I'm conflicted about Artemis.

Did I like it? Yes. It was a fun, fast-paced science fiction novel that, like The Martian, is heavier on the science than the sci fi books I typically read/enjoy. Weir does a good job of presenting science (whether it's legitimate science or fantastical science) in an interesting manner even though sometimes there is a LOT of science explanation. Some of the supporting characters were also quite interesting -- Jazz's father and Rudy the security enforcer to name a few. I found that these supporting characters and the engaging world building of this "city on the moon" drew me into the story fairly early on.

Did I dislike it? Yes. My dislike centers mainly around the central character - Jazz Bashara who is easily one of THE most annoying characters I think I have ever read. She reads more like a prepubescent boy than a twenty-something woman. A dirty joke here and there is one thing...but her entire monologue is one crude joke after another. Her one-liners just become tiresome fairly early on in the plot. I kept hoping Weir would tie her strange characterization into the plot somehow...but it just never materialized.

I found it to be an interesting story...I just don't know if the issues I had with how the main character is portrayed justifies (for me) the time spend reading the story.

My issues with Jazz aside, if you enjoyed The Martian and Weir's writing style then I would recommend you also check out Artemis. This title will be released on November 14, 2017.

Nov 01, 2017 · edit
it was amazing

I received an ARC of this book from NetGalley in exchange for a fair and honest review.I

Ok, #1 thing is that I loved this book, I could hardly put it down! With that being said, there were some issues with the book. As some other reviewers have stated, Mr. Weir seemed to have some difficulty getting inside a young woman's head. But overall I found it to be an exciting read with a lot of science, but put in layman's terms for the scientifically ignorant.

Jazz was a wonderful main character, despite the occasional mental comment that seemed rather juvenile. As Jazz is 26 years old, it didn't click like it should have.

But the part I really felt was a letdown was the ending, it was written to be dramatic, but it was really anticlimactic for me. I finished the book thinking, that's it!!??

With all of that being said, I am still glad that I read it, and am eagerly anticipating Mr. Weir's next book.

*ARC provided by the publisher via NetGalley - thank you! This in no way impacted my opinions of this book.*

Going into this book, I was a bit nervous. After all, like so many people, I was completely blown away by The Martian. I loved Mark, so would I be able to enjoy this without constantly comparing this narrator to him? Turns out the answer was yes (eventually).

Jazz has spent pretty much her entire life living in Artemis, the city on the moon, and while she has always shown an incredible aptitude for math, science, and engineering, she instead works as a delivery person (a front for her smuggling organization). When presented with the chance to make more money than she could ever dream of, Jazz takes it, but things quickly spiral out of control.

This space-caper is an action packed heist story - the best way I can describe it is Ocean's 11 on the moon. The characters jump off the page, the stakes are constantly being raised, and I'm always a sucker for a sarcastic narrator. While at times I felt overwhelmed by the technical jargon and from time to time it slowed the pace of the story, overall I really enjoyed Weir's sophomore novel and look forward to whatever comes next.

This is a strong follow up to The Martian. There's the same wit and humor with a similar sci-fi premise. My only criticism would be that the main character is basically the main character from the Martian but a 26 year old female instead of a 30-40 something year old male. Really smart, but sarcastic as all get out and definitely doesn't play by the rules. It was enjoyable and I would recommend it for anyone who wants a smart adventure story set on the moon!

4.5 stars - If you thought Andy Weir's was a one-shot wonder think again. I loved "The Martian" and "Artemis" does not disappoint; great story, well-written and well-paced. It has everything; suspense, romance and just enough science to make it real without overwhelming this non-science person. Other than the end seeming a bit rushed there is nothing negative I could say about this book.

Artemis: A Novel

Avec The Martian, lu dans une version à 0,99 $ bien avant sa reprise dans une grande maison d’édition et bien avant le film, Andy Weir m’avait scotchée dans le genre livre d’ingénieur bien fichu et très très drôle (bien mieux que le film vous dis-je !). Avec Artemis: A Novel, il confirme sur sa lancée tout en s’essayant à un autre genre : l’intrigue policière avec en guise de héros un criminel au grand cœur. Ou plutôt une criminelle, Jazz, contrebandière établie sur la seule ville lunaire, Artemis, et embrigadée sans le vouloir dans une tentative de prise de contrôle mafieuse des lieux.
Comme pour The Martian, Andy Weir dresse un portrait ultraréaliste et particulièrement détaillé de la vie sur la Lune

