was more involved in this production as well. He wasn't as involved in the Martian because he didn't have the stature. And a bit of trivia. I'll say for the trivia section about Andy Weir. But you know, Andy Weir's a brand now. So this is really something that's going to be in our lives for a while now with the Martian, we're like, can you do another one guy surviving in space? And he did a lot of filigree and gold leaf on this. This is still a one guy in space. I don't know that you can go back to this. Well again. So I guess I enter the next Andy Weir book with somewhat similar trepidation of after the Martian is like, okay, now what? But I certainly am interested to see what he's going to come up with.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

Yeah, I think we can expect Andy Weir to keep us in space. That would be my baseline expectation because he is a self described lifelong space nerd. He grew up in the Bay Area. His dad was a particle physicist and his mom was an electrical engineer. And you can see all of that on display in this book especially. And then he grew up reading sci fi. His dad had a collection of really pulpy sci fi novels from the 50s and 60s. Then he moved on to Asimov and Heinlein and Clark and that's what made him fall in love with the genre. So you have all this in the stew. This guy growing up in a household with a particle physicist and an engineer, he's reading science fiction. He goes off to college at UC San Diego where he studies computer science. But then he runs out of money before he can get the degree. So he gets a job programming. He works at video game companies. He works at AOL. And he started writing the Martian in 2009 while he was working at a mobile game company. And so he's just kind of writing this in between and around work. And he started posting chapters on his website for free and then uploaded the full text to Amazon after readers were requesting it. He charged 99 cents for the full text of it and sold 35,000 copies within a few months. So that's how a literary agent named David Fugue, who's still his agent today, finds out about him and reached out with a book deal or offered to help him get a book deal. And Weir was skeptical at first, but ultimately he goes for it. He sold the book rights to Crown, which is a Penguin Random House imprint, and the movie rights were sold within the same week. So he was just off to the races. I think to your question earlier about like maybe why this doesn't get couched the same way as like Colleen Hoover or E.L. james in great self publishing hits is the time period of it like that. This is too.

[Jeff O'Neill]

It wasn't years of him slogging away writing self published novels.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

It happens very quickly. Like the. The Martian has just really started to be successful as a self published book before Fugate helps him sell it to Crown. And there's not like, in addition to not having a deep backlist, there's not TikTok, there's not a big social media phenomenon around this. No one in publishing knew who Andy Weir was. No, like mainstream book people knew who Andy Weir was until Crown picks it up and started publishing it. It was people who knew who Andy Weir was before. Like the nerds that are reading Andy Weir's blog knew about this.

[Jeff O'Neill]

The people that were willing to buy self published sci fi on Amazon, they were the early adopters for this. And it got enough momentum that someone took notice. And it makes sense that it was published here on a website. If you know the structure of the Martian, it's told in these journal entries. Right. So you could do, I wonder if he was writing them in real time, like would he write one and post one? I don't actually know.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

Yeah, it is very episodic.

[Jeff O'Neill]

Yeah. I interviewed Andy Weir a long time ago for an old show and one thing I remember from that interview is he was working. He did some other things too. He wrote comic books. He had this sort of universe called Cheshire Crossing which sort of mixed a bunch of like fantasy ip like Mary Poppins and Alice in Wonderland. It's sort of a shared universe. So like he's an interesting person. He is certainly a sci fi nerd and a coder and a programmer, but interested in storytelling on a grander scale. Like outside of just how can you get this proton from one place to another, which he is singularly good at doing. I don't think anyone ever tried to turn that into a chapter or a plot point of a book. But a really fascinating person. This is interesting too because, you know, my students used to ask me this, like, what if an author says their book doesn't mean what you think it might mean? So you have this note here that his books are meant to be purely escapist with no subtext or message quote. If you think you see something like that, it's in your head, not mine. I just want you to read and have fun. Sure, right. I mean, I don't know. I will take authors saying what they think their book should be doing at face value, but they don't get to control it. And sometimes things are in it that they don't mean but they're still in them anyway. And then. So I find it very difficult to read a book like this without having some sense of some kind of way. Andy Weir, for example, feels about climate change or feels about science funding or feels about like things that are true or 2 plus 2 equally 4 if we want to bridge off our Orwell discussion before. So maybe that's just when he says there's no subtext, that's just text. But I think there are some things that are very clearly in a more broadly humanist, pro science vein. I don't see how that cannot be. That is the text, Rebecca.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

To me it is the text. And there are certainly elements of conversations, characters have in the book, ways that they go about problem solving, the different priorities that they place on even like why should a person be willing to go on a mission where they know they're going to die, they're never gonna make it home. Is it selfish to not go on something like that when it's your life versus saving all of humanity? There are some sort of political and values based things that show up. Like I don't really believe that any art can ever be a political.

[Jeff O'Neill]

No, I don't believe that either.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

Yeah, because people have ideas about things and it infuses the way that we write and the way that we create. It seems like Andy Weir is a like, like lowercase L libertarian in his approach to politics. And that's really pretty believable from the books as well. So I, I believe him that he intends it to be purely escapist and they certainly are escapists. These books are a great time project. Hail Mary is so much fun. But you do bump into ideas that have political weight and there, there's like jokes in the book about conspiracy theorists who don't believe that the space algae is real, who don't believe that the climate change is going to happen. And that felt potent, of course in 2021, but it feels really potent reading it in 2026.

[Jeff O'Neill]

And he knows his P's and Q's like in a very detailed way. I have this document here he created to build out what the atmosphere and ecology of this fake planet arid is actually like and what the mass is and atmospheric pressure like he goes into the weeds because he is both interested. I think he clearly enjoys and cares about having him the science being as buttoned up as it can possibly be. And that's one of the joys here. Like if you don't know the term hard sci fi congratulations, you do now. And that is science fiction in which the science is fussed over. Right. The opposite end of the spectrum would be something like space opera, like Star Wars. Where do they mention one thing about how anything actually works in Star Wars? No, I think Star Trek. Those of you out here who are more fluent in these distinctions and gradations shouldn't shoot us an email. But like Star Trek is somewhere in the middle. Like there's some actual science and there's a lot of quite a hand waving. Andy Weir wants to do as little hand waving as is possible to tell the story he's interested in telling.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

Yeah, like truly a nerd's nerd. When he was writing the Martian, he built software to calculate the constant thrust trajectories for his unbelievable ion engine. He studied NASA satellite images to map out the astronaut character's course across Mars, and then he gave a detailed formula for how to make water out of oxygen and hydrazines like he really is. Hon it. I am typically not a reader of hard genre anything, especially hard sci fi and hard fantasy. Like my eyes glaze over at highly technical descriptions of things. I just don't care. And the fact that Andy Weir can make me interested in them like is a true testament. Like I am one of those people who crosses into sci fi. For Andy Weir, that's one of the ways that he executes this four quadrant kind of hit.

[Jeff O'Neill]

Yep.

