Project Hail Mary, an interstellar road trip and a one-way mission to save Earth
Andy Weir creates a new story of space peril with our hero and an alien working towards protecting their planets from Astrophage, the particle that can destroy it all.
People always assumed our first contact with alien life — if any existed — would be little green men in UFOs. We never considered the idea of a simple, unintelligent species.
A group of astronomers have observed that the Sun is getting dimmer at an exponential rate, leading to an instant ice age, crop failures and mass starvation. The world’s best minds are trying to find out the reason, solution and ways to avoid impending doom. This is the premise of Andy Weir’s latest sci-fi tale, Project Hail Mary.
Having already read The Martian, I was well-aware of Weir’s ability to create witty and charming characters with an inherent optimism and resilience. In The Martian, we presume Mark Watney to be dead. However, he is alive with a limited food supply and stranded in the deadly Martian atmosphere. It is a given that Mark Watney will be the first man to die on Mars. The story is about Mark Watney’s survival against all odds.
After reading The Martian, Andy Weir became a go-to author for me. When I found he is releasing a new book, I couldn’t help but start reading it as soon as possible. In Project Hail Mary, we have Ryland Grace, a character similar to Mark Watney, but, here, the stakes are much higher. Billions of lives of people on Earth are threatened, and the world needs a solution within the next 27 years.
Attempt number three: What’s your name?” Only now does it occur to me: I don’t know who I am. I don’t know what I do. I don’t remember anything at all.
The book starts on an interesting premise, reminiscent of The Bourne Series and Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind. Our protagonist wakes up from a coma, unsure about his identity and location, and a plethora of medical equipment attached to him. Judging from their appearance, the other two people in the room have been dead for some time. Despite the memory loss, Ryland has an intuition that he loves science and remembers physics, planetary sciences and a bunch of random facts. To discover his location, he experiments with the available lab equipment and discovers that he is not on Earth.
The story progresses with frequent flashbacks to Ryland’s time on Earth. He recalls Astrophage, a highly energetic particle that is consuming the luminosity of the sun exponentially. Ryland, who has a PhD in molecular biology, gets recruited to perform experiments on Astrophage and learn their life-cycle. He further recalls that except for one, Astrophage has infected all stars within 8 light-years of distance. A crew is formed to go on a one-way mission to Tau Ceti (the unaffected planet) and find a solution to the Astrophage problem. With subsequent flashbacks, we get to learn more about Astrophage and how Earth prepared for the Project Hail Mary mission, putting in all its resources to the task. Scientists from all fields of life came up with plans to minimize the damage for the next 27 years, while the crew on Hail Mary sends a solution to curb the problem.
Thirty years. I looked out at their little faces. In thirty years they’d all be in their early forties. They would bear the brunt of it all. And it wouldn’t be easy. These kids were going to grow up in an idyllic world and be thrown into an apocalyptic nightmare. They were the generation that would experience the Sixth Extinction Event.
With flashbacks, Weir is successful in creating a perfect pace for storytelling. The readers learn sufficient information to keep reading and are fed more information progressively. This combination of the right order at the right time worked wonders for the book. Weir has taken up simple concepts from evolution, planetary sciences, chemistry, physics and biology and woven an intricate tale of survival and friendship. The book references a lot of science concepts, including them in just the right amount to drive the plot and keep it engaging.
Knock-knock-knock.
No, that’s not creepy at all. Being in a spaceship twelve light-years from home and having someone knock on the door is totally normal.
But Mr Weir doesn’t just stop here. Around the 30% mark of the story, Ryland meets Rocky, an alien who resembles a spider and talks in musical chords. Rocky is from Erid, a planet in the 40-Eridani solar system. Like our Sun, Astrophage has infected Rocky’s Sun too.
With the same goal, Rocky and Ryland join hands. They have to use their ingenuity to learn how to communicate and come up with a solution to save both their planets from getting destroyed. Ryland is a science guy; Rocky is a brilliant engineer and together, they make a great team. I loved how they bounced ideas off each other. This back and forth of discussions infused with sarcasm forms the most charming part of the book. They experiment with Astrophage, do research on Tau Ceti, come up with experiments and handle multiple failures along the way. The situation was unprecedented. They faced one roadblock after the other but kept on pushing through.
One aspect of the book that shines out to me is Ryland’s character arc. Owing to some unfortunate circumstances, a hesitant Ryland becomes the third crew member aboard the Hail Mary. He did not want to lose his life. Again, the Weir optimism shines through and Ryland makes the best of his present situation. The ending shows a newer side to him, where he makes an enormous sacrifice to save his friend. I feel that his character came full circle and provided the book with a satisfactory conclusion.
Project Hail Mary is a story that will stay with me for a long time. The book had it all — an epic story, a problem with no solution, two amazing characters, a dash of humour and a marvellous bond of sacrifice and friendship. It is a passionate science-fiction novel, casual enough to entice fiction fans and scientific enough to challenge the science nerds. When I’m reading a book, I’m always searching for those touching moments which can change my perspective. This book made me laugh, think, hope, and marvel. Nothing can be better than this.