Andy Weir’s sophomore novel is set on the Moon, specifically in Artemis, the first and only lunar colony and 26 year old Jasmine Bashara’s home since she was six years old. On paper, Jazz works as a porter, but her true business is smuggling in contraband items through shipments from Earth. Poor, smart, and a chronic underachiever (and tired of people pointing that out), Jazz gets entangled in corporate games and the fate of Artemis as she struggles to make a few slugs. Elements of The Martian’s style are apparent – foul-mouthed Jazz spends a lot of time explaining, ranging from the much-needed explanation of lunar physics and colony workings to the rather unnecessary explanations of Muslim clothing. And maybe it’s my love of The Moon is a Harsh Mistress casting a shadow, but many of the dynamics of the colony’s workings seem a little underdeveloped or glossed over. All in all, it’s a quick read with fast-paced action that keeps the plot moving quickly forward, but nothing stellar and slightly disappointing. I would be interested to see this author try something new or try reading his short stories instead.

Artemis is just a really fun and fast-paced book to read. There is a lot of science behind how the city is constructed and how things work when you live in the only city on the moon. I have no clue if the science is accurate or not but I don’t really care. The story didn’t get bogged down by all the science explanations and moved quickly. This book isn’t anything like The Martian except maybe the main characters have a tendency to be snarky. I am going to call this sci-fi light. It’s that book you need after ready something heavy, deep, and thought provoking.

Note: This interview will appear in Mountain Times, print and online, on Nov. 16, 2017. (http://www.wataugademocrat.com/mountaintimes/columns/book_reviews/)

It’s been six years since Andy Weir’s novel, “The Martian,” was published, three years since it was reissued and two years since the movie by the same title was released — all to the phenomenal success that could set any debut novelist’s head spinning with stars.

Repeating that success with a sophomore effort could seem like a moonshot, but that’s exactly what Weir has in mind with “Artemis” (Crown). And, after reading the new novel, it’s apparent the author is again firing on all cylinders, prepared for a successful launch and positioned well for an even more successful landing on myriad bestseller lists.

But, enough of the space cliches. Recently, Weir agreed to take a few emailed questions about his new novel — this one featuring a female protagonist every bit as razor witted as “The Martian’s” Mark Watney.

The twist this time: Instead of astronaut Watney trying to think his way off of Mars after being left behind and presumed dead, it’s space-native Jazz Bashara trying to find a way to continue hustling a life on Artemis, the first and only city on the moon — and one peopled by rich tourists and eccentric billionaires. Bashara is smart and arguably eccentric, but she’s not rich. That she also finds herself increasingly involved in a conspiracy to take control of the city fuels Weir’s rocket-like narrative.

Yet, no more of this count-down. Read below for Weir’s interview.

Apologies, I couldn’t resist.

Tom: Let’s start with the most obvious departure from your debut novel: “Artemis” features a protagonist with even more intellect, ability and wit than Mark Watney showcased in “The Martian.” The comparisons will be inevitable, so why the shift to a female perspective?

Andy: I didn’t set out to make a female Saudi lead. It just evolved that way. Originally, Jazz was a minor character in a completely different story idea. As I worked on the plot and characters for "Artemis," Jazz just kept becoming more and more prominent. Once I decided she would be the lead, she was already cemented in my mind as a Saudi woman. My imagination would have rebelled at me if I tried to change her at that point.

Tom: You’re a self-confessed “space nerd,” and the depth of science you bring to your novels is enviable. What was the research like for “Artemis,” and how did it differ from researching “The Martian?”

Andy: I did a lot of research and math, of course. But that’s the fun part. I enjoy that. I had to work out the economics of the city, and how they built it in the first place. It was quite a lot of work, but very fun. The sad part, for me, is that I only got to tell the reader a tiny percentage of what I worked out. If it wasn’t important to the plot, I didn’t dwell on it.

Tom: What type of challenges in writing the novel did you have to overcome to set a crime story on the moon?

Andy: Well, I had to make an economy. And I had to figure out exactly how people could smelt local lunar ore into usable metals. I had to work out how they power the city. And how they cool it. And how they make sure people don’t just all die of radiation sickness. Plus, I had to make sure the city was designed so a single mistake by someone couldn’t kill everybody.

Tom: Of those challenges, what was the most difficult problem you had to solve to flesh out your story?

