Then Geo and I came back from a road trip and decided to catch a movie, knowing nothing about Project Hail Mary in the slightest. We loved it, of course. I dug into the stack of books and pulled my copy out, leaving it well within reach.
Of course I loved everything about this.
Weir does science fiction supremely well.
What makes science fiction work isn’t the science. All stories, to be successful, have to rely on the universal truth of humanity: love, loss, life, ambition, deception, success, companionship, betrayal. And what science fiction is uniquely suited to is stories of universal truths that are arranged around problem-solving, one of the most fundamental elements of human existence. We’re alive; we solve problems. It’s what we do. For what it’s worth, this is why the Star Trek series succeeded so well, and why the first Star Trek movie failed so spectacularly. Grand sweeping shots of the outside of the ship, or of technology in general, aren’t a story.
Anyway, I loved everything about this book, and of course you knew I would.