Artemis by Andy Weir

It’s hard for any writer to follow up a major success, and Book #2 usually doesn’t turn out as well as Book #1. So it was no surprise that Artemis, by Andy Weir, was a bit of a disappointment, but what was surprising was how much of a disappointment it was. Set on the first and only colony on the moon in the not-too-distant future, Weir did create a compelling world where rich tourists come for a once and a lifetime experience in 1/6th gravity (Disney in Space!), but the plot and character development was heavily bogged down. Jazz is a young porter who has spent most of her life on the colony and probably can’t go back to Earth without getting very sick. She’s messed up every opportunity for a good living that has come her way, including trashing her father’s welding business and failing her EVA exam. Life on the Moon is expensive though, so when a lucrative but illegal business proposition comes her way that involves a lot of dangerous stuff, she jumps right in, and of course, bad things then happen.

In an attempt to re-create The Martian’s strengths (fast-pacing, quirky narration, using SCIENCE to solve problems, and an easy adaptation to the big-screen), we are left with a non-stop run of drama and physics/chemistry 101 with a twenty-something female narrator who thinks and talks exactly like a fifteen-year-old boy. Perhaps Weir wanted to challenge himself as a writer by taking on a female narrator, but it was so off-putting at times. She seems like a sci-fi fantasy projection: beautiful with a gorgeous body, tough-talking, will have sex with almost anyone apparently, and of course, is a genius. Oh, but she does cry in the corner on several occasions, just to remind you that she’s a woman. Hope they make her more realistic in the inevitable movie.