Andy: The biggest challenge, storywise, was creating the entire economy of a lunar city from scratch. I had to make the setting work before any story there would seem plausible to the reader. Readers are more perceptive than people think. If you try to hand-wave the reason people are living in a city, it calls the whole setting into question. So I needed a tangible reason why people actually live on the moon. My answer ended up being tourism, but I had to do a lot before the economics of that worked.

Once you have a city, though, coming up with crimes to take place in it is easy. Crime happens wherever humans live.

Tom: The Washington Post ran a story on Oct. 6 under the headline, “We have a pretty good idea of when humans will go extinct.” The answer, at least from one science perspective, is between 5,100 and 7.8 million years from now — unless we manage to colonize the universe. Is the moon truly a viable option for future human relocation should we need to emigrate from planet Earth?

Andy: I haven’t read the article, so I don’t know how they came to that number. However, I think that if we have at least five thousand years to work with, colonizing the other bodies in our solar system will be trivial. Consider the technological advances in the past thousand years. In the year 1117 they had just invented “the plow” — and now we have the International Space Station.

Also, I’m not sure what would kill us five thousand years from now, but my guess is we could figure out how to beat it by then.

Tom: Dec. 11, 1972, was the United States’ last manned moon landing. We now have a presidential administration that is pushing a return to the moon via a partnership with industry. What are your thoughts on this call for a new moon launch?

Andy: I’m excited about any push to explore beyond low-Earth orbit. Mars, the moon, asteroid missions, whatever it takes. As for what we “should” be working on, that depends on what we’re trying to accomplish. If we want to put a flag and some footprints on Mars, then there’s no reason to return to the moon. But, if we’re looking at viable off-Earth locations for a permanent human settlement, then the moon is definitely our first stop.

As for colonizing Mars, I just don’t see any way to do it without already having a lunar colony. Colonizing Mars before colonizing the moon would be like the ancient Romans colonizing Japan before they colonized Sicily.

Tom: Similarly, do you find the efforts of industry giants such as Elon Musk, Jeffrey Bezos and, most recently, Robert Bigelow of Bigelow Aerospace’s inflatable space habitats — and announcer of plans to build an orbiting space station for the moon — encouraging?

Andy: Yes, very much so. These are exciting developments. Once the space industry has legitimate competition for middle class customers we’ll see a massive improvement in space technology.

Tom: “Artemis” the novel has just been released (Nov. 14), but what can you tell us about plans for “Artemis” the movie?

Andy: It’s early days yet.Phil Lord and Christopher Miller are set to direct. Right now, they’re considering writers to adapt the book to a screenplay. A million things have to go right for a film to actually be made. I’m hopeful it will happen, of course. I would love to see it on the screen.

Fabulous! For those who thought Any Weir couldn't top the Martian, think again. Jazz is just an ordinary girl in a small community. Except that her small community is on the Moon! Trying to win back her father's approval, Jazz jumps from one scheme to another until she finds herself in a tangled web that she can't get out of. Armed with an extraordinary intellect and a ragtag assortment of friends and former friends, Jazz must save Moon-kind from a dire fate at the hands of Lunar Mobsters. You do not want to miss this not so futuristic tale of of intrigue and redemption.

I really enjoyed this one! Very different from The Martian, but not in a bad way. Jazz's voice is great!

I received a free Kindle copy of Artemis by Andy Weir courtesy of Net Galley  and Crown Publishing, the publisher. It was with the understanding that I would post a review on Net Galley, Goodreads, Amazon, Barnes and Noble and my fiction book review blog. I also posted it to my Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and Google Plus pages.

I requested this book as I  read Weir's first novel, The Martian, and enjoyed it.

Unfortunately, as with many new authors, after a very successful first novel the second one fails to come close to the first. The basic story of a moon colony had great potential, but the book did not deliver. It was predictable, the characters were uninteresting, it was very slow moving at times and very easy to put down to read something else. It reads as though the author was under contract to produce a second book while he was still a hot commodity.

I really can't recommend this book other than you may have a very different take on it.

Artemis, by Andy Weir, is about a small town that just happens to be on the moon. It is a city with it's share of problems: income disparity, misfits, obnoxious tourists, and corruption. This book was wonderfully fun, and I loved the small town feeling, the main character Jazz, along with large doses of intrigue, action, and humor.

What I Liked:

Small Town Feeling:

I love books about small towns. All the characters have a history together, and it is a treat to uncover all the backstories. This small town just happens to be on the Moon, so there is even more of a feeling of shared purpose among the residents.