[Sponsor Announcer]

Today's episode is brought to you by Random House Children's Books, publishers of the book Thief by Marcus Zusak. It's 1939 Nazi Germany and the country is holding its breath. Death has never been busier and it will become busier still. Liesl Biminger is a foster girl living outside of Munich who scratches out a meager existence for herself by stealing when she encounters something she can't resist. Books. With the help of her accordion playing foster father, she learns to read and shares her stolen books with her neighbors during bombing raids, as well as with the Jewish man hidden in her basement. Now There is a 20th anniversary edition of this best selling mega bestselling book. Excuse me. It includes gold sprayed edges, a new letter from the author, details of how characters and scenes evolved, excerpts from the author's notebook, and handwritten notes from the original manuscript. So make sure to check out the 20th anniversary edition of of the book Thief by Markus Zusak. And thanks again to Random House Children's Books for sponsoring this episode.

[Jeff O'Neill]

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[Rebecca Schinsky]

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[Jeff O'Neill]

We talked about our first exposure. I'll just note this is my son's favorite book. He's read it multiple times and he's currently working on an honors project about how it intersects with the idea of the hero's journey, which is fun. All right, so what is it like to read this? I think maybe I'll pick up on something you just said. There are moments of Andy Weir books, and I think it's both a feature and a bug. If that can be the case where the science gets a little heady for most people. And I will include myself in most people. I think there are probably some people have more of a background in science that they will scale all the way up to the hardest core elements of the science here. And it usually lasts a paragraph at 2 at its longest. But also then you get things that you do understand. Right. So I think he's giving a range of technical difficulty. And it's kind of like if you're going to top out at like the Thursday New York Times crossword, there are still people who do the Friday and Saturday by themselves.

[Sponsor Announcer]

Right.

[Jeff O'Neill]

But they're gonna get a lot of that there. And it is okay and expected and you are not weird. And I don't think it really affects the reading experience to be like, you know what? I really don't understand that part about angling the astrophage panels away from the IR blasters because we're gonna set the atmosphere on fire or whatever.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

Just words, words.

[Jeff O'Neill]

Okay. Words, words, words. And I think that's one place where the movies as a storytelling, different storytelling problem make different trade offs that can be more or less satisfying depending on where you are on that scale.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

Yeah. And I think it's a great point about it. Just a paragraph or two for the really hard sci fi details. These are not like chapters about the whaling ships in Moby Dick. Like if your eyes do glaze over, it's not for long. And Weir is really good at coming back to a like layman's terms. One summary sentence or one sentence summary of like what he's trying to do there. It reads like sci fi. But there are also mystery elements which like kind of the best parts of mystery show up in this book where Grace is trying to piece together who he is and how he ended up there. We as the readers are trying to figure out what's gonna happen to him. What all of the components were on Earth going into making this decision to send him out there and. And how it's all gonna go down. And then what the mystery is changes at a couple of points. Like, oh, could he actually make it back to Earth? What's gonna happen? What happens to Rocky after they part ways? Lots of satisfying little threads that you can try to pick up and track down. Combined with what I always think of as like the Ferris Bueller record scratch moment of like you're probably wondering how

[Jeff O'Neill]

I ended up here and so am I. I'm here with two mummified corpses in the middle of interstellar space.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

It's just a really delightful vibe that we get to be along for the ride. Like this is just. It's so much fun. The ride of this book is so much fun. And Grace's voice with this particular blend of intelligence and humor and hum make him a really great hang. Like I don't know if I want to hang out with Ryland Grace on Earth, but I'm really happy hanging out with him in space. And yeah, that's really true solving of it is a fun time.

[Jeff O'Neill]

The figuring it out and I have this down here is like the. This is in the pro curiosity. We can do things and then they do them right. Like there's a couple of times where. And this happens in the Martian too where Grace or Watney just sort of want to give up. Sidebar. They should probably be Xanax in this capsule. That's something I thought about. There should be, you know. Yeah.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

For like you figured out you're the lone survivor. Take the edge.

[Jeff O'Neill]

Can we just give me a little pharmacological assist here? And it is an amnesia book. I think this is the most forgivable amnesia deployment I can imagine because again I keep not wanting to spoil it because I know the movie is coming out but. But one of the surprises and it doesn't come really late and I think it's the. The biggest character surprise is Ryland Grace has said he does not want to do this. He does not want to go.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

This is in the trailers for the movie.

[Jeff O'Neill]

I don't think I've seen the most recent one yet.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

We're not spoiling anything with that. I think it's interesting that you name checked Dan Brown earlier because one of the things that recommends the Dan Brown books is you get to feel smart when you're reading them. Like, you get to feel smart learning about art history and obscure things and then putting the pieces together. And I think Weir gives us that as well.

[Jeff O'Neill]

Definitely at the same time, but here. So this amnesia thing. But it's. It's a. It's a pretty interesting deployment of a different character. This is why Ames is so interested in the hero's journey element. Is that part of the hero's journey is this call to adventure? Right? Like, you know, someone knocks on the door and you open or close, whatever. Like, he is forced into this. And that's pretty unusual. Like, our great stern Dutch doctors, like you are just, just. And there's a bunch of details we don't need to get into here that makes it the case where he really should go. Like, the John Stuart Mill utilitarian imperative is like, you've got to do this. But he just doesn't want to. He's scared. And understandably so. And then. So she gives him this kind of medication which, as he wakes up from this coma, will induce amnesia for long enough for him not to basically nope out. Like, he'll sort of start working the problem, which has sort of a circular ouroboros to like, did the amnesia. I'd be so curious to hear Andy Weir talk about how he put that peptide chain together of like, the amnesia is caused by this thing. But the amnesia then gives you this wonderful. I'm assuming the first 20 minutes of the movie will be him figuring stuff out just, like, who he is, what's going on, tubes coming out of his butt and, like, how to get the food out. And having this sort of talking to the computer, that's not really being helpful. I really hope they don't change the. He refused because then there's another turn at the end where then he volunteers to give himself up secondarily for Rocky and his planet. That, you know, it just adds to it that he has changed. Right? He's changed from the kind of person that will not sacrifice himself for a whole civilization to one he will. Even if it's not.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

I mean, this is like dork boy wish fulfillment at its very best. Like, it turns out that being nerdy is an asset. And Grace gets to discover that he's not actually a coward, which, like, there's this wonderful moment when he's resisting going. And Strat is like, you're a coward. Like, it's a really brutal one paragraph.

[Jeff O'Neill]

I like you, but I don't respect you.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

Right. Yeah, you're a coward. You're afraid of everything. You dropped out of grad school after people didn't. Or you, you stopped being a biologist after a couple people didn't like a paper you wrote.

[Jeff O'Neill]

Yeah.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

And so like you've squandered your talent to go be a teacher when you could have been doing these other things and like just man up and go basically. And he's like, oh my God, I never. He's having this realization in space about, like, I never understood myself to be a coward before. And then the whole present day moment in space is his journey, his opportunity to counter that, to become something different, to become a hero, to become a brave person. And like, who is not attracted to the idea of getting to discover that about themselves. Like, plus you just get to do MacGyver in space. It's process and like the story, all the process in the story. And how Grace and Rocky communicate, how they teach each other their languages, how they share knowledge and how they work things out is so intensely satisfying. And Grace gets to do that on that like very basic level of the problem solving, but also be addressing like higher order concerns and self actualization.

[Jeff O'Neill]

I do want to highlight too, as people enjoy the movie and enjoy the book and those moments that are so thrilling, as you say, and so satisfying and so sort of a relief when they make a breakthrough or something isn't the end of the world, or they have a brainstorm form of an idea that gets him to the next piece of the puzzle is please do notice the creativity Weir has to deploy to put his characters in those situations.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

Yes.

