Anyone who regularly reads my reviews knows that I’m a fan of reading the book first and then checking the adaptation. I’m always interested to see what they change and how they streamline a book to get it into a movie or TV show. This practice has already taught me many tricks I use to simplify my own writing—as well as reveal traps I shouldn’t fall into.
As such, when the film adaptation of Project Hail Mary was announced, I decided to read the book! It was already on my radar for a while, after watching the adaptation of this author’s previous bestseller (The Martian). And it just so happened that I finished the book series I was currently reading on the same day I saw the trailer.
If you’ve seen the trailer, you know that it “spoils” one major development and several minor developments. This was a bit frustrating, because I couldn’t have known that from watching the trailer. I really don’t like spoilers, mostly because I want to go into experiences (books/games/films) blind, without previous bias or assumptions.
On the other hand, if the trailer hadn’t given that information, the story would have made zero sense to me and probably would not have interested me so.
But I won’t make the same mistake! This review is spoiler-free until the spoiler barrier.
What’s the idea?
The story starts with Ryland Grace (our main character) waking up from a coma. He has no clue where he is, or why. Through some quick science experiments he discovers that he’s on a spaceship, and pretty soon memories start flooding back to him to plug the gaps.
That’s all I can say without spoilers. It takes a while before the memories reveal more details of the how and why of this space mission. It takes until the end of the book to reveal several massive developments which answer basically everything that was left to answer.
What did I like?
The book is unapologetically written for science nerds. From the get-go, solutions are researched and solved with scientific experiments and smart calculations. None of this is really hidden, or dumbed down, or pushed into some corner to say “magically we fixed the issue!” That’s nice.
The book is also written in such a way that it’s still easy to follow—at least most of the time. There’s humor and levity. The main character is not some “ultra smart serious scientist”, he’s a mostly regular dude who has a degree in biophysics. But you respect him and want to follow him, because he’s shown to be capable.
Over the years I’ve learned that this is the major thing. Your (main) characters can be dumb, evil, short-sighted, naïve, selfish, whatever. As long as you make them capable (enough) in some specific thing that’s very relevant to the story, people want to follow along and enjoy the character. And so, despite the self-deprecating humor, Ryland Grace is a pretty good scientist and astronaut.
This meant I didn’t have to worry all the time if the writer was going to pull something stupid out of his ass :p Like suddenly make him extremely dumb to get a “tense action scene” in which the spaceship explodes. Or suddenly make him “forget” about something crucial and ruin everything for no reason at all. No, our protagonist is capable and determined, it’s just that the challenges he’s facing are pretty big and mysterious.
Every chapter alternates between something happening “right now” on the spaceship and some memory coming back to him. This is a nice predictable structure to put the story into, while allowing variety and a good pace. Never did I feel like it was convoluted, or like we were cutting away just as one of the parts was getting interesting. The memories inform the current events and vice versa.
The story even has a very good explanation (near the end) for why he lost his memories and they’re only coming back now. It’s one of the rare stories that does! Usually when “memory loss” is used as a story construct it’s just a very flimsy excuse to fabricate tension or some “clever” reveal that ultimately goes nowhere. But in this book it absolutely makes sense and makes the whole thing better.
Also, the event that happens about 1/4 into the book (and continues until the end) arrived just in time. Because I was getting worried about the current trajectory of the story continuing for the entire book. That’s all I can say without spoilers.
What did I not like?
I feel like some science parts whizzed by too quickly. Or, rather, it illustrated how many things are just far easier to explain with a simple diagram. Just a few drawings here and there would have made a world of difference. (Maybe some versions have drawings/schematics/extra material—mine didn’t.)
Reading many paragraphs in a row about very specific experiments, terms and numbers sometimes just … created a mess. I’m tired. I’m reading this before falling asleep. I’m not keeping up with all that, and I have an Engineering degree.
In fact, I do feel like my background as a scientist was one of the reasons I could understand many things rather quickly. Or at least estimate what the story intended to convey or where it was going. This was both a pro and a con, because it also meant that some parts of the story were slightly predictable. That’s the danger with realistic science-y stories: science follows rules and patterns, so once the rules are established, you can pretty much know for sure where some storyline will end up. As such, some reveals or developments fell completely flat for me. But the story had more than enough twists and clever events to keep it interesting and keep me on my toes.
Would your “average reader” be able to understand? I’m not sure. The language is quite simple, the concepts not that hard, and it’s quite well-explained and integrated into the story. I just missed some diagrams that could have communicated what took 4 pages of difficult words now. I guess most readers would be able to understand the book, at least if they have some affinity with science or space engineering. Because if you don’t … well, I don’t see that kind of reader picking up a book like this :p
The story sometimes became a bit too “streamlined”. It would just summarize a whole set of experiments or actions in a single sentence or paragraph, skipping over all of that. That’s fine! You can’t tell everything and especially shouldn’t tell the boring bits! But it didn’t help my feeling that we were sometimes just “going through the motions”: we set up this experiment, oh suddenly it is done and reveals what we logically predicted. And there is no real tension or growing conflict or increasing interest along the journey.
The biggest issue with those summaries is that you lose all sense of character and color. At the start, Ryland Grace has some colorful inner thoughts and commentary. Some funny jokes, fun insights, clear character-defining choices. By the end, this mostly gets lost in very neutral descriptions of science and more science. I like having color and characters, especially in fiction.
