Worth My Time: A Review of Artemis by Andy Weir

Only 8 a.m. and the kid has wandered outside eager to embrace the first sunny spring day.  I can feel the smack of the soccer ball being smashed up against the fence wondering when the 20something neighbours will kindly request him to lie in a little longer.  It's been a long haul here with ice storms in mid-April and dreary winter coats decorating hooks that should be drying raincoats. The thermometer rose to a balmy 10 C degrees yesterday.  Pandemonium as people flung themselves onto sidewalks in a disarray of toques with shorts intent on feeling wind that promised not to freeze their grins in place. 

The annual hosing of the deck took place at 2. A momentous occasion in this household, topped with the first BBQ and a bevy or two, winter's last vestiges washed quietly away. Lawn chairs magically appeared as a strong desire to just sit and read until the sun slowly made it's way West settled down up on me. Summer is all about a tree, a good bench and a book. Day-dreaming of green things, I flipped through Artemis, Andy Weir's sophomore novel desperate to read one developed sentence. 

I gave up when the protagonist found it necessary to disguise herself as a prostitute. 

Jazz Bashira immigrated with her father to the Moon city of Artemis at the age of 6. She was a sweet child, quick, and full of promise to someday work along side her father as welder. That was then. Wandering the corridors of Artemis we quickly discover that her place in this small town is not favourable. Renting a single coffin bed in one of the poorer areas Jazz works as a porter, fixated on increasing her self-worth and fortune side shuffling as a smuggler. Delivering the latest contraband cigars to the richest man in town, Jazz is offered a job that would answer all her dreams.

My annoyance of this book has me stopped in my writing tracks. I could discuss the paradigm of the frontier town. It's wiliness to work outside of the law to produce a productive economy, even society. If I was bothered, I could unpack Jazz herself, unconsciously clothing herself as a tough woman running from her past mistakes into new ones, all the while simply wanting love and acceptance. I could chip away at the idea of Moon city, one of Sci-Fi’s oldest and enduring tropes. 

I won't, however the book isn't worth my time. 

Morning Chocolate Cake: A Review of Armada, Ernest Cline

I am almost but not completely ready to discuss Armada by Ernest Cline; almost, a few antidotal paragraphs are vital as I procrastinate my reluctance to acknowledge my distain. Thankfully, my fortuitous decision to serve up a slice of chocolate cake with my morning coffee is lulling me into a false sense of sugary safety.

Unaccustomed to October play-off major league baseball, Canada rightly so, decided to whole-heartedly lose it's marbles.  During the 1992 World Series, I witnessed my dear father rise from the depths of our den, walk calmly to the front door, step out into the cold Saskatchewan wind and shout to the heavens "Okay, Blue Jays, Let's Play Ball!". From there, this large, 6 foot four inch tall dad of mine, proceeded to shut the door, retrace his steps, descending down into his sports lair where he watched his team clutch the title. And so it came as a shock that as most Canadians were screaming their roofs off as Jose Baustita threw his bat into infamy in Game 5 against Texas, my parents were seemingly unaware. Like nervous parents across the ages, my folks could not commit to the nail biting intensity that was October, opting to keep the telly off, and the blood pressure low. And this is this girl's attempt to not even discuss the federal election that was so prominently intwined through the Jays fever. So, yes,  the span of months of blog neglect were rightly filled with newsworthy events. Nevertheless it all returns to the fact that I didn't like the book and morning cake really is best served cold.

Ernest Cline, crowned purveyor of 1980s nostalgia rose to the heights of geeky goodness with Ready Player One. An homage to gamer cultural, Ready Player One offers a unique literary opportunity to fall within the clutches of a video game without ever having to play. Addictive enough to distract I recall only the joy of pursuit unable to summon details, depth or characters. A recent review that shines a less than spectacular light upon this first novel has me questioning if Ready Player One was worthy of my passionate recommendations. Did the chase leave me so besotted that I was blind to all else? Having completed Armada months ago, irked beyond a rational state, I question less Cline's writing prowess and more our cultural obsession with nostalgia.

What is of more importance, an author who writes well, or an author who through social media networks displays a lifestyle perpetuated in his/her books that coincidentally enhances the sales? Simply stepping into the arena of Twitter it is obvious that it takes more than written talent to promote a book. My feed is inundated with Andy Weir hugging yet another scientist while Scalzi is documenting a minute by minute account of his existence, to Ernest Cline driving his Delorian across the galaxy saving old Atari video games with George R. R. Martin. While I am not against such campaigns, finding it all quite entertaining, I am beginning to suspect we, the reading public have been duped. 

Armada is the story of a teenage boy who saves the world. With an innate talent for video-games, Zac Lightman spies through his school classroom window a spacecraft that improbably emerged from the very game he obsessively plays. The plot moves along at a maddeningly logical progression exhibiting little in way of surprise. Having either read or viewed this arc countless of times, relishing each new spin on the classic tale, I would have gladly enjoyed myself if I hadn't been drowned in 80s jargon. Every other sentence hallmarks the past, and while that can be highly effective in developing wit, too much becomes saccharine. Do yourself a favour, rent The Last Starfighter and enjoy the plot in it's original conception.

Geek Out: A Review of The Martian, Andy Weir

Having slammed the door in February's cold face, it is time to welcome with open arms, March the month of breaks, the month we need the most even though we all think it's July. July, what a flashy hussy. Drowning in deadlines, heatless rooms, burst water pipes, doldrums of wintery skies, this family was in need of one bad. What will be tossed in the suitcase continues to mystify me as I wrestle with the appropriateness of my reading choices. 

Having already returned, inadvertently altering this post from a contemplative reading travel essay to "look who's back", I acquiesce my accomplishments were little to nothing beyond a killer tan and an unhealthy relationship with KUWTK; brain functionality is not a provision for this girl's vacay. When you read so much, reading nothing can be pretty darn awesome. 

While the resident geek may have slipped into a vacation coma, there were others who did read and read well. The hubby, a voracious internet addict, unplugged, sat in the sun, and opened up The Martian by Andy Weir. We, his adoring family barely saw him; this girl has never been more proud. 

2014 had two IT books, The Martian by Andy Weir and Ancillary Justice by Anne Leckie. Home with palm tree deficiency syndrome, I am soothing my broken tanned soul with Weir's no nonsense science fiction tale. Mindful that I have used this reference numerous times, it rings true once again. What book is better labeled SF than a plot about an astronaut stranded on Mars. With the recent bad ass pictures of Buzz Aldrin promoting missions to Mars while touristing Stonehenge, this novel seems extremely close to our very near future. The Martian is thankfully martian-less; you won't find any vomit zombies, sentient planets or ingeniously improbable time travelling worm holes. The abrupt, at times crude means by which it is written is a compatible fit to the toils that the protagonist endures. Weir has spent most of his life geeking out, creating orbital software, envisioning Martian missions and the consequence that such a flight would have on it's astronauts. Eventually his little hobby became a book and here I am contemplating why journal entry prose wind up being some of my favourite good time reads. I am a sucker for the first person narrative. 

Even though The Martian negates the typical fantastical science fiction plot lines that I have been addicted to as of late, it dances within the confines of hard science. Like Mark Watney, the science is as laid back as the protagonist, allowing the reader to feel almost as smart as an engineering botanist, the first pioneer of Mars, almost.