[Jeff O'Neill]

That are both tense and interesting and explicable and that further the plot. I think that's underrated. And you know, this is one thing where some of the great writers of plot and popular fiction don't get the credit that maybe they should for the things that don't feel super writerly or super art art. But I'm sure he went through a bunch of different ways of putting this together. The astrophage and the Venus and then the going to the other. Like all of these things that seem kind of almost inevitable over the course of the book are not inevitable by the instruments of Imagination. And that delight and surprise and satisfaction that comes out of problem A is actually not problem, it's problem, it's the end. Problem B is the answer to problem C. Actually, if you put it like, there's sort of a Rubik's Cube level of connectivity here that is. So you turn the pages so fast, you're likely to miss it. So that might be one recommendation I have is, like, when you have one of the moments of, like, oh, that was so cool, maybe just stop and think about, wait, how did that thing get put together? Because one thing we like to do here is, like, that's part of being a different kind of a reader is stopping to look and stopping to smell the roses, or as Rocky would do, echolocate the roses in that moment and notice how they're put together. So that's one thing I wanted to

[Rebecca Schinsky]

highlight here too, I think, to notice just all the levels that Weir is working on. Like, one of my notes is about alien jazz hands, which Grace notices that Rocky will mirror his posture and his gestures. And Rocky's got five arms, so he's always got, like, extra hands he can wave around. And when he gets excited, he does what Grace talks about as being alien jazz hands. And I find it just so charming. It's like the most charming. Alien jazz hands is the most charming thing I've ever read. But then you back out. Like, he's giving us these charming interactions between creatures from two different species. He has already helped them figure out how to communicate with each other. All the science is super technical, yet a layperson reader can understand most of what's happening. The stakes feel high. You always know where you are. Like, there are 25 different balls in the air. And executing, like, executing any three of the things Andy dewir does is hard in a book. And he pulls off, like, 25 of them.

[Jeff O'Neill]

Yeah, it's a plot version of orbital mechanics. Like, all these things spinning around get exponentially more complicated as you go. That's a really good point there. All right, time for some stray thoughts. Rebecca, why don't you lead us off?

[Rebecca Schinsky]

Okay. Dr. Ryland Grace is a Colleen Hoover ass character name.

[Jeff O'Neill]

Definitely could lease this out to be the dark, stormy hero of a romantasy. Ryland.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

What are we doing?

[Jeff O'Neill]

Is that a real name? Have you ever heard the name Ryland before?

[Rebecca Schinsky]

Yes, but it's like a millennial. Like a bunch of millennials names like Braden, things like Ryland. Yeah, like, I. I don't know that someone who's the age this character is in 2021. Like, how realistic it is. But whatever.

[Jeff O'Neill]

I don't know. Whatever. Especially since this person is supposed to be in their 40s. Right. Like, yeah, who's being named Ryland in 1983?

[Rebecca Schinsky]

Exactly. Yeah. Like, we don't have a lot of peers named Ryland.

[Jeff O'Neill]

We don't. They're all Jennifers and Jeffs, right?

[Rebecca Schinsky]

Yeah.

[Jeff O'Neill]

And they're all extinct.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

A little bit about how you can sort of gloss over some of the science. But years ago, you told me about Lauren Graham from the Gilmore Girls. She wrote a memoir and she talked about filming a medical show. And before they had learned all the medical jargon in their dialogue, they would just say, medical, medical, medical in it. And, like, I kind of just wanted a technical. Technical for this. Or like a science science. I gave myself permission to do that when it was like, okay, this is more detailed than I care about, and I trust that Andy Weir is going to fill me in on it later. But, like, technical, technical.

[Jeff O'Neill]

I had this thought, I always think when he was publishing the Sound and the Fury, William Faulkner wanted each of the chapters to be the font to be a different color so people would know which point of view they're in.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

And oh, my God, that would have been so helpful for them.

[Jeff O'Neill]

It's so cool, right? But the technology or the publisher, I don't remember the details of why it didn't come to pass, but I often think about different colored fonts as having. You could do different things with that if you wanted to. And people do do different fonts or italics, I guess, is the famous one one. I would like the difficulty of the technical descriptions to be color coded. So, like, you know how in skiing there's like green, blue and black?

[Rebecca Schinsky]

Yes. Yeah.

[Jeff O'Neill]

Right. Could I. Highlights. Like, if I'm lost and I'm realizing I'm reading a black, double black diamond, like, okay, I feel better about myself, but if it's a green and I'm lost, like, maybe I should spend a little bit more time. What's going on here? That was a stray thought I had as well.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

You made reference to what's two plus two? That's the first line of the book. He's waking up and the robot is trying to figure out how cogent he is. But a character being asked, what's two plus two? Is hilarious coming off of having read 1984 a couple weeks ago.

[Jeff O'Neill]

Right.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

And you brought up Robert Langdon already, of course, the Dan Brown character. But there's a field of study mentioned in the book called Speculative Extraterrestrial Biology. And that is some Robert Langdon shit if I have ever heard of it.

[Jeff O'Neill]

Yeah, for sure. Let's see, what do I have here? The science thriller, the mystery and the heist novel. Novel all fall generally under the figuring out novel. I'm proposing a new genre and I would like more of these. I just would. I would read this in any kind. Spy novels are this. Spy novels are essentially a heist novel. I want people figuring stuff out. I want more of these. I want people working together figure out interesting stuff. I find this as fun. This is my entertaining escapist. I want to have a great time reading and have dopamine. There's other things I want for my reading, but this is one of them. And when I'm looking for this, I want people to figure stuff out in interesting environments.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

Yeah, I totally agree. I like this as a new sub genre for us.

[Jeff O'Neill]

The panspermia theory. This is the theory of like all life has come from, you know, somewhere else. Like in seated different planets. We need a different name for this, Rebecca. For reasons that I think are self explanatory. So there you go. That's one of my strange.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

Not great. That's not great. I like your note here that you just don't like general relativity.

[Jeff O'Neill]

I don't like General Relative. I don't like it. I don't like this idea. Neither does Rocky. That's one of the funnier moments where the radians have not discovered general relativity because I guess they didn't have an Einstein. And you can. For reasons that. It gets explained quite beautifully actually. It feels like a very Carl Sagan sort of moment where. Or maybe Douglas Adams moment where the. They. They can't see. Right. And so they have no reason really to be interested in space travel because they don't see stars and stuff. And so they haven't done a lot of astrology. And basically the re. They're trying to save their plans the first time they're doing a bunch of this stuff which creates some interesting narrative tension and humor. But then he has to explain to them. And Rocky's like, I don't like that. I don't believe that. You and me both. You and me both. Brother slash five armed sister. I don't know what's going on here, but I've never liked it. It's the time dilation general and the moxie hall problem. Those. Those can all go jump into the sun. I wouldn't mind if they got sucked up into this. The sun. I don't like any of that.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

I've Just never liked time dilation. What Commentary.

[Jeff O'Neill]

Hate it. Drive me crazy. I remember reading A Brief History of Time by Stephen Hawking and reading about. I was like, can I not. Can. Can I just check other. I don't like it at all.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

I do have one stray thought that I thought about multiple times. So they've got this group mini ships that they call the Beatles because they look like the bug beetle that Grace is supposed to be able to load up with data and send back to Earth because he's not gonna make it back.

