Looks like a good movie and I’ve heard it’s a good book. Problem is I’m a lazy reader and if I can’t finish a book in a week I won’t finish it.
Is this book a fast read? Is it as good as the nerds say it is?
It’s reasonably fast, but more to the point, it’s a page-turner. You won’t be able to put it down.
And yes, you should read it first.
Yes to both questions. I have a feeling it’s going to be better than the trailer, although I plan on seeing it when it comes out. I suspect they’ll cut some of the best jokes just because you can’t include everything.
I think I read it in just a day or two. It’s not very long and the chapters are fairly short as I remember them. The protagonist is also pretty snappy so the words go quickly. I’d consider it analogous to a short Crichton novel. Pretty fun, and quick and easy.
A strong yes to the first question and a weak yes to the second. The book is a straight-ahead survival adventure story–there is little in the way of character development or deep reflection. It does a good job at portraying how an experienced engineer might solve problems, and also how he might address the problems that his solutions caused.
Yeah, I finished it over the weekend. Worth it because a lot of the science and technical details will have to be cut (or conflated) for the film, and that’s one of its most entertaining aspects.
I always think it’s a bad idea to read the book for an upcoming movie.
Not knowing what’s coming makes me appreciate the movie more and the book usually expands on things so there is more to look forward to instead of worrying about what’s left out. I find I complain less about the differences if I read the book later.
I’d recommend reading the book first - it’s a very quick read (several people I’ve lent it too read it in less than 3 days), and quite good.
P.S. As I think about it, I usually read the book first. I read Lord of the Rings before seeing the 1970s LOTR movie, read Lost Moon before seeing “Apollo 13,” read Searching for Bobby Fischer, Harry Potter, Watchmen, and all the Clancy books before seeing their respective movies, and the same for Clockwork Orange. I even read “The Razor’s Edge” before seeing Bill Murray’s take on the book, and through circumstances beyond my control, I read “Star Wars” before seeing the movie too. I haven’t read the Hunger Games though, even though I saw the first two movies.
If you’ve seen all the trailers, you might as well read the book. It’s a fast read and in fact, I read it a second time when I heard they were making the movie. Is it a good book? It has a good plot and narrative but it isn’t exactly what I would characterize as literary SF. Of course, the conceit is that we’re just reading the stranded astronaut’s personal logs and dammit Jim, he’s a botanist/engineer not a poet!
I think that this might be one of the few instances of a movie surpassing the source material. The novel provides a great story/plot, though it’s a little spare. What the novel lacks in characterization can be fleshed out with talented acting and direction. And to be sure it looks like we have a good cast and director. And what the novel lacks in colorful descriptions of Mars itself can be filled out with cinematography and art/set direction. From what I’ve seen so far there are no problems on this front either. Wadi Rum is a great stand-in for Mars. Everything looks fantastic.
So, you can go either way; read first or read later. Read first if you want to be sure that you understand everything that’s going on. But from what I’ve seen of the trailers, I don’t think that they’ve made any major changes from the book and it looks like it should be understandable to the audience. If you choose to read it later it will more as a supplemental appendix. You know, cargo manifests, chemical reactions, bills of materials, etc. I will say this: the author certainly did his homework.
We listened to it on a road trip this summer.
The Audio book is maybe 8 hours long, but you can do other things while you are listening…
I thought it was very well done.
I’m an engineer in real life. When a certain system booted up again, I stood up and said YES! outloud. VXWorks 4 life. Also, in another tense scene when our hero made some measurements and figured out how to avoid something that was going to kill him, I was also quite happy.
Agreed. I always prefer to watch adaptations first (when possible), then go back to the original source. Eight times out of 10, the source material offers a richer, more detailed experience and it gives me new stuff to consider.
Going the other route, OTOH, means you’ll almost always be annoyed at the inevitable plot shortcuts, missing/combined characters, and thinner writing.
(There are adaptations I prefer to the originals, even when I read the originals first. Of course offhand I can’t think of any, but they do exist!)
I very much enjoyed The Martian. It’s a quick read and a worthwhile one.
I’m in the “read before watching” camp, especially when the book is known to be good. Movies, by their nature, have to condense and take shortcuts. Good books are as much about pacing and development as they are about the strength of the story. Movie adaptations, even really good ones, can never be much more than a highlight reel. Highlight reels are fine if you don’t have the time or care to watch the whole game, but generally speaking I don’t want them to be my first exposure to a work.
The book has a lot more of the technical nitty-gritty about what he does and why he does it. I’ve heard the book described as “DIY-porn” because it’s all about here’s this problem, here’s how I solve it, here’s how I solve the problem I hit while trying to solve the first problem… I would guess the movie will gloss over a lot of that and make it more of an action/adventure movie of a guy trapped on Mars.
If not having those technical details in the movie would bother you–“Why’s he doing that? Why’d he do that thing that way?”–then reading the book before hand could make the movie more enjoyable. If you’re not into DIY or solving engineering problems, you might not enjoy the book as much.
And even if you’re not into that, the wry, cynical, protagonist, not overly engaged with Great Thoughts about the Meaning of Life but only about the reality right in front of him, is a refreshing change. Despite all the hardware stuff, it really is a character-based story, something rare in SF, and rarely well-done elsewhere, either. I simply liked Watney right from Page 1, and got to like him more as the book went on.
Even the tech stuff may help popularize the Mars program in real life, since it shows how doable it could be. I hope so, anyway.
Purely YMMV, but I’m not into either of those things and I enjoyed the book. The main character is wry and funny, and the problems/solutions are presented clearly enough that even a layperson like me can appreciate his clever workarounds and accomplishments.
I think that’s the main strength of the book, really. It’s a technical novel that’s accessible to non-technical folks, but still feels very technical. That’s no small feat! I have trouble seeing how the movie is going to keep that feel, and suspect they’ll drop it altogether in favor of generic “heroism in the face of adversity.”
I have to take the other side of the debate. My rule to live by is never read the book first if you know there’s going to be a movie and you plan on seeing it. I’m invariably disappointed by the movie if I’ve read the book first, whereas I can enjoy the movie for what it is if my expectations haven’t been raised by the book.