The excerpt from critics on the first page of Andy Weir's self-made masterpiece "The Martian" says, alongside many other things, "A perfect novel in almost every way," and I can't help but wholeheartedly agree with the sentiment. In an age where sci-fi has become almost synonymous with magical futuristic superhuman settings and stories, Weir brought back the science part of science-fiction in a brilliant, refreshing take on a genre that was going stale.
"The Martian" is not about the extremes of science, on the contrary, it's about a grounded, beautifully realistic look at how the story of a scientist who gets stranded on Mars would play out if it actually occurred. What really makes the whole affair so poetic in a way is that this grand experiment, this attempt at rebirthing the merger of true science and fiction, was all done by a first time author. Yes, "The Martian" was the debut novel of Weir as unbelievable as that might be at first glance.
Why is it important though? Why do I rate "The Martian" so highly that it could be my favorite novel of the last decade, and accordingly its 2015 film adaptation directed by the master Ridley Scott, one of my favorite movies of the last decade?
Weir's Martian escapades and their Earthly cinematic sister achieved something that is truly incredible and incredibly difficult. They stood as true works of scientific fiction and held their heads high as the champions of science.
A great book became a great film in one of the rarest successful examples of a good adaptation in the entertainment industry where adaptations usually go to get butchered at the altars of studios.
Let's get ready for take-off and fly among the otherworldly qualities of this most surprising of books – surprising because no one including the writer expected it to shoot like a star as it did.
So, how did it soar to its own planet, and most importantly how did it change the perception of what was possible in the rocky terrains of sci-fi?
First things first though, how did this interstellar voyage begin? As most other great stories, it began with one small step for a man and concluded in one giant leap for mankind who loves art.
"I always wanted to be a writer ever since I read my dad's inexhaustible science-fiction collection," Weir said in a speech at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in California, back in 2015 – that collection included the likes of Isaac Asimov, Arthur C. Clarke and Robert Heinlein.
"I liked writing, but I also liked regular meals," he jokingly continued, talking about why he chose computer programming in college.
While he was at college, Weir actually wrote a book, which he confessed was really bad, but the good news is that this was before the time of the internet so there are no digital copies the writer assured the audience.
Weir was working in software at America Online – or AOL at the time – but was laid off when the company merged with Netscape. So, Weir took three years off, deciding to focus on his writing. After several failed attempts at breaking into the industry, the author went back to programming.
He did, however, still want to write, maybe not as a profession but at least as a hobby. So, he started writing short fiction – web comics and series – which he published on his own website for free. Around 2009, he started writing "The Martian," as a series, writing chapters and publishing them on his website, receiving feedback from readers, particularly on the technical side of affairs, and editing and updating the chapters accordingly to grind out those scientific mistakes.
"I wanted to make sure that dorks like me could enjoy the book that I was writing," Weir said, explaining why he put enormous effort into making the story and plot points, actions and reactions as scientifically accurate as possible.
After nearly three years of publishing a chapter nearly every other month and going back-and-forth with the readers, listening to the nitpicks and making changes along the way, "The Martian" was complete.
Then came the requests for a full e-reader version that readers could download and read instead of going from chapter to chapter on the website. So, Weir obliged and provided one.
Then came the requests for him to put the book on Amazon's system, which would save the readers from dealing with Weir's self-proclaimed terrible website. So, Weir obliged and put it on Amazon through the company's self-publishing system, for $0.99 – the minimum allowable price he could set.
Those who read the book for free on his website started to go over to Amazon and pay for it to show support, and with recommendations doing the rounds it started a snowball effect on readers. That initial spike in sales put the book on the top sellers list, which led to more sales, which led to "The Martian" topping the top sellers list, which led to more sales.
After hitting No. 1 on Amazon, along with rave reviews, Random House's Crown Publishing came calling. At the same, 20th Century Fox knocked on the door for a movie option.
Both of these – the book contract and the film deal – were signed in the same week.
It would appear that the universe smiled upon Weir and his fortune turned unexpectedly but not undeservedly.
What makes "The Martian" so special? At its core, it is a simple "man versus nature" tale, a conflict as old as the medium of the novel itself, going back all the way to Daniel Defoe's 18th century classic "Robinson Crusoe."
Actually, there are several similarities between "Robinson Crusoe" and "The Martian," and they go beyond the nature of their central idea.
One of the most integral pieces of both is the narrative point of view of the story. "The Martian" – in the same vein as "Robinson Crusoe" – employs a first-person narration the speaker of which is the protagonist of the story, Mark Watney. This diary-like – or log-like in Watney's case – style of both novels is I feel imperative for their success as entertaining pieces of art.
As both stories center around singular characters stranded in deserted landscapes, pulling out of a first-person perspective – which ensures a much more personal, close and relatable feel for the reader – and bringing in a third-person, let's say omniscient, point of view would make the stories too distant, especially with how little dialogue there is in the stories – this being more so the case with "The Martian" than "Robinson Crusoe."
Watney, from the very beginning to the almost end of the novel is alone. He keeps himself from going insane by using log entries as pages of his own diary, speaking to whoever might chance upon the data years from then, detailing for that unknown reader his trials and tribulations of the day.
In a story without dialogue, the character's thoughts carry most of the weight and do the heavy lifting, and for the reader to access those thoughts, the first-person narration makes the most sense. Watney's stream of consciousness would never come across as relatable from a tertiary perspective, and it would only hurt the novel's pacing.
Speaking of pacing, the narration does leave Watney and switches to a third-person perspective when it narrates events revolving around other people – those aboard the Hermes spacecraft, or those on Earth. This switch in the point of view may seem jarring at first but the eye quickly adjusts and what could have been the most terrible mistake in the pacing of the novel ends up playing in its favor.
Now, we have established that the first-person point of view is integral to "The Martian," however that perspective would have been wasted if Watney – the reader's eyes in this world – did not command an intriguing, interesting, captivating aura.
He is smart, he is funny, he is witty, he is vulgar – appropriately so – he is a nerd, he is a popular culture geek, he is the greatest botanist on Mars. Watney, singlehandedly succeeds in keeping the reader's attention in a truly satisfying manner.
More importantly than anything else: Watney is human. Granted he is a smart human, but a human nonetheless. That's what makes him relatable. His personality shines through in these one-way conversations, and he honestly comes across as a guy you would love to sit down with, have a drink and converse.
After watching the author himself in interviews and speeches, one can see from where Watney gets his charming personality. On top of all that, he is genuinely funny. "The Martian" can almost be classified as a comedic book – funnily enough, the film was classified as a comedy at the Golden Globes where it won the Best Motion Picture Award in the category of Comedy or Musical.
So, the narrative choices are great, the characters are mesmerizing, what is left is the story and the plot. Thus we come to the central point of the novel: science – and the central conflict of the story: man versus nature.
All the other factors contribute to elevating this book from greatness to a masterpiece, but what makes it a great book in the first place is the science. This is a singular novel, I have not seen anything quite like it before or since its publication. This is not a science-fiction novel, this is a science novel, and that makes it stand out head and shoulders above the galaxies full of sci-fi hacks, and puts it on a pedestal that in time could allow it to take its place among the Asimovs, Clarkes and Heinleins of the genre.
It highlighted what we have been missing from our sci-fi books and films: Science. I don't even want to call them sci-fi, they are more in tune with fantasy – which is fine, fantasy is a great genre. My favorite novel of all time is a fantasy piece, and if you want to write fantasy more power to you, but don't attempt to become a hardcore science-fiction work only to sully it all with pseudo-science gibberish.
In a time where science is seemingly under attack from all fronts, including from within, as different sides fight with their own scientific claims and even scientists disregard established literature on basic principles of science, we sorely lack more champions of the unaltered, unspoiled, pure science. This is where Adam McKay's "Don't Look Up" also shined – and where it also failed as it jammed too many jabs at its own opponents.
Everyone who has seen the film, and many who haven't, will have engrained in their heads the line: "I'm going to have to science the sh*t out this."
"The Martian" – book and film – succeeded as no one else had ever done before, and no one else will ever accomplish quite the same again I imagine, in making science the leading character of its story. Only the likes of "Apollo 13" are close to "The Martian" in terms of crowning the science and the scientist and that film is based on real-life events, so it was handed the science on a silver platter.
"The Martian" was a breath of fresh air for its genre, its medium, and for us, the audience.
