An ARC was provided by the publisher via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review. *Thank you so much!*

Let me start with this: I do recommend, and it's nothing like The Martian (which I LOVED!! FYI). It's got comedy, murder, smuggling, and lots of sciency geek speek, lol. I enjoyed the female protagonist, and all the side characters too.

Brief (I hope) synopsis of the book.
Jazz lives on the moon and has since she was 6.


When I moved here I was six years old - that was the minimum age for residency back then. Since then they've bumped it up to twelve. Should I be worried?

(I think I snorted when I read that line. :) )

She makes a living as a smuggler and thru this met billionaire Trond Landvik. Long story short, Trond outlines his plans for world moon domination and offers Jazz an opportunity to make some money.


"I'm sorry, but this isn't my thing," [Jazz] said. "You'll have to find someone else."
"I'll give you a million slugs."
"Deal."

She is clearly a business savvy smuggler. ;)

The nefarious plan (in a nutshell) is for Jazz to break the "dump trucks" that bring moon rocks to a smelter which as a by-product create oxygen which is then used to provide breathable air on the moon. The reason Trond wants Jazz to do this is so he can then take over the contract (there are reasons, which you will learn when you read the book way beyond this point. But it's related to something called ZAFO.).
"What's ZAFO?"
"Suck a dick!"

Unfortunately Jazz's plan doesn't go according to plan and her once clandestine mission is discovered and she needs to figure out how to finish the job. Incomplete job=no money. BUT!! As she is working on a plan, she discovers something.


I walked up to the Landvik estate's main entrance and rang the chime. No answer. Huh. That was odd. .... That's when I noticed the damage to the door. ... I pushed open the door and peeked into the foyer. No sign of Irina or Trond. A decorative vase lay on the ground...a splash of bright-red blood on the wall-
"Nope!" I said.
I spun on my heel and stormed back into the hallway. "Nope, nope, nope!"

(ahahahaha!!!)

So now Jazz has to find and stop a killer (because they are after her too).


"Goddammit!" I yelled to him. "Will you stop whining about your problems during my murder?!"

Thankfully Jazz has some friends (and father) she can rely on to help her end the whole drama once and for all.


I hopped off the roof and landed next to him.
"You shouldn't jump down that far," he said.
"You shouldn't fuck other people's boyfriends."
"Oh, come on!"
"I could get used to this new relationship we have."

(OMG, I find this whole relationship dynamic soooo hilarious! :-D )

Many shenanigans follow.


Crashing your pressure vessel into things is bad. It can lead to unscheduled dying.

(Bahahahahaha!!!!)

Of course things don't go according to plan - again.

This whole deal centers around Sanchez Aluminum, and Loretta Sanchez is the CEO and founder. When Jazz goes forth and starts her destruction, Loretta doesn't leave for safety, and instead stays to inspect the problem Jazz creates. Loretta isn't prepared to leave her smelter (it melts the rock which produces the oxygen).


"A smelter I poured my life and soul into, which you just destroyed, you reckless puddle of exudate!"
"Don't think I won't look that up!"

Jazz is a sarcastic and SMART woman who could have been a very successful (legal) businesswoman on Artemis. But through life choices she ended up being a smuggler instead and despite all she did (I left out A LOT!!! And it's a doozy of a thing, trust me - it's good), she isn't deported from the moon (she finagles a way to stay on the moon). Let's just say those million slugs she was promised to create all this havoc? She doesn't exactly get to keep it. :)

I thoroughly enjoyed Artemis and found it to be very entertaining. As I said before, it's not like The Martian, but it is certainly well written, and Weir's comedic talent is fully present. I didn't laugh as much as I did with The Martian, but I did laugh. The world building is amazing,


[Ngugi] made sure Kenya enacted special tax breaks and laws just for the new megacorporation. What's that you say? Favoring a single company with special laws isn't fair? Tell that to the East India Tea Company. This is global economics, not kindergarten.

and I felt I knew everything there was to know about living on the moon (the good and the bad - which I pray isn't what happens when the human race decides to be stupid and live on the moon). The science speak is definitely present in this book, which I will admit to skimming because I am soooo not a science person, but I read enough to know that Jazz is one smart cookie who is wasting her talents as a smuggler.