[Jeff O'Neill]

Yeah.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

And the Beatles in the book are named after the Beatles of the band John, Paul, George and Ringo. Jeff o'. Neill. What famous quartet would you name.

[Jeff O'Neill]

Boy, that's. Because that's like. That's where my brain just goes for famous quartets. Are there, like, would you do. I mean, for science, could you do like Curie, Asimov, Einstein?

[Rebecca Schinsky]

Okay.

[Jeff O'Neill]

You know, something like that. You could do some scientists, you know,

[Rebecca Schinsky]

maybe I was leaning like the Golden Girls or the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles.

[Jeff O'Neill]

Oh, I like that. Well, then you get the science as well, because then they're also Renaissance artists, which is nice.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

I landed on Frodo, Sam, Mary and Pippin, the hobbits going on a long journey.

[Jeff O'Neill]

I like that. Exactly.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

Or the Sex and the City characters. But I think I would land on the Hobbits.

[Jeff O'Neill]

That's pretty good, Rebecca. That's a good find. Um, let's see. We should figure out elective comas. That sounds nice. Is one of my straight thoughts. So one of the things that's, I think, invented science. I didn't go look this up. Is this idea of there. You can put people into medically induced comas, like in uttermost extremity, but you really don't want to do it because the side effects are generally worse than whatever you're trying to do. In this book, Weir has invented the idea of a company that's tried this, but it turns out that most people have very bad reactions to it. Only one in 7,000 people can sustain it. That is part of the narrative armature that gets Ryland Grace into space, that he has this genetic mutation or whatever it might be. But their idea was to use it for, you know, very extent, you know, very painful recoveries from, like. Yeah, like, it kind of is severance. You know, I get very. When I get the stomach flu, it's very bad for 48 hours. If I could do an elective coma for 48 hours, a trans oceanic flight, you know.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

Yeah. How short can these be?

[Jeff O'Neill]

You know, I Think there was a

[Rebecca Schinsky]

good idea where Grace mentions in the book that like he has no idea what's happening back on Earth. And I, I didn't have the thought about the elective comas but I was like, man, 13 being 13 light years away from the news cycle would be terrific.

[Jeff O'Neill]

You know, elective comas, Xanax and not knowing the news. I think we're set up here maybe arid sounds great to spend some time there. I know why we can't get one of these books every other year, but Lord, I wish we did.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

Yeah, so much fun. If we could get like Dan Brown and Andy Weir. I have to think about a couple other authors. I don't want a schedule.

[Jeff O'Neill]

Oh, I see what you're saying. Can you, can you give us an Olympic style winter, summer kind of a situation?

[Rebecca Schinsky]

Yeah, if we could get them some of our other like super fun reads, get them on a regular rotation. I would love that. Let's do notable cool quotes.

[Jeff O'Neill]

Notable quotes. I did not do a lot of highlighting here, Rebecca, but there's some fun. There's some fun to be had.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

Mostly fun stuff. Dr. Strat at one point says I have all of the authority and just that's the dream. Like just to get to be a bossy lady in a situation where they're like this bossiness is exactly what is called for. And every government on earth has imbued you with all the power. Like just my wish fulfillment in Project Hail Marian in the movie is going to come straight through here to me.

[Sponsor Announcer]

Mueller.

[Jeff O'Neill]

Like just, you know, there's a similar sort of mob boss figure in three body problem because they are encountering.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

Oh yeah.

[Jeff O'Neill]

Not exactly the same. But there is a. There's a reason for the world to get together to figure a big problem out. And they do come up with someone in a similar capability. They go through a different process. Actually don't know what process Dr. Strat came to be. But you know what the We've got a single problem here and we need to decider can work. I just started to watch the Sopranos for the first time and that's very important. Much in the early episodes of like you really need someone just to be in charge here. And that works until it doesn't. Because then Dr. Strat at one point also says, I'm sure after all this is over, I will be in jail even if it goes well because of, you know, post hoc persecutions of things you said I could do. But after the fact it's easy to

[Rebecca Schinsky]

say maybe I'll leave the Authority.

[Jeff O'Neill]

Just really the authority.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

There's a moment when Ryland Grace first, like, turns off the centrifuge stuff that gives him gravity in the ship, and he feels like he's falling and he's adjusting to zero G, and so he's just. Just, I'm not falling. I scream, I'm not falling. This is just space. Everything is fine.

[Jeff O'Neill]

I would also like to add this to things I don't like that zero G is every. You're just falling all the time. As someone that struggles with motion sickness, this sounds like a torture.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

You're not going into.

[Jeff O'Neill]

I need an elective coma at all in space. Like, it's all elective coma in space. But, yeah, that's a funny moment.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

That, like, I'm not falling moment is just also such a good example of what weird does. Like, this is what a person would do. You're by yourself.

[Jeff O'Neill]

All sorts of Xanax would help with, by the way.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

And you're like, everything's fine, Everything's fine. I'm not falling. Everything's fine. This is just space. And, like, related to that. There's also a moment where he's, like, trying to go out to catch this first thing that Rocky has launched towards his ship, that he doesn't know what it's going to be. Will it be a message? How are they going to communicate? But he's getting distracted by something else, and he just says, I don't have time for this. I have an alien thingy to catch. And that Weir will go from such highly technical language to I have an alien thingy to catch is such a good demonstration of his ability to reach audiences wherever they are, in their comfort with the science language or not.

[Jeff O'Neill]

I also think his sort of slangy, you know, glibness. Both Watney and Rylan Grace, are they different characters? Who's to say at this point? But they share this ability to, like, be serious, but also not. They also joke. And I think it's a survival survivability mechanism. I think that's how it's presented here. It's like, if I take everything so seriously all the time, my head's gonna spin off my body. Even in space. Space. So making a joke, making light of something, using a little bit of slang, that's prevent. Presented in sort of the very first journal entry for Mark Watney. And it comes very early for Rylan Grace here was like, he finds some humor in his sort of objectively hellscape situation that he wakes up, it's a nightmare. It's a Nightmare. But there's a little bit of, like. There's a little bit of funny here, and I can make fun of myself, and that's okay. Let's see. I'll do a couple. Couple good. Oh, this is Rocky. So they're kind of getting testy with each other. And at one point, Ryland Grace is like. Just so you know, we have these things on Earth that are called spiders, and everybody hates them. They're scared of them. And you look exactly like that. And Riley's like, good, proud. I am scary space monster. You are leaky space blob. They're just sort of busting each other's spaceballs at the same time, which I really enjoyed.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

Yeah. There's a point where Grace has, like, been up for two days and is not functioning super well. Yeah. A lot about sleep mechanics. And Rocky looks at him and goes, grumpy, angry, stupid. How long since last sleep?

[Sponsor Announcer]

Question.

[Jeff O'Neill]

As. As a. As a walking cans counselor, you very probably tuned into rocking, making sure that Rylan Grace had been eating and sleeping.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

Oh, yeah.

[Jeff O'Neill]

Because otherwise you gotta hydrate. Yeah.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

If you get lost in space with me, I'm 100% gonna be like, do you need a banana? Have you had a glass of water?