As lovely as it is to live in a place with a sense of community, it can also be a drag for those who don't fit in. Everyone knows your business and once you develop a reputation, it is nearly impossible to get a fresh start. With just a few poor choices (or maybe many), Jazz has a reputation as a trouble maker. And no one, from her father, to the city's constable, will let her forget it, either.

The book also had some smart speculation on what a society on the moon would look like. There would still be rich and poor, corruption, vigilantly justice, and other societal issues, even on the moon.

Main Character:

The main character of this book is a smart, self-reliant, woman of color! I appreciated all the small touches that brought this character to life. Even though she is a lapsed Muslim, she still has many cultural connections to Saudi Arabia, where she was born. Her ethnicity wasn't just mentioned to tick off a diversity box!

Everyone in town knows that Jazz had amazing potential as a younger person, but she made some very poor choices as a teen. She is still trying to live down her bad reputation. She also has a difficult relationship with her devout Muslim father, and is bitter over a terrible breakup. But she is also proud and will not ask for help resolving her problems. I admired her self-sufficiency, but also cringed when her stubbornness prevented her from connecting with others.

Intrigue:

In such a closed economy there is bound to be a little corruption, right? Various groups have monopolies on different industries. The one that has the biggest grip on the city is the company who manufactures aluminum in the town. Apparently, oxygen is a by-product of aluminum production (who knew?) and rather important to the vitality of Artemis. When Jazz is hired to disrupt the aluminum smelting process by a competitor, a series of events unfold that expose an intricate web of lies that keep the town running. Will Jazz take the fall, or will she use her wits to uncover what is behind everyone's interest in aluminum?

Action:

One of the signatures of an Andy Weir novel is the McGyver-like problem solving skills the characters use to escape danger. The author's use of scientific attention to detail creates a sense of realism to the novel. There are many scenes where being on the Moon creates life-threatening problems for Jazz. But she is able to use her brains (and sometimes her fists) to figure out the solution. This was so fun to read, and I hear there will be a movie coming soon. Based on my reading, this will make a very exciting film.

Humor:

This book is narrated by the main character, Jazz, and is full of humor (and a lot of swearing!). While her observations of small town life are witty and astute, this book is not a comedy. But I laughed throughout reading this story.

Andy Weir and I have fundamentally different opinions of his protagonist. He clearly believes she is a down on her luck, extremely clever, good person. I think she is an extremely clever terrorist.

That said. This book reads like if Ocean’s Eleven really cared about science. I enjoyed it on the whole. Weir’s narrative format, interspersed backstory through correspondence, managed to avoid exposition dumping, which is a trap many authors fall into.

I want to start off by saying I was really excited to read "Artemis". I've heard SUCH good things about "The Martian", although I haven't read it myself, so requesting an ARC of this book just seemed like a no-brainer, right? Wrong. What should've been an amazingly diverse and interesting scientific book with action and intrigue was...well, all of that, don't get me wrong, but also dry and forced. Throughout what I was able to read of the book, because no, I could not finish it, the main character liked to tell the reader that she is in fact a girl and mentioned sex so many times, I was rolling my eyes. I'm not a prude, y'all, it just felt so forced.

Alright, enough ranting, let's get into what I actually liked. The science behind it all. The author did a really good job with this aspect. There were even maps at the beginning of the book, which I appreciated! The science was what I came for, and science is what I got. It was what made me keep reading as long as I did. So thank you for that.

Reradiation

The problem I have with this book is reradiation, that physical property that makes black cooler than white.

No Benjamin Franklin was not wrong, but his paper on snow experiment did not go far enough. Reradiation is a tricky concept. Sometimes black is hotter than white (walk barefoot in the Shwedagon Pagoda in the summertime and your feet will tell you that) but sometimes black is cooler than white (Tuarag robes, for example). The point is, in space you don't make stuff shiny to reflect sunlight and be cooler, in space shiny stuff is hotter because it can't shed its internal heat because the inside of the reflective surface reflects the heat back in, instead of shedding it out.

Andy Weir spends a lot of time, LOTS of time, explaining how things work on the moon but in his imagining everything is shiny. I don't buy it.

Some other details niggled at me too. Why didn't the rich guy who asks Jazz to commit the crime advance her money to cover costs? High tech crime costs money and Jazz has very little to acquire the tech she needs. (Remember the subplot in Ocean's 11?) And why didn't he offer her the use of his shower, instead of complaining that she smelled? Now that would have bought her loyalty.