There is murder in the story, which is a shame, but it proves necessary to move the story along to the next point. I loved how Jazz didn't go into the house like the stupid heroines of horror movies. Clearly she watched YouTube and found "horror movies for smart people." ;) Yep, that is totally a thing - look it up.

Overall I do recommend you read this. Especially if you are already a fan of Andy Weir.

4 stars

And I leave you with something that should (I hope) make you smile.

"Is that a condom?"
"Yes!" he said proudly. "My latest invention."
"The Chinese beat you by seven centuries."
"This is not your everyday condom!"
"Why would anyone buy this?"
He grinned. "It's reusable."
"Are you shitting me?"
"Not at all!" ... "After each use, you turn the condom inside-out and put it on the cylinder-"
"Ew."
"Then you turn on the cleaner."
*
"I'm not looking for investors. I need someone to test it."
"And you think I've got the dick for the job?"
He rolled his eyes. "I need to know how it feels for the woman."
"I'm not having sex with you."
"No, no!" He winced. "I just want you to use it the next time you have sex. Then tell me how it affected your experience."
*
"I need data from a woman who is having sex for fun. The woman has to be sexually experienced, which you definitely are-"
"Careful..."
"And likely to have sex in the near future. Which, again-"
"Choose your next words wisely."
*
"Did you get a chance to use the condom?"
"It's been twenty-four hours! What kind of sex life do you think I have?"
*
"Did you get a chance to test the condom?"
"No, I haven't had sex in the two days since you gave me the condom."
*
"Hey, did you try out the condom yet?"
"Goddammit, Svoboda!" I said.
"What? I'm waiting for feedback here."
I threw up my hands and walked away.

Cheers!!

After thoroughly enjoying "The Martian", I looked forward to Weir's next book. Again, he writes a good science infused adventure....but I really felt like it read more as a YA genre.... maybe because of the attitude described of the main character, maybe due to the 'penpal like letters', or just the youthful description...... It was a good, quick read....offered an interesting window into that 'future'?! I do/did like all the scientific explanations/offerings. I'll look forward to his next offering too! It was good enough!
I did receive this e-galley free from NetGalley, in return for my own fair & honest review. All opinions offered are my own.

I'll definitely keep reading Weir.

_Artemis_ is not a rehash of _The Martian_, and it shouldn't be.. It does, however, use Weir's formula of a not-to-distant future, with well thought out, detailed, and believable technology. It doesn't require buying into a 'Weirverse' where "This ain't your familiar world," and we have to accept whatever deus ex machina solutions the author throws at us.. We understand these people and their culture. And we don't have to suspend disbelief to accept their technology.

Two weaknesses: First, _Martian_ entailed a long series of life-threatening situations and clever technological solutions, which were believable and what that story demanded. _Artemis_ uses and somewhat overuses the same formula: there have to be repeated life-or-death situations; the heroine has to come up with a brilliant techno-solution each time; all saves and rescues have to be accomplished at the last second. We even get a diminutive female heroine with no apparent self-defense training, able to repeatedly overcome attacks by a professional killer. In other words, it devolves somewhat into a trite, predictable thriller.

Second, Jazz's endless snarky responses grow tiresome. And they are the snark of 2017. The smart-assery of 50 or 100 years ago was different, and it will be different 50 or 100 years from now. She is a snotty smart-ass from a 2010s sitcom. It grates a bit, like characters in a Disney fantasy animation talking like today's teenagers.

But read it. And read the next Andy Weir book.