[Jeff O'Neill]

Speaking of things I didn't like, and neither did Grace, I didn't particularly care for the red means eating process. I thought that was pretty gross, and I don't know why it was. I think Weir is just showing, like, there are other ways that life and, like, blowing your mind up. But I was like, I don't like that particular one. We basically put a ham sandwich or something up there, and it's pretty traumatic. And it stays up there. And then you open yourself back up and, like, blur it out. And then you put something. It was gross. I didn't like that. We don't see that in the movie.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

Yeah. And Rocky, like, doesn't want to be observed while he's eating because he knows

[Jeff O'Neill]

they realize it's shameful. Yeah, I guess.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

Yeah. But that sort of connects to one of the things that I marked, where Grace is explaining that he and Rocky have an unspoken agreement that cultural things just have to be accepted. It ends in E minor. Disputes, dispute. So, like, Rocky wants someone to observe him while he sleeps. And it's just part of Eridian culture that gets explained later on. But Grace just has to go with it. Or Grace needs to go do something. Or maybe when things don't make sense to the other person. But it's not about making sense. It's about this is just the way we do things on Earth. He's like, it's a cultural thing. And they just have to roll along and support each other in it. And I thought, like, have we tried that? Could we just try that on Earth?

[Jeff O'Neill]

It's a cultural thing.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

Yeah, yeah, it's a cultural thing. Roll with it. Like, don't just be cool, man. And they pull that off really nicely.

[Jeff O'Neill]

I think it's in some version of what it means to be America. That's what we're supposed to do. That's not super in current right now, but I would be. I would be happy going into elective coma until that comes back into fashion. I think there are some. There are some sort of meta science fiction ideas that would inform like a more of a Philip K. Dick sort of situation. One of them is intelligence evolves to give us an advantage over the other animals on our planet. But evolution is literally lazy. Once a problem is solved, this trait stops evolving. And then. I don't know if this is in the same conversation, but it's similar. We're as smart as evolution made us. We're the minimum intelligence needed to ensure we can dominate our planet. I just thought those were cool, you know, ideas to think about. What else do you have on quotes, Rebecca?

[Rebecca Schinsky]

Let's see. Validation for corporate life. When they're back on Earth and they're figuring out all of this stuff, everyone is wanting to work independently and trying to avoid meetings, but of course, they end up in big meetings and that's the only way to do it. And Grace just says, sometimes this stuff we all hate ends up being the only way to do things. And I thought, yep, yep, that's right. Sometimes you just have to have a meeting.

[Jeff O'Neill]

I think one thing that both the Martian, I think Artemis has this too. And then Project Hill Mary is a very easy part for a lead actor actress to see themselves playing like you can see, like this is would be fun thing to do. I think the first line that struck me with this is Gosling. Whatever Ryan they first gave this to. Maybe it was Gosling, maybe it was Reynolds. So this is when Grace is waking up from the elective coma and he's sort of trying to figure out what's going on. Jason Bourne style is like, all right, time to get to know my fellow patients. I don't know who I am or why I'm here, but at least I'm not alone. And they're dead. Yeah. And you can just see that being something really fun for someone to imagine playing the Shock, awe and reactive defensive humor at the same time. So that's another one I thought was a good one.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

I thought for a second about Artemis because you teased that at the beginning.

[Jeff O'Neill]

I keep doing it. I might as well do it now. So people might think, is Artemis a read alike? Because we have a read alike section. There's not a whole lot of read alikes for something like this. I enjoyed it. It's not as good for either of these things. And I think he just has a harder time managing. It's on a moon base and it's a heist. So like there's a bunch of people and you're in civilization and there's like a crew and there are combinations and it just doesn't really hold up. Right. Like some of the science, like how I'm gonna get outside the moon base to get this thing and how everything works. There's some family stuff that goes on. I. The character dynamics just weren't. They didn't hold the water that you wanted it to. I don't think it's impossible. Do sometimes you write a book that doesn't work all. You know, most writers have this experience. But I think if you like Project Hail Mary and you like the Martian, I don't think you're gonna hate it. But you might expect a sort of different vibe from it. Even though it's science based, it's in space. She's trying to do something a little bit different, which is good. You're going to need to do that because these two together are fairly similar high concept things. He does add wrinkles. Actually more than wrinkles. They're fully folding space time. But I don't know. There's another fold of space time to do in this particular sort of one person floating around in a tube trying to do something.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

Yeah.

[Jeff O'Neill]

So that was it. That was it. Okay. Is this for you, Rebecca? How would you know if this is for you?

[Rebecca Schinsky]

If you like a good time? I mean, this is, as we said earlier, a Swiss army recommendation. Just about any reader can enjoy it. If you're on the fence, try it. Like listen to the first 20 minutes of the audiobook. Give yourself some space. Well, maybe the first hour or two of the audiobook. But this is a great, great, really fun book. Very widely beloved as evidenced by that 4.5 stars on Goodreads. That's kind of unheard of. Like a. A good rating is 3.75. So 4.5 is very high. Yeah. This is in my. Like, you probably. You should just try this. It's a good.

[Jeff O'Neill]

It's gonna sweep you away in the first 50 pages. Even on the reread. I remember you said this. You started rereading it before I did. Like, oh God. The hundred first pages just go by like wildfire.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

Yeah. It's just. I don't think I've recommended it to anyone who didn't enjoy it. Like, from my dad to nerdy friends to people who don't read very much. But they wanted a good time, and this is a really good time.

[Jeff O'Neill]

Yeah. Let's see. If not. You hate fun. Okay, that's. That's funny. I guess if you're really afraid of the technical stuff. Boy, I. I can't. I can't overemphasize. I don't feel like how you're just not going to notice. You're going to notice that. Like, boy, I didn't catch that. But then you're going to be moved on to the next.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

It doesn't matter.

[Jeff O'Neill]

It's kind of hard to get hung up on. But that's my particular reading experience.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

And like, if the Bechdel test is a make or break for you, this book is not going to pass it. There are female characters, but they don't get a ton. I think the female characters will get more screen time on the movie than they get in the book. But this really is a guy in space with an alien that he talks to about and as if it's a dude as well.

[Jeff O'Neill]

He uses a he pronoun. Just probably for normal bias reasons. Like, that's the first thing that came to mind. Yeah. Sandra Houler is going to make a meal out of Dr. Strat that I. I really look forward to. I'm sorry, Sandra. What'd I say?

[Rebecca Schinsky]

You said Sandra Houler. I think I said her to Mueller earlier, but that's wrong.

[Jeff O'Neill]

Okay. Okay. Yeah, I don't. I don't think any German leaders are going to be taking on that particular part. Be. That'd be an interesting choice for her career. Let's see. Immortal questions Art asked. What is the good life? What do I owe my neighbor? How do I know what I know? Is this all there is? How to deal with a certain leave, Death. What else might there be? What to deal with? Good and evil, free will or not. I was worried this weren't going to happen, but actually there's a lot here for us. Yeah.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

Yeah. I think the biggest one is what do I owe my neighbor? Like, since Grace has to answer that question for himself on Earth before he decides to go into space. But it also comes up later in the book of should he try to go back to Earth? Should he try to save Rocky after something happens to Rocky's ship? Um, are you gonna sacrifice yourself? What are the ethics? What are the expectations? That that's really big connected to. What is the good life like connected to? How do I know what I know? Like science is all about how do I know what I know is what I know? Right. Because what if Rocky knows something else? And how do we, how do we rationalize and not quite justify. But like how do you square the things you believe to be true with someone from a different culture, evidence that their way of thinking about it is also true. And he's also reckoning with the certainty of his own death at several points it's not so much about that.