You might like this book or you might not. I was annoyed at the overly descriptive writing.

I received a review copy of "Artemis: A Novel"by Andy Weir (Crown) through NetGalley.com.

It has been quite a long time since I’ve been so absorbed within a book that I was compelled to literarily devour it from cover to cover within twenty four hours. Artemis, chock full of action from page one, will quickly draw the reader in for an out of earth adventure on the moon colony that shares the name of the novel. Weir’s second novel doesn’t disappoint, especially having to follow up the wild success of his debut novel, The Martian. The Martian was my first book every reviewed on The Critiquing Chemist, and I hesitated to link my review because my formatting has evolved so much from day one. It almost makes me want to reread The Martian so I can update the formatting of a book I so thoroughly enjoyed. Regardless, based on my initial love of Weir’s work, I was ecstatic to be sent an ARC copy of his sophomore novel. Taking the place of the memorable Mark Watney is the spunky, funny, equally innovative and intelligent Jasmine Bashara, a.k.a. Jazz, whose foul mouth ranges the full spectrum of cringe worthy to literally causing the reader to laugh out loud. The supporting cast is equally delightful, including a Ukrainian scientist that contains all of the stereotypical tendencies that are associated with that career, and a head of security that dresses like a Mountie with the law enforcement philosophy of a Wild West sheriff. Toward the end of Artemis, I found myself having comparable exasperated feelings as when I read The Martian, with regard to the myriad of disasters our protagonists would find themselves in only to have just the right tool or the right problem solving epiphany in the knick of time. Overall, Artemis was a highly amusing read that will keep readers enthralled throughout as they embark on a harrowing adventure taking place within a city that calls the moon home.

Okay, I'm Jazzed.

Finally - a heroine who's independent, feisty and could give MacGyver a run for his money. That much of the time Jasmine ("Jazz") Bashara skirts the edge of the law makes her all the more interesting. Throw in a kinky sense of humor that doesn't let up from start to finish, and I'm in it all the way.

Jazz, now in her mid-20s, has lived in Artemis - the first and so far only city on the moon - since early childhood. Residents live and work in five self-contained spheres called bubbles that have numerous fail-safes to protect residents from an unfriendly moon atmosphere. People come from all parts of Earth to live and visit (tourism is big business, and trips from Artemis to Earth take half a dozen days or so). Jazz herself is from Saudi Arabia, brought by her father, who practices the welding trade in his adopted city. They aren't particularly close - for openers, he's a practicing Muslim and she has no interest in any kind of religion.

Because it's forging new territory, life on Artemis isn't as fully regimented as is Earth; some rules, for instance, like no firearms (or fire of any kind, for that matter), are more stringent, mostly for safety reasons. In addition to her regular but peon-type job, Jazz has been smuggling goodies up from Earth for quite some time. But because she's almost desperate to earn lots of money (called "slugs" on Artemis) so she can move out of her coffin-like living quarters and eat food that isn't reminiscent of Soylent Green, she's hoping for something closer to a windfall.

Then along comes her big chance, in the form of filthy rich businessman Trond Landvik. He's consumed with the notion of putting Artemis's huge aluminum smelting operation out of commission so he can buy it at a fire-sale price and take over. Knowing her proclivity with a blowtorch (some skills she bothered to learn from her father) and willingness to color outside the lines, he offers Jazz a monumental amount of slugs if she can disable the company's four "harvesters" that gather rocks from the moon for use in the smelting process.

Needless to say, things don't exactly go according to plan, and Jazz and her cohorts more than once find themselves between a rock and a hard place (literally). Telling more would ruin the story for others, though, so you'll just have to read it to find out who wins and who loses.

What I will venture to say is that I liked this book even better than the author's previous book, "The Martian," which also earned 5 stars from me (and FYI, each of the two books stands totally alone). Admittedly, Jazz can grate on the nerves a bit, although overall I enjoyed the heck out of her sense of humor. And as was the case in "The Martian," the technical stuff is both educational and fun but can be a bit overwhelming at times.

But in the end, I loved it. Many thanks to the publisher (via NetGalley) for the opportunity to read an advance copy in exchange for an honest review.

Holy crap!
I am never good at writing reviews for books like this because I don't want to spoil a thing, but if you read "The Martian" and you're a fan of a good sci-fi novel, PICK THIS BOOK UP!