Convoluted and I hated the heroine—like a teen version of Eloise but more annoying.

Second novels can be tricky, especially when the first novel was a hit. People who loved the first book expect the second to be just as good, but where the author might have had years to refine their first novel, they often get a contract that gives them a lot less time to finish the second.

When The Martian - Andy Weir's wildly successful first novel, which was originally self-published - came out, I read it and loved it. I gave my father a copy for his Christmas book (everyone on my Christmas list gets a book as part of their gift), and he loved it. We saw the movie together in the theatres and really enjoyed it (even if they did throw out a good portion of the second half of the novel).

As a result, I approached Artemis with a lot of trepidation. There was no way it was going to measure up to The Martian, but I hoped that it would still be a good read.

Thankfully, it was.

Artemis takes place on the first city on the moon, where the locals live in cramped spaces (for the most part), and tourism is a large part of the economy, as the rich and powerful come to see where Armstrong was the first person to set foot on the moon.

Jazz moved to the moon with her father, a welder, when she was a child. Now estranged, she works as a runner, and as a smuggler. She's trying to earn a very set amount of money that we don't find out the reason for that amount until nearly the end of the story. Among other things, she smuggles contraband combustables (ie, cigars) for a businessman who moved to the moon to make things easier for his disabled daughter.

But then her client hires her to sabotage a business rival, offering an insane amount of money. But of course things go wrong, and Jazz finds herself on the run from the organized crime backers of the rival. She feels she has no choice but to to try to follow through on her promise.

The plot moved along nicely, and I enjoyed the planning and the action, but unfortunately the characters didn't work as well as they could have. It seemed like Weir was checking off the diversity list. The main character is an Arab woman whose father is a devout Muslim. The on-Earth smuggling partner is in Africa, and presumabley black. Jazz has to work with a male former friend who stole her boyfriend. Another ally is the awkward geek. The cop is actually a former Mountie (who should not still be wearing the uniform). The bad guys are Brazilian. The city administrator is Kenyan. The daughter of the employer is in a wheelchair. After all that, you basically have a full Bingo card.

Still, Jazz was likeable, and you definitely get the feel that she had a life before and after the novel.

So, while Artemis is nowhere near as successful as The Martian, I would recommend it to fans of hard sf. I just don't think it was be as big a breakout as The Martian was, outside of the SF fandom.

3.5 stars

Jasmine (Jazz) Bashara has been living in Artemis, the only city on the moon, since she was six-years-old. The daughter of Muslim master welder Ammar Bashar, twentysomething Jazz is a bit of a wild card - a brilliant young woman who refuses to take up a 'laudable' profession. Instead Jazz works as a porter, picking up and delivering goods. Mostly, Jazz conveys products shipped from Earth. When a shuttle arrives, Jazz picks up merchandise at the Port of Entry and brings it to the appropriate buyer.

Jazz - who's an enterprising young woman - takes advantage of her job to smuggle in contraband items ordered by her 'clients.' This includes things like: expensive cigars; cigarette lighters; pure ethanol; electronics; illegal chemicals; and more. The money (called slugs) that Jazz earns by smuggling augments her meager salary, but the porter is still dirt poor. Jazz's living quarters amