Project Hail Mary is the 3rd book written by Andy Weir, who is also the author of The Martian. 

This book is told in the first-person perspective of Ryland Grace, a biologist who gave up on his dreams and became a middle school science teacher. The conflict starts when scientists on Earth start to notice that the sun is being drained of its energy, and calculate that the Earth will experience a new ice age in 30 years. Ryland Grace is called upon to go on a long suicide mission to find the solution and save humanity. Spoilers ahead.

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My Favorite Elements from Project Hail Mary:

Design

I think Rocky’s design is unique, especially when compared with most alien designs like those you see in movies. Rocky is described as what I imagine to be a tarantula made out of rock, with vents on the side and no eyes. It’s a realistic and simple alien design, but also not too close to Earth life to make it seem unimaginative.

Planet

Rocky’s home world is really interesting, and not what most people would think of when they imagine another planet with life on it. Dark, hot, and filled with ammonia smell is far from what anyone here could live comfortably in. Personally, if I was in Ryland’s position, I would have a hard time dealing with Rocky’s stinky ammonia smell.

Advanced Echolocation

The alien-spider’s echolocation ability was a great contributor to the story, and I think such an ability could have easily created plot holes, but there aren’t any that I can point out. Initially, I found Ryland’s immediate assumption that Rocky had ‘eyes’ and could see like us to be insensitive, but I guess with eyes being such a common characteristic on Earth, he can be excused. I probably would have also missed the fact that Rocky was ‘blind.’

Rocky

Rocky’s personality is awesome. He is a creative, inventive engineer that can achieve almost anything when he puts his mind to it. 

Ryland Grace

Ryland was a great character too. He is a silly, intelligent scientist who is a little reckless when it comes to his scientific process. An example of this is when he first exposed his sample of Astrophage to carbon dioxide and he momentarily lost them because they traveled across the room. 

The Ending

I love how, at the end, Ryland was teaching little alien-spiders. This task is very fitting for him and wholesome, and it shows just how much he enjoyed teaching science.

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Thoughts

One thing I do wonder, however, is if the probes Ryland sent back contained the info he collected about Rocky’s species, the language key, and where the Eridians are located so humans could possibly meet up with them. Knowing Ryland, I could totally see him forgetting.

Hey, you know how The Martian was made into a movie? Guess what! They’re going to do the same with Project Hail Mary! Hopefully the movie director won’t change up the plot or mess up Rocky’s design, but anyhow, I’m excited. I can’t wait to see Rocky in CGI!

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