[Jeff O'Neill]

But yeah, yeah, what else there might there be? I mean Andy Weir does a lot to imagine another sentient life form that's so different from anything we may understand as life and imbue that species with a historic, with morality to a world view and a sensibility that's a way of imagining that something that doesn't exist that actually expands our understanding of what could exist. Like this is sort of the, this is the boundary pushing thing that art and imagination and science can all do differently and sometimes in tandem. And Weir is using all the tools at his disposal to like broaden our mind about what might be out there, what might be possible and that what it means about how we, we live our own lives and understand ourselves.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

I think that's one of the things that really makes the book special is that the aliens are not either just like totally wide eyed and naive and dumb or all knowing and evil, the

[Jeff O'Neill]

master species that's going to wipe us out with their magic space race.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

But Rocky and Grace are pretty much on par with each other. They just have different strengths and that makes it work as well. And the buddy dynamic works through that.

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[Rebecca Schinsky]

I wanted to give something to the fans that they didn't expect. The only thing left is to close

[LifeLock Advertiser]

the book the end of an era. And don't miss Taylor Swift. The Eras Tour, the final show featuring for the first time the tortured poets department. Streaming December 12th only on Disney. If you're interested in what's happening in the world of technology, you will love our roundtable news show this week in Tech. Hi, this is Leo Laporte. Every Sunday I bring the best tech Journalists together to talk about the week's tech news. This week, the showdown between Anthropic and the Department of Defense, Apple's big week ahead, Samsung's new phone and a whole lot more. Join me this week and every week for TWiT. You'll find it at our website, TWiT TV or wherever you get your podcasts.

[Jeff O'Neill]

This one is not about our. So there we go.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

Easy one, easy one.

[Jeff O'Neill]

Could you get the most of the gist from watching the signal adaptation you have? Lord, I hope so. I guess if we reverse engineers from the Martian, you. You can. From the Martian, you really can.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

Yeah, yeah. I think it's going to be a great time.

[Jeff O'Neill]

I really have a high expectations for this. If we were to do another adaptation that's a movie, musical TV series, or, or Muppets, what would you do?

[Rebecca Schinsky]

Muppets. Like, let's do it. I mean, but you just. You could get the Muppets like all in the science meetings back on Earth figuring stuff out. Like, I have Gonzo as Ryland Grace, Ms. Piggy as Dr. Strat.

[Jeff O'Neill]

That is a stroke of genius. Miss Piggy Astrat is extremely funny.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

She's bossy. It's great.

[Jeff O'Neill]

Is she ever. Yeah.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

Animal could be that astronaut from the original crew who's just having a boink fest with his other crewmate and they're talking about it. Like great moments of humor in that as well. Grace first meets these people and one of the astronauts is like, well, this other astronaut and I have blocked out time at 2:30 this afternoon to engage in sexual congress. Like that would be. It's so funny if you get Muppets. Like, I'm here for that.

[Jeff O'Neill]

Beaker. Yeah. What if that was Beaker giving that line? That'd be pretty funny. Or Scooter. Beaker doesn't talk. I'm now confusing Herta Mueller as Gonzo as Ryland Grace is what we're doing right now. I actually think this would make a really good TV series. Series.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

I think so too.

[Jeff O'Neill]

The chapters would line up quite nicely. A movie will be wonderful. Seeing at the big screen is probably what I would choose. But I think there's a version of this that maybe is like five episodes. I'm into this. I'm into the. The limited series for something like this. But I will be very much interested in seeing on a big screen and being done in two hours and 17 minutes. Or it's also.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

Yeah, the early reviews are very. Go see it in imax. Like see it on the biggest possible screen. And I Think.

[Jeff O'Neill]

Yeah, there's a 70 millimeter at the Hollywood Theater. I'm gonna get to over here. Miscel Trivia, adaptations, rumors, misattributed quotes and more. Rebecca, this is our junk drawer for other interesting stuff we found but didn't know where to go.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

Yeah. The most popular quote from the book on Goodreads is Grace describing something that he's done to telling Rocky about something that he's done. And he says, I penetrated the outer cell membrane with a nano syringe. And Rocky says, you poked it with a stick? No, I said, well, yes, but it was a scientific poke with a very scientific stick. And like, that gives you another sense of their interaction and the level of humor and levity. This they're not taking it too seriously, which I think is really the trick of the book. That, of course, this is like as serious as a situation can get. The fate of humanity hangs in the balance. But you can still tell a joke about poking things with a stick and it being science.

[Jeff O'Neill]

I think that might actually be earlier in the book when they just discover astrophage, but this. The point still stands about the dynamic. Yeah. Anyway, let's see. I have. Andy Weir was so afraid of flying, he never visited the set of the Martian, which is mostly started Budapest. But he's had therapy and some work and now he can fly, and I guess he's been part of this. But someone who is afraid of flying, riding the Martian and Project Hill Marion, really, that's a really good trivia thing to take to your cocktail party. But that's why we're doing it here. What else you got?

[Rebecca Schinsky]

Ryan Gosling was cast in the adaptation of this before the book even came out. So, like, this has been a big.

[Jeff O'Neill]

They probably took it to all the dudes, right? They took it to Leo. They took it to. Or did they just maybe. Is Gosling. This is what I was gonna ask you. I forgot to put in this year. Is Gosling your number one draft pick for this?

[Rebecca Schinsky]

My personal number one draft pick for this is Donald Glover.

[Jeff O'Neill]

He was terrific in the Martian.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

Yeah, he does the science stuff and that. Like, highbrow, low brow, funny, serious, smart.

[Jeff O'Neill]

So.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

Well, he was great as one of the scientists in the Martian. I would have loved to see him in the main role here. He's not a big enough movie star to be the lead character in a film this big or. I can understand why a studio would have gone for the Ryan Gosling of it all. Like, because Matt Damon had already starred in one of these.

[Jeff O'Neill]

That was my straight Thought I didn't get to is like, I would kind of like to have seen a Mark Watney cameo when they're on ground still of like coming and saying, okay, it's not going to be as bad as you think. Here are some tips. In Texas, is this the same shared universe as the Martian? I don't think we get a definitive answer to that.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

You just have to be able to play smart, but also funny and also not taking yourself too seriously. And that's a pretty specific skill. Skill set. Glover would have been my number one draft.

[Jeff O'Neill]

I have another thought around that. We have this format called Adaptation Nation. We do for the BR pod from time to time. And one of the standing things. Are we sure Zendaya shouldn't be in this somehow? And I think the answer is absolutely. She could do that similar kind of a role.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

She could be Dr. Ryland Grace. 100%. Yeah, that would be great.

[Jeff O'Neill]

Ryland is good for many non gendered. Whatever you want to do.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

Other stray stuff. Andy Weir is super into mixology and he has.

[Jeff O'Neill]

That is not a surprise. That is not a surprise. He wears a page boy hat and writes about a little nitrogen a little too often not to. I would, I would like to enjoy a tiki tipple with Mr. Weir. That would be.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

Yeah, he's got a large collection of cocktail books. You are a tiki mixologist in your own right. Like you guys could have a good time. You got matching hats. You could go for it.

