Right. That wasn't really a question, it was a statement, but please take a few minutes to ponder our tininess.
Alright, so here we go.
The Martian by Andy Weir fits this bill. An everyman, Mark Watney, is also a botanist and an astronaut. He is part of a Mars mission, not the first, but a continuation in a series of eventual colonization. Our dream, currently. SpaceX and all that. Very timely.
Something bad happens. He is left behind. He should be dead, but he is not.
Mars is far away. Help is far away. This is a stranded person on the biggest, most remote island ever. Not even the luxury of a tropical beach and coconuts.
Surviving is such a human thing. It's our nature, it's what we strive for, automatically. It's instinct. That's part of the gravity (ha, see what I did there?) of this book. That's partly why it's been a best seller. It's so inherent. All the themes within this book, despite all the fun technical clever solutions and space talk, it's the core themes- exploration, survival, and, most importantly, the realization that our humanity is so very small but so very, very vital.
Space is boundless. It's outside, within us, above us, beyond us. We are little bits of space,between all those molecules in our atoms. These big broad themes are within us, and we relate.
I like these concepts. I liked the book. I'm not going to say it's the best writing, because it's not, or the most original concept, it's not, but it's engaging. Even if you aren't finding all these big conceptual things within it, it's still a good, quick read. I'm just being introspective these days, ha.
And, honestly, I think the movie might be pretty decent, because the text in the book is written like audio logs from Mark, so it leaves a lot to the imagination. You leave him at a critical moment, and then he comes back. The action in-between will make for good screen fodder, and I have faith in Ridley Scott, hehe.
But do give the book a read. You should always give the book a read.
Cheers.
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