Finally, the initial chapters weren’t grabbing me. Well, somewhat, but not enough to keep reading—except I knew some spoilers from the film trailer and was thus inspired to read on anyway. I can’t really tell you what was the problem. It was just a bit slow when it didn’t need to be. It revealed some things that were very clever, but it took a few more chapters to realize what it meant/how interesting it was. Which means that, at the time, the first few chapters just felt dry and aimless and meh to me. Upon finishing the book, I view those first chapters in a more favorable light, but they still feel like the weakest part of the book.
Conclusion
I thought the book was pretty good, but not great. Well-written, interesting ideas and (correct) science integrated with the story, a nice structure of having two storylines (now-spaceship and past-memories) converging over time. Some clever twists/events that had me interested or reinvigorated the story. With the biggest one, as stated, at around the 1/4 mark. Which was also one of the things that the film trailer spoiled, so I knew it was coming and maybe that helped me get through the first part.
It offered up some interesting scientific ideas and problems. As far as I can tell, it tried very hard to get the science and experiments correct, without letting it bog down the story. It also neatly answered all mysteries or obstacles that were introduced, while allowing a bit of mystery/open ending to keep you wondering. Those are the best endings, if you ask me. Promised resolutions are provided, but it’s not 100% sealed, tight, no mystery/wonder left.
I guess I like my stories with a bit more color, characters and variety. Maybe that’s my hyperactive brain. But you’re just not going to get that with a space mission story about someone stranded in a pretty bad situation. The alternating memories already helped a lot here—otherwise it would be a lot of “docter alone in space doing the same things”—but not enough for me. It was slightly too much science and logic-brute-forcing through problems for my taste, but not so much that I put down the book or dislike it.
Spoiler Barrier!
Ye be warned!
Okay, so, the biggest spoiler (which the film trailer shows) … is that this isn’t some lone astronaut adventure.
He meets aliens at about the 1/4 mark. Or, well, a single alien. This story is actually more of a buddy comedy than anything. And I like that! It fits the tone, it fits the story, it’s a pretty unique approach.
The “buddy” in this case is an alien he decides to call Rocky. And the way they work and interact is also quite funny and interesting. It absolutely added that bit of color and character I was missing in the first part.
Should the story have been more clear about this? Is this an unexpected tonal shift? I’m not sure. I mean, it’s about a space mission. Aliens showing up is pretty high on the list of possibilities. For me, it wasn’t unexpected, which is why I had no issue with it at all.
At some point it did become somewhat tiring that physical/realistic constraints were being upheld. That alien simply can’t survive in the same atmosphere as a human, so they have to stay separated at all times, coming up with these complicated solutions to stay in the same room together, etcetera. This is fine for a few chapters. But then it just bogs down the story a bit, having to repeat this and make sure the writer/reader didn’t forget.
I personally would have not chosen this at all, or would have found a way to streamline it after several chapters. They explore a solution, they find it, now they have solved many practical problems and none of that needs to be mentioned again. I mean … the story ends with the doctor going to the alien’s planet and them building him a breathable atmosphere, even inventing a way to grow food for him. The technology was there and the writer didn’t mind going there—so why not introduce it sooner?
But that’s personal preference again. My hyperactive mind just doesn’t like “problems” persisting without being solved or simplified :p It feels like wasting words, and space, and effort to read those words explaining exactly how Rocky lives inside a different atmosphere all this time. Then again, it’s not that bad and it’s obviously an important element of this “human-meets-alien-and-tries-to-solve-problem-together” story.
The second thing the film trailer spoils is also revealed around this time. The fact he’s not circling around their own sun, but a faraway one (Tau Ceti). And that’s because all suns are being infected by Astrophage that are dimming its light, except for this one. So he was sent out to go investigate it.
In the book, this reveal comes in a natural way and at a natural time. This is true for all the memories, really. They reveal stuff at a good pace, usually in tandem with what Ryland is doing right now, which is how you keep the pace and get to infodump/explain some things without it being annoying. But I already knew this because of that trailer! So I can’t judge that set of reveals for how they’d appear to a new reader. I do understand why the trailer explained that in more detail in advance. It’s a really good way actually explain the story and get people interested.
Because without that … if someone asked me what this book was about, I couldn’t tell you anything sensible after reading the first ~5 chapters. “Someone is in space … he doesn’t know why … or where …”
So, yes, that mostly confirmed my feeling that the first few chapters are the weakest and most directionless. It’s a wise choice from the filmmakers to streamline that and put the seed of an explanation of the main problem at the forefront. After that start, the story starts to sing a bit more, and it mostly keeps that up until the end.
Another example I just thought of after finishing this review. We start the story with Ryland describing sharing a room with two very dead astronauts. He was part of a team of three, but only he survived the years-long coma and woke up. This is an interesting idea and approach … but it means nothing at the start. Ryland sheds a tear for them, but he also doesn’t remember who they were.
And so the order of events here doesn’t … work? It’s like inverse storytelling. You dryly reveal the climax and, hundreds of pages later, provide some backstory as to who these people were and why they’d mean something to Ryland. But by that time, we have loooong moved on from them and their deaths, and even the main character doesn’t even think about them anymore.
It’s interesting and bold to start the story this way. That doesn’t mean it worked—for me, at least—because at the start of the book, I have no clue who these dead bodies are or why I should care. Neither does the protagonist. And that makes for a pretty weird and emotionless start to a story.