[Jeff O'Neill]

Yeah, he understands what happening. I'm just dumping stuff into stuff that's not really mixologist. I wouldn't think.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

All right.

[Jeff O'Neill]

Also, Andy Weir got fired from an early coding job for poor performance. So you just, you never know.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

Well, as we were talking about this on the 1984 episode that like nobody who knew George Orwell as a young person was like, that guy is going to write the most important book of the century.

[Jeff O'Neill]

Who does say that? Do the people that get most likely to succeed in their yearbook ever turn out fine or do they just like a very good, you know, get addicted to cocaine and burnout working at Maryland or something? I don't know.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

Don't peek in high school kids.

[Jeff O'Neill]

Hot tips, hot takes. Rebecca, you go first.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

All right. Reading this again, it feels to me like Weir got hip to how Hollywood works and really wrote to the goal of a four quadrant hit. I don't know if that's what he did, but I think it's believable. And like, I love this book. Do not get me wrong. I can't wait to see the movie. But Grace is a little earnest and awe shucks, it's a good option. The language is really cleaned up. Like, the first line of the Martian is, well, I'm fucked. And there's a whole lot of, like, gosh darn and G willikers kinds of language in Project Hail Mary. Instead, it's just less edgy than the Martian. And I cannot help but think that that was canny and intentional on his part.

[Jeff O'Neill]

Does. Does Ryland Grace ever swear?

[Rebecca Schinsky]

I think there's. There are like, a couple moments. Um, yeah, but it's not. I mean, he's not swearing nearly as much as a person would be swearing if you woke up alone in space and had to figure it all out.

[Jeff O'Neill]

I would invent new swears. I would ask for iridium swears to try to capture the. We need new language, Rebecca. That's one thing we're trying to do here.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

At one point, one of the. When he's still on Earth, one of the other scientists, like, teases him about his ASHOK sort of language and he's like, well, what do you want from me? I'm a middle school teacher. But, like, once you've been alone in space, it's like. And you're not catering to the audience of kids. Like, I just. I think that this is cleaned up so that you could give it to your teenage kid. You could give this to, like, your son when he was a younger reader without having the same concerns about the language that some parents might have had about the Martian. Like, there are young readers editions of these, but this just. I think Andy Weir just got a little too, for me, a little too smart about it. Like, I kept bumping it up almost.

[Jeff O'Neill]

The point doesn't seem believable. I hear what you're saying.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

Yeah, I just kept bumping it up.

[Jeff O'Neill]

I mean, I know middle school teachers that went off the clock. They would abash sailors. So I don't think that's.

[Sponsor Announcer]

Yeah.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

Like, are we really saying darn in this moment? I just didn't quite.

[Jeff O'Neill]

To yourself. Yeah.

[Sponsor Announcer]

I don't know.

[Jeff O'Neill]

I'm not sure. Maybe. I think Rocky has a chance to enter the alien cultural representation pantheon. Some combo of ET and Dr. Spock is what we're looking for here. That's what's going to happen.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

It could be.

[Jeff O'Neill]

What do you think? Are there going to be? So we. We made this mistake with the baby Yoda. Are there. Is there Rocky merch ready to rock and roll? Do we have Rocky, like, things ready for people to buy?

[Rebecca Schinsky]

I haven't looked at any of the project Hail Mary merch, but now I'm gonna.

[Jeff O'Neill]

I think they should take a look. What else do you have?

[Rebecca Schinsky]

Here's my big one. We're not negging men enough.

[Jeff O'Neill]

Terrific. Great. All right. Sounds fun.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

Does the full like you're a coward from in the Language of Little Women. She gives him the full. We've got to have it out, Joe. And it's really effective. It gets Grace on board. It gets his asses in space. Like that's the thing that needed to be said to him. And she says it like, we need to do this more. Just pony up.

[Jeff O'Neill]

I mean, not. Not to take that. Your take from you. But I think we should remember who was saying we've got to have it out, Joe. I think we just need more. We've got to have it out. X gender person. We're radical candor people.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

We are. We are. But I was.

[Jeff O'Neill]

And the fellows could probably take it more than others. Yes.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

We're not nagging men enough to get them to like just step up and do the thing.

[Jeff O'Neill]

Well, maybe that dovetails nicely into my hot take. Could we not just mind Soul Swap and do we earn Elon Musk? Just. They're interested in similar things. Yeah, I'd rather we are building that, you know. Anyway. Further readings, Rex. Read alikes and more. This is a very tough one. We talk about this all the time in the show. So that's why I want to do the Artemis thing. Because it's natural to wonder. I mean, the Martian, of course. I mean.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

Yes, go read the Martian.

[Jeff O'Neill]

The Andromeda Strain by Michael Crichton. That was one of his early. Maybe his first sort of. They called that techno thriller at the time, which just sounds scarier to me. And the Crichton stuff is scarier. I want to use a science filler for what Andy Weir is doing. There is a space bacteria that they get in Arizona. We're trying to keep it from taking over the Earth. So similar dynamics. There's going to be a lot about containment in both. In both. We want to keep them the same. I actually think for me, my closest read alike might be Contact by Carl Sagan, which There's a very good movie that stars Jody Foster.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

Foster.

[Jeff O'Neill]

The setup is that she is a space scientist who, not unlike Ryland. Grace is sort of. She's trundling down a path of less sexy, less.

[Sponsor Announcer]

I know.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

Don't.

[Jeff O'Neill]

I don't know. Reputable science. Search for extraterrestrial life. She's trying to get grants. So she can have giant arrays of space telescopes. Listen for ET Essentially. And then something happens. Picks up something one day and there's a lot of science in it. It's not quite as hard sci fi. My memory of the book is that it's a little harder sci fi than the movie, but it's there. But it's cool. Let's figure this out. What's going on. Jodie Foster's great good side characters. I really like the book and the movie. And I think if you like this, it's worth a rew or just checking it out.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

That reminds me of Arrival, the movie based on the Ted Chang short story the Stories of youf Life.

[Jeff O'Neill]

That's a good idea too.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

I think that's a good read for the. If you like the problem solving of like, how are we gonna communicate with each other? Because that's pretty much what Arrival is about. If you like the we're waking up and figuring it all out. Really, you just should go watch the Bourne Identity.

[Jeff O'Neill]

None of these are as fun as an Andy Weir book. That's the one thing. Arrival Contact is a little more fun. It doesn't take itself quite as serious. Obviously there's some silliness that goes on. Quite. But like the Autumn Dharma Strain isn't fun. Even Jurassic park, the book is not as fun as Jurassic park the movie. No, that's not what they're trying to do. There supposed to be Jurassic park here.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

Someday.

[Jeff O'Neill]

That's fine. Someday we'll do. All right. Cocktail party. Crib sheets. Three to five takeaways.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

All right. It's not about the glory of saving humanity, Jeff. It's the friends you make along the way.

[Jeff O'Neill]

It is no matter how they eat and defecate out of this same hole. You know, you let your friends. You know, you. You. You forgive them their.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

It's a cultural thing.

[Jeff O'Neill]

Mono hole things. That's not even a cultural thing. That's just gross.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

If you forgive them, their mono hole things is definitely going in.

[Jeff O'Neill]

Yeah.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

The clipped quotes from this.

