Project Hail Mary

 Project Hail Mary by Andy Weir, 476 pages.

This was my third time reading this sciencey space adventure (and my second time reading it for a book club) and I continue to be surprised at how well it holds up to further scrutiny! I first wrote about this book in 2021 here, and I still stand by most of those first impressions. However, to keep things fresh I decided to try the audiobook this time! I found it remarkably well-done. Grace's sense of humor comes across well with the audiobook narration, and the addition of sound added some really interesting elements to communication with Rocky. My book club ended up chatting about this book for nearly two hours, which proves to me that there's quite a lot to chew on for such a fun book. Definitely check out the book before the movie comes out next month!

Zero Stars, Do Not Recommend

Zero Stars, Do Not Recommend by MJ Wassmer, 371 pages

Dan's having a great time spending time with his girlfriend on the beach at an all-inclusive, adults-only tropical resort. Then the sun explodes. And because Dan happens to be the closest person to the microphone when all of the resort guests gather, he ends up becoming the de facto leader of one of the schisms that inevitably forms when the VIP guests start hoarding resources for their final days.

A blurb on the cover of this book calls it Lord of the Flies as written by Douglas Adams, and that's not too far from the truth. It was certainly one of the funnier books I've read about class warfare and the end of the world, and I heartily recommend it.

August Kitko and the Mechas from Space

 August Kitko and the Mechas from Space by Alex White, 451 pages. 

August Kitko had resigned himself to inevitable death by giant robot with the rest of the planet. Which makes it a big surprise when the doomsday robot is attacked by a second giant doomsday robot, who proceeds to kidnap him and make him an integral part to the forces trying to save humanity from certain destruction. This is a whole lot of pressure for a jazz pianist, and soon he's drawn into a series of questions whose answers will determine the fate of his species. 

I had such a great time with this book! I had a hard time putting it down, and managed to tear through the whole thing in a few days. I was impressed at the amount of thought put into making all of the mechas unique and interesting, and that thoughtfulness translated into some really fabulous giant robot fights. I thought this novel did a really good job balancing these fun and exciting elements with the seriousness of the extinction event in the premise. I also really liked both Gus Kitko and Ardent Violet, who is both Kitko's rockstar love interest and the second protagonist of this book. This is a space opera with an emphasis on the opera, which is a fun choice. This book definitely makes my recommendation list, and I'm very excited to discuss it with Orcs & Aliens next week!

The Witch's Heart

 The Witch's Heart by Genevieve Gornichec, 361 pages.

Kara has actually written about this Norse-mythology inspired tale twice, but I'll reference here her first review of this new angle on Ragnarok. The book follows Angrboda, the witch and seer who both predicts Ragnarok and bears many of it's most notable figures (fun detail: they're all in her hair on the cover).

I really enjoyed this book, which feels like it has a firm enough grasp on the original myths to play with them very intelligently. For example, the character of Angrboda herself also fills the role of several other minor witches from Norse mythology (all outlined in the book's appendix). While I occasionally found the pacing a little slow, I was always invested. This is very much an inward-facing novel, and I found Angrboda well-written and compelling. I'll be very interested to see what other reader's thought of this one at Orcs & Aliens on Monday.
 

The Future

 The Future by Naomi Alderman, 415 pages.

Kara reviewed this very cool (and slightly hard to quantify) book here a couple of weeks ago, and I entirely agree with everything she said. Despite a lack of linear plot and many characters doing entirely unrelated things in distant places, this book never felt like it was moving slowly. That being said, I  will say that I felt like the first half of this book was stronger than the second. It felt like the climax of the novel couldn't quite deliver on how strong the rising action was. This also feels like a book that has to be read to be understood. It was an exciting, thought-provoking ride, definitely recommended.
 

Project Hail Mary

  Project Hail Mary by Andy Weir, 478 pages.

I actually already reviewed this book last July! You can read that here. Overall my opinions about it are pretty much exactly the same, but with less surprise this time. One difference is that I was reading it with someone else (and in preparation to discuss it with more people) which definitely led to some interesting conversations. And I'm looking forward to more conversations with Orcs and Aliens tonight!
 

Defying Doomsday

 Defying Doomsday edited by Tsana Dolichva and Holly Kench, 432 pages.

This anthology, by mostly Australian authors, is all about disabled and chronically ill protagonists facing the end of the world (or sometimes coping with a world that has already ended). The specific apocalypses run the gamut from disease to aliens (a whole lot of aliens) and the protagonists are just as varied, representing a wide range of human experience.

I found this anthology very alright. Most anthologies have stories that are, in my experience, wildly varying in quality. Normally there are at least two or three authors that impress me enough that I seek out a longer work by them, and a few stories that I find very difficult to get through. This book was filled entirely with stories in between. Many of them had very interesting concepts, but the stories didn't quite come together into something I was impressed by. This was a very good concept with sort of meh execution.

Project Hail Mary

 Project Hail Mary by Andy Weir, 478 pages.

This wonderful novel has already been written about by Kara (here) and Christa (here), so feel free to look there for a plot summary and more thoughts. This was my first Andy Weir novel, and it wasn't quite what I had expected. For starters, even after hearing about how fun and accessible The Martian is for years (it's still on my list, but this book cut in line) but I don't know that I had ever really grasped how accessible and fun it would be until I read one of his books myself. Also, this book is much smaller scale and more personal than I had realized. I had seen this book described as a "first contact novel" which isn't inaccurate, but did have me picturing sort of grand scale explorations of alien civilizations. What it is instead is an intimate portrait of two different creatures meeting despite astronomical odds. 

Which is all to say that I ended up much more emotionally invested in this novel than I ever expected to. I had to work myself up to starting this book because I was expecting "hard sci-fi" to be a bit dense and hard to get through, even if it was very good. However, I never got that feeling reading this book. Instead I found the science interesting (and when it was too difficult for me to understand I found it was easy to gloss over it and still understand the story) and the plot kept me reading way too late at night. It was a beautiful experience that really got to me emotionally, and the pacing was very nearly perfect. I would definitely recommend this book to pretty much anyone, even those who aren't normally interested in Science Fiction.

The Apocalypse Seven

The Apocalypse Seven by Gene Doucette, 384 pages

When Robbie wakes up the morning after his first college party at Harvard, the dorm is so quiet he's sure he's slept through his classes. Turns out it's quiet because nobody else is there. Everyone is simply gone, and Robbie keeps finding other strange things — crumbling buildings, empty supermarkets, overgrown plants, a TON of wildlife that usually isn't in Cambridge. When he eventually does find a few other people, they band together in a joint effort of survival and solving the mystery of what is going on.

Doucette does a pretty good job of incorporating the realities of regular people facing brutal survival situations, something that isn't always realistically portrayed. I particularly liked his inclusion of a blind woman, whose disabilities and strengths were even more pronounced in a difficult situation. That said, there are some definite problems (such as the assumption that a random public library would have a large Braille section — those books are both huge and expensive!) and a somewhat disappointing ending. The first 90% of the book is great though; just wish he could've finished as strong as he started.

Project Hail Mary

Project Hail Mary by Andy Weir, 478 pages

When Ryland Grace wakes up from a coma, he has no idea who or where he is, much less why he's there. Slowly, however, things start to come back to him, and he soon discovers that he's the lone survivor on a "Hail Mary" mission to save Earth from a rapidly dimming sun. Oh, and that he's 12 lightyears from home, on his way to visit the star that may have some answers. But when he arrives, he finds out he's not quite as alone as he thought, as an alien ship has also come, possibly for the same reasons that he has. Soon, what started as an apocalyptic survival story becomes a first contact story...but without forgetting that first part.

After a second novel that only diehard heist fans would like (me. this is me), Weir has returned to form with Project Hail Mary. It's full of the hard science and humor that made The Martian such a success, this time tinged with compassion and creativity that we hadn't seen before. I absolutely loved this book, and it's well worth the hold list.

Severance

Severance / Ling Ma, 291 pgs.

Candace Chen is a hard worker.  She is often lost in her work and gets a lot done for the publishing company that employs her. She also has a long term boyfriend that she isn't TOO serious about.  Oh, and she seems to be immune to Shen Fever, the epidemic that is racing through the world.  Candace stays at the office when everyone goes home for good.  She really doesn't have any other place to go.  Her parents are dead, the boyfriend moved away and she doesn't feel close to anyone else.  After it becomes apparent the fever has killed most, Candace gets picked up by a small group of survivors.  They are heading to a place their leader Bob is billing their safe place.  She goes along but isn't sold on the group and is certainly wary of Bob.  How will this end up for Candace?  Learning her story along the way is at least half the journey here.  An interesting take on many topics and often quite funny.

This Book is Full of Spiders

This Book is Full of Spiders: Seriously, Dude, Don't Touch It by David Wong (Jason Pargin) 406 pp.

Apparently this book is the sequel to one called John Dies at the End. Reading the first book is not required before tackling this one. I am undecided in my opinion of it but the audiobook did hold my attention. In an unnamed town in the midwest an outbreak of strange proportions has created national paranoia. But are the spider monsters real? Do the spider monsters turn people into zombies? Are people really being turned into zombies? Do the people supposedly infected really have to die? Is the government really going to bomb the town into oblivion? Why does the author use his own name and that of his friend for the main characters? (Answer: "David" & "John" are pseudonyms for writers at Cracked.com) Should I read the first book . . . or the sequel? This one was a wild ride.

Vivian Apple at the end of the world

Vivian Apple at the end of the world / Katie Coyle 264 pgs.

Vivian Apple is not a believer in the book of Frick, the evangelical religious craze that is predicting the end of the world.  But first, the "true believers" are going to be saved during the rapture...the date of which is well known.  Vivian has never been a believer but her parents are baptized into the faith.  She is among the surprised that find a hole in the ceiling and her parents gone, theoretically saved.

Vivian teams up with her best friend Harp, (her parents ALSO disappeared) and they embark on a trans continental trip to find out what is really happening.

I don't read a lot of YA books but this one has many of the traits that make it YA...young protagonists, teen angst, relationship woes.  At first, this book followed these plot lines pretty well but later in the book there are some twists and turns that take it up a notch.  In the end, Vivian figures a lot out and makes great strides in "finding" herself.  I liked this much more than the average YA book and feel like Katie Coyle is an author to watch.

The Wake

The Wake by Scott Snyder, art by Sean Murphy, colors by Matt Hollingsworth, 256 pages

Dr. Lee Archer, a cetologist, is recruited by the Department of Homeland Security to study a marine call that doesn't match any known animal. Taken to a secret deep-sea drill rig in the arctic circle, she meets the rest of the team, and, more importantly, the creature who made the call. Given that this is Scott Snyder and a horror story, things quickly go pear-shaped, as the creature escapes and all hell breaks loose. And then we fast-forward 200 years to a world running out of freshwater and constantly under siege by the creatures. Like all good Snyder stories, the world around the story is top-notch, and he quickly drops you into the conflict at hand, ramping up the tension as the DHS agent slowly explains why they're all there, and keeping it going as the crew try to escape. Sean Murphy's art is fantastic, especially his creature design, and Matt Hollingsworth's colors really add to the underwater feel of the story. Unfortunately, and maybe I was just not paying enough attention, Snyder makes a jump in explaining the end that I wasn't able to follow. Regardless, I still really enjoyed this story, and am eagerly looking forward to whatever Snyder dreams up next.