Week 9 - The Martian, plus Bradbury

The Martian

This week I listened to The Martian by Andy Weir, because I heard that the Audiobook adds another layer of enjoyment to the book. When I saw that the book was going to be heavy on technical explanations I thought I wouldn't like it, but Mark's quippy inner dialogue and dry sense of humor made it really enjoyable, and the audiobook narrator definitely captured Mark's personality in a way that made me like the book even more. I was also impressed that Weir managed to make the first half of the book interesting! The earth and spaceship storylines weren't introduced in a significant capacity until later, so most of the first half of the book was Mark alone on an empty planet. Instead of being bored, though, I felt very invested in Mark's quest to get plants to grow on Mars.

I also saw that one of the alternate readings for this week was Bradbury's The Martian Chronicles. This and The Illustrated Man are my favorite books, and there are some interesting debates in book-land about whether they're scifi or actually fantasy that just takes place in space. I think Bradbury's writing really shines in his short stories more so than his longer work because they can be more experimental and abstract, since there's no need for them to hold up in a longer format. The escalating and strange sequential catastrophes of the Martian space landings are interesting as a way of creating a connected idea between stories without them actually being one narrative. It helps incite a feeling of dread and anticipation at the beginning of each story without needing any exposition, because you learn to understand that a trip to Mars probably means some kind of bizarre death.