Andy Weir has another winner on his hands. It's quite different from his first book, The Martian, but every bit as enjoyable. Once again there's a fun mixture of comedy, drama, adventure, and science., and once again it's presented in first-person-- this time by a 26 year-old woman.. Artemis doesn't concentrate on the science as much as The Martian did, plus there are a lot more characters who interact with the heroine, so it's probably much more accessible. I'll be recommending this book to everyone.

Artemis

by Andy Weir

What’s better than being stranded on Mars and abandoned by your crew with only potatoes to live on?

Anything really.

Anything would be better than that.

But if we are talking in terms of Andy Weir’s brilliant first novel THE MARTIAN, what would be better that Andy Weir writing the witty and scientifically credible story of one character? That would be Andy Weir creating a witty and scientifically credible story about a whole city on the moon with an awesome no nonsense female protagonist smuggler. Which he did when he wrote ARTEMIS.

Having loved Weir’s writing voice in THE MARTIAN, I scooped up ARTEMIS immediately and summarily devoured it. The protagonist, Jazz, a citizen of Artemis, the moon colony, slaves away as a smuggler to save up enough slugs for a better life. Because moon real estate sounds pricier than New York and San Francisco combined. An integral player in the city’s sordid underbelly, Jazz is roped into a scheme by a wealthy benefactor while desperately dodging the ever-watchful moon cop and a new slew of moon mafia. Which, let’s face it, is kinda challenging in a city that’s literally under a bubble. (Note to self: this could be included in the genre: books that effectively employ domes as a device.) Let’s just say that oxygen is at a premium in zero G.

With a seriously diverse cast of characters, an entirely new take on moon landing and a unique pen pal scenario, Artemis is bound to launch to the bestsellers’ list immediately. Pun intended.

Kudos to Weir for introducing a minority female protagonist who is dynamic, intelligent, flawed, and beautiful - and incidentally, like a lot of the awesome dynamic, intelligent, flawed and beautiful female characters in my own life.

Plus, reading Weir is like taking a cool science class as an adult, just in a totally different atmosphere.

I think this will make a fun movie, It was not that great of a book. Bit of a let down from the Martian, the dialogue was clunky and I'm not sure Weir was entirely comfortable with the female voice. The moon colony setting was enjoyable though.

Interesting and action-packed novel with a backdrop of a colonized moon. Andy Weir has written another exciting adventure set in space—this time the setting is the moon's only established city, Artemis, and features Jazz Bashara, a total kick-ass, smart-ass, asshole of a woman. Just like with The Martian, Weir once again grounds his technical jargon with humor in what is clearly a more Young/New Adult-centric story.

Jazz feels a lot like The Martian's main character, astronaut Mark Watney (which makes me picture Matt Damon). In fact, I didn't realize Jazz (short for Jasmine, as it turns out) was female for the first 4% of the book. Jazz is hardened and tough, an overall fun character to read. Though she experiences little growth throughout the book, the steadfastness of her character is central to the effectiveness of the plot as the plot turns into supporting quite the caper.

So, as this version of The Martian transitions to be a moon-based Ocean's Eleven (also featuring Matt Damon interestingly enough), the novel's pace alternates between speeding up and plateauing out. This makes for an intriguing and unpredictable storyline. I was never quite sure where Jazz was headed with her plans, with her rash decisions, and with her crew. She's bold, impulsive, and yet a fascinatingly intelligent, strong female character. Her biting wit and caustic sarcasm was perfect for this role.

While the book did get a little mired down in technical aspects and actions required for Jazz's situations, not much steam was lost and the story chugged along to a humorous and satisfying ending.

WARNING: If you want to form your own opinion of Artemis, you might not want to read this review. If you would like to know what you're wading into, go ahead and read on.

I really wanted to like this story.

My God, did I want to like this story. The Martian is one of my favorite books of all time, mostly because Andy Weir is a sarcastic and wonderful genius and Mark Watney is a fantastic character.

Unfortunately, Artemis displays very little of that great sarcasm and characterization. 