[Jeff O'Neill]

You just do. I have. Science says the only truly universal language. And shared language means shared possibility.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

Yeah, that's it.

[Jeff O'Neill]

That was nice. What do you think about that? Not a bad job. Me only had to take multiple years of having read this book to come up with and then take hard sci fi as an idea. Not a lot of people think of this as a. I don't know if it's a sub genre, but it's like a.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

It's a flavor.

[Jeff O'Neill]

Flavor. Yeah. A flavor of sci fi. And like how difficult. How Exacting. Is the book trying to be about the actuality of the science. And some people like it and some people don't. I like it in moderation. I don't think I want to do this all the time. The final beat is our zero to well read score. Each one of our categories gets a score from 1 to 10, with 10 being. Being the highest. Our five categories are historical importance, readability, current relevance of central questions, book nerd read credit, and O damn factor. Popular hits. We grade on a curve a little bit or, you know, some of these. You're not going to be able to score as high, but that's okay. We want to mix.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

Yeah, I mean, historical importance. This is an interesting moment to try to answer this question about this book, because there's a version of this that's like a two or a three, but there's a version where the movie becomes such a hit that the book, like, gets another pop and stays.

[Jeff O'Neill]

So what's the high side? So what's like our historical antecedent for like, what the highest version of this would be? Yeah, I mean, like the Matrix.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

Yeah. If the Matrix had been based on a. On a book, I guess, because the book did go back onto bestseller lists after the trailer came out, and that's not common. Yeah, it got enough attention and it's had enough buzz for a while. I think that the high side, Star

[Jeff O'Neill]

Wars, Star Trek, like, it's hard to imagine it reaching those heights, but those are the pinnacles of what something like this could be.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

I really imagine the book ending up in historical importance as like a six or a seven.

[Jeff O'Neill]

Yeah, that's even.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

Because there's not art stuff happening here. You need art stuff to get to a nine or a ten. Right now I'm gonna give it like a three.

[Jeff O'Neill]

Yeah. Sci fi's been long enough around long. It can't do like a Jules Verne kind of thing. Or, you know, it doesn't have like. I mean, maybe if this turns out to be the high point of Weir's career And there's like five or six more, but books, maybe it could be a six or seven, but I think a three is probably readability. This is a 10. I mean, what's more readable than this?

[Rebecca Schinsky]

So readable and fun.

[Jeff O'Neill]

Current relevance of central questions is interesting. Rebecca, how do you wrestle with this one?

[Rebecca Schinsky]

Well, I mean, there's not space algae on the sun, but that we know

[Jeff O'Neill]

of, that they'll tell us about.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

But we are wrestling with climate change, with what kind of sacrifices individual individuals can or should make for the greater good.

[Jeff O'Neill]

The utility funding and furtherance of science as a human endeavor seems relevant.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

Yes, let's. I'm gonna go with like six.

[Jeff O'Neill]

Yeah. I think that's fair. I think that's fair. Book Nerd Read credit is probably low because so many people read it and it's like, so easy. Again, this one's tricky. Things that are new and popular. At some point, maybe if the book is huge, that you went back and read the book, maybe you'll be like, I don't know, two or three lowest you can get. We've never really talked about what a one looks like that you read. What's the lowest read cred. But I really don't want to slight anybody, but geez, I don't really know.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

No, because, I mean, even when we talked about, like, Great Gatsby and some of the titles that you have that almost everybody has to read in school, we're giving the read cred points for, like, you went and read it on your own.

[Jeff O'Neill]

What about AI generated fanfic? That's a one.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

To me, that's a negative 12. You get no points for reading AI generated fan.

[Jeff O'Neill]

We're going to have Dr. Strat come to talk to you.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

Yeah. And that won't be negging. It'll just be true. Book Nerd read cred. Let's just give it a 2.

[Jeff O'Neill]

Let's go 3.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

3.

[Jeff O'Neill]

Let's go 3. I don't know why, but 2 doesn't feel. That feels disrespectful. Okay.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

And the oh, damn factor. There's a version where this is really high because what Weir is doing really hard and a book this fun is unusual.

[Jeff O'Neill]

Look, no one else does what he does.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

Yeah.

[Jeff O'Neill]

Or at least not that I know of. And I'd assume if it was really performed well, it would burble up. Maybe I'm wrong about that. Choose emails zero to. Well, write a podcast dot com. Like, you know what? There's less or no Andy Weirs that are just as good. This happens. This happens. Where one person.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

We would love to.

[Jeff O'Neill]

Yeah, would love to. That'd be a thrilling email to get. But I think from that point of view, like, i8 or 9 is possible. Like, there's some moments. That's amazing. Look at this. Yeah.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

Five.

[Jeff O'Neill]

Cool. I like this. I feel good about this.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

Okay.

[Jeff O'Neill]

I feel good about this book, Rebecca. I think our expectations here. We used to do this format called Confidence Index about adaptations in which you look at the director, the actor, the source material. Like, I don't know that I could have a higher confidence index in this particular prediction.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

I'm going to be buying IMAX tickets for release weekend. This is a big group experience. We're all going to go have a great day time. It's going to be fun. I'm so glad that we had an excuse to do this book.

[Jeff O'Neill]

I know. I'm too. Can I give a hot tip for those people seeing this on a large format screen that maybe get a little queasy. Half Dramamine and a Diet Coke, an upper and a downer. They'll take the edge right off.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

It's not an induced coma, but it'll get you through.

[Jeff O'Neill]

If you could have one thing put on your 13 light year space mission that is not. Not wouldn't necessarily be sanctioned. Oh, what do you. What do you. Is it goldfish crackers? Is it bourbon? Like what do you. What do you need to have in the special shinsky locker that's just for you and you alone?

[Rebecca Schinsky]

And I only one thing mine would

[Jeff O'Neill]

be industrial grade Dramamine. I mean that's what brought this up. That'd be the only acceptable thing.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

What I want is like a good strong pot gummy and then a box of Cheez Its. But like that's the combo.

[Jeff O'Neill]

That would be bad. You have a gummy and you have the munchies in space and nowhere to go. Just that slurry food. That's a real bummer.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

No, if you have space munchies, you gotta have some Cheez Its.

[Jeff O'Neill]

Have I told you before that sometimes Michelle will say I wish I could just eat the Matrix gruel and not to decide what I'd like to eat. Just like she just wants to. Like I just.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

I'm not on board with that plan.

[Jeff O'Neill]

I know, I know, I know. That would horrify you. But every now she's like, God, we have to figure out what to eat. Can I just eat that goo space food. Some kind of weird space food. Yeah.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

All right.

[Jeff O'Neill]

Well, all right. You want to take us out? Why don't you do the end? I would do the end.

[Rebecca Schinsky]

Yeah. You can find our detailed show notes, our free newsletter and all of our membership options, along with our paid bonus content, which is our office hours that we're going to stick around and talk more about Project hail [e-mail] 0to well read. You can follow us on the socials at zero to well read podcast. Email us at zero to well [e-mail] especially if you know of someone else who's doing what Andy Weir is doing because we don't want to wait this long in between books. Thank you to Thrift Books for sponsoring this season of Zero to well Read. And Zero to well Read is proud member of the Airwave Podcast Network. Until next time.

[Jeff O'Neill]

Bye, everybody.