In the book, "Artemis" is the name of the city on the moon where our main character, Jasmine Bashara, who goes by the name of Jazz, currently lives. She's a rough and tumble street character who controls the majority of the smuggling in and out of the city. She has a few wealthy clients who will pay her an extreme amount of money in order to get their items (cigars, for example, which are outlawed because they're flammable and you don't wanna set anything on fire where there's a surplus of pure oxygen). 

In fact, let me just give you the synopsis from Amazon so I don't mess this up: 

***

Jazz Bashara is a criminal.

Well, sort of. Life on Artemis, the first and only city on the moon, is tough if you’re not a rich tourist or an eccentric billionaire. So smuggling in the occasional harmless bit of contraband barely counts, right? Not when you've got debts to pay and your job as a porter barely covers the rent.

Everything changes when Jazz sees the chance to commit the perfect crime, with a reward too lucrative to turn down. But pulling off the impossible is just the start of her problems, as she learns that she's stepped square into a conspiracy for control of Artemis itself—and that now, her only chance at survival lies in a gambit even riskier than the first.

***

You good? All right. 

Jazz Bashara is one of the most unpleasant characters I have ever had the misfortune to read about. I mean, I've read some books with pretty terrible writing, but Jazz isn't just poorly written: she's a mish-mash of every female hero rebel stereotype there is. 

Jazz Bashara:

had a falling out with her father years ago
has slept around most of her life because she can't find true love
has had a string of terribly abusive boyfriends in her past
is foul-mouthed
wants to do everything her way or no way
And I could keep the list going, but I don't want to bore you. Weir attempts to give Jazz some backstory by saying she has a specific amount of money she's working towards (just over $416,000 in Artemis-money), and for the majority of the book you believe you know what she's saving up that money for. It was a twist to me at the end, admittedly, but I was proud of what she did with the money.

Jazz is irritating and obnoxious and I could not find myself feeling either sorrow or sympathy for her throughout the majority of the novel. 

In fact, a lot of the things she has to do throughout the novel really requires that you give her the benefit of the doubt. She is hired to dismantle the huge harvesters that supply the raw ore to the aluminum smelting plant, and of course that goes awry, and then everything is just in a downhill spiral from there.

My favorite part of the novel are the letters she writes every few chapters to her elementary school pen pal on Earth, Kevin. He has a lot of advice for her, and she has some advice for him, but I felt so bad for Kevin. Jazz is so clearly using him throughout their entire letter exchange, but at least he does get a percentage of their smuggling profits. I wish we'd had more of Kevin, instead of focusing on all the drama Jazz causes.

THIS NEXT PARAGRAPH CONTAINS A SLIGHT SPOILER. What I hated the MOST was that she spends the entire book saying she'll never sleep with someone (although in much raunchier, NSFW terms than that), and then at the end SHE TOTALLY FALLS FOR HIM. INSTEAD OF FREAKING ALLOWING OUR HEROINE TO LIVE HER LIFE SOLO AND AS AN IRRITATING SMUGGLER, WE LEARN THAT SHE'S JUST GONNA GET INTO ANOTHER RELATIONSHIP. I hate that Jazz is reduced to the lowest of the low at the end, shoving in romance where she didn't need to end up with anyone! SPOILER END.

This is, at its heart, a heist story, but it's saddled with an incredibly unlikable narrator, which ruined the experience for me. I was expecting a narrator like Watney from The Martian, who was funny even in the face of danger. Instead, Jazz just gets more foul-mouthed and annoyingly "rebellious" as the book goes on. 

There were some nice quotes throughout (which I'm not allowed to share with you because the book hasn't been published yet and as such it hasn't been finalized), but overall, this book fell far short of its expectations for me, which was such a disappointment.

I don't know if Weir was trying to capitalize on the success of The Martian by rushing this one, or if he didn't have as much help with this one as he did The Martian, but I finished this book feeling unsatisfied. The final chapter, in particular, really made me angry. If you're going to write a heist story, or a story in general, and you're going to focus on one person, at least make that person remotely likeable. 

I give this book 3/5 stars. It's okay. It's relatively decent, if you can get past the aggravating main character. The story is interesting, even if you have to give it the suspension of disbelief at times. If you're a die-hard fan of Andy Weir, I'd give it a shot. If you like heist stories, maybe give it a shot. If you don't like seeing red every time the main character speaks, skip this book. 

Worst of all, there were no potatoes. If they were mentioned at all, I must have missed it between anger fits at Jazz.

I really enjoyed the snarky attitude of Jazz. She was a great character. I really really liked this book.

Crafting a follow-up to runaway phenomenon The Martian had to be an incredibly daunting task, but Weir has for the most part avoided the dreaded sophomore slump, even if the highs of this book don't match the dizzying ones of its predecessor. Although the events also take place in space, this time the setting is the moon, where a fairly straightforward heist quickly spirals into something much bigger and more sinister. Protagonist Jazz is well rounded and interesting, but Weir clearly has difficulty writing from a female point of view, with an end result of her sounding more like a teenage boy than a 26-year-old woman. The technical aspects become a little too pronounced during the climax, which sadly bog down the story and make it confusing to follow instead of servicing it like in The Martian. Despite its shortcomings, this was a joy to read, and I love the humorous style of writing that Weir employs as well as the colorful cast of supporting characters on display here.

Fast-paced and sarcastically funny like "The Martian", I really loved the world-building of a town on the moon and the details Weir included to make it realistic. Like many readers, I tended to skim the science-y parts to get to the MacGyver-like action, but overall, enjoyed it and tore through it!

I love how realistic Andy Weir makes space travel! He thinks of all the questions I could possibly think up about life on the moon (or, in his previous book, Mars) and answers them. This is a great one to add to collections, especially when fans of The Martian hear Andy Weir has a new book! I'm looking forward to sharing it with patrons at the library.

As someone who liked the Martian a lot, this book was disappointing. The plot was boring, even with an interesting settings, the characters were on dimensional stereotypes. The Martian was renowned for its humor, and this book seemed incapable of making a funny joke. Most of the jokes were at the expense of marginalized people in a way that just came off as offensive. It failed to get at the kind of fresh new territory I would expect from Andy Weir and a book about moon crime. Still, the plot had the same kind of scientific rigor I've come to expect from Andy Weir and the worldbuilding was very interesting in how it enabled the crime. Moon bases mean a whole lot a locked door crimes.

**I would like to thank the publisher and NetGalley for providing me with an advance copy of this novel in exchange for an honest review**

When I was approved for Andy Weir’s new book Artemis I was over the moon (pun intended) with excitement. Like most of the world I loved The Martian and couldn’t wait to read his next book. And when I heard the synopsis for Artemis, I was in love. What an innovative concept! Blend that with a good old fashioned heist story and I’m certain Mr. Weir has himself another massive hit on his hands.

This book was entertaining the whole way through. Written in the same whimsical style as The Martian, Weir keeps the reader laughing and manages to impart interesting scientific factoids along the way. As a main character Jazz was a stroke of genius. I loved this character! Her roguish charms will no doubt draw comparisons to Han Solo in the most flattering way. Weir brought his city on the moon to life with great characters to support Jazz, and fantastic visual details that more than once made me wonder if this city could actually be up there!!

The only negative I had with this read was the odd choice of pen pal letters at the end of chapters. While they gave the reader some back story, they felt unnecessary and broke the story up too much I felt. I found myself rushing through them just to return to the thrill of the main narrative.

A definite 5 star read… or maybe 5 stars and 1 moon (no purple horseshoes or green clovers though lol). This is a must read from a fantastic author.

Really excellent! This novel is about a young woman who has lived on the moon since she was six years old. After a falling out with her father, a devout Muslim, she has carved out a place for herself as a porter and smuggler. She's always looking for the next buck, the next big score, and she is handed an impossible task with a potentially huge payoff.

I enjoyed this novel as much as the author' previous book, "The Martian,". The ending seems to be open to a sequel. I hope that is the case.

Weir's new novel was a breath of fresh air or should I say a cool breeze on a summer night? Well, even though neither of those can really be experienced on the moon, I found Jazz Bashara an entertaining protagonist and outlaw. Jazz's adventures in welding and combustibles had me confused and my head spinning (very similar to how I felt reading The Martian), but this was a brilliantly imaginative and riveting read.

All of the ingenuity and creativity that made The Martian great, but completly different.

I LOVED this novel.
It follows the main character, Jazz, who lives on the moon in a colony-like place. Throw in scientific knowledge, cheesy jokes, and a heist, and it was honestly the most awkward but human book I've read this year. I blew through this story and couldn't wait to find out how it ended. My only complaint is how...weird the main character can be at times but when you grow up on the moon since the age of six, maybe this had some affect on her. I love, though, how smart she is and that, for once, a female character isn't reduced to her body. She might be weird but she's got brains.
The world was built well and much of the science I could understand was legitimately explain. Again, loved it and I would definitely recommend!

I haven't read The Martian nor did I intend to, but now I really want it. From that, you can see how much I liked this one.

The story is quite different, though. First, it takes place in a city built on the moon and controlled by a Kenyan enterprise. Jazz is a street-smart young woman who is tired of only having a small capsule to call home and could really do with a private bathroom. A billionaire's offer to sabotage one of Artemis's monopolies was supposed to be her passport to a more comfortable life until she finds out the heist is against something so big that threatens not only the lives of people she loves but the whole Artemis.

Full disclosure? I'm not a sci-fi or even a fantasy novel fan. That is the very reason I had never taken interest in The Martian before. But I do like the idea of a city on the moon and having a female lead to top it off bought me here. But I had no reason to fear, Weir has a very good way to explain everything that always got me laughing instead of my usual bored-to-death whenever it's "let's teach the readers" time.

The book not only has a girl as the heroine, it barely even mentions the United States. It was patent that the author wanted to avoid the cliche and searched for different countries to compose his Artemis. It's nice to mention, he even inserted a statue of the Chinese goddess of the moon—whose name I'm sorry but I can't remember. Even though I called his effort patent, it was all very well mixed. I remember reading another book that had attempted the same and it became a circus of misfits. It was not the case in Artemis. Point to Weir.

(But knowing well about Latin America, the names chosen for the Brazilians were a little too Hispanic, in my opinion... Sanchez and Alvarez don't sound Brazilian to me.)

On the other hand, I think that the feats I liked were also what bothered me. Jazz wasn't much of a woman, I think you could rewrite the whole thing changing her pronouns to the masculine and it won't make a difference. Except for the awkward moments Weir seemed to feel the need to reassure the readers she was a woman, like making her change clothes in front of an audience, forcing a character to have romantic interest in her (he needs to work on his romantic skills if he really has to insert romance in his stories), repeating for no reason how sexy she is... They were just details so I frowned and pretended they didn't exist. Still, it was a bother.

Another issue were the excessive joking. Yes, they were funny, I liked how they soothed all the scientific explanations. It was also clear, however, that they existed for that very purpose. And while we're on the science, I don't think the book needed that much science. I wonder what someone who really understands what that was about would think but for me, while it wasn't boring, it was still an excess of details. Well, it was still amazing that he thought that far, that I'll concede.

In the end, the plot was way more simple than it really seems and it made me wonder if Jazz—and her employer—didn't go too far if that (spoiler censored) was his objective. Still, the conclusion was satisfying, and I enjoyed how he inserted some Economy talk there, I wasn't expecting that.

I'm excited to read not only The Martian but also Andy Weir's next works, since he proved he's build worlds and think very far about them. What has he got in store for us?

Honest review based on an ARC provided by Netgalley. Many thanks to the publisher for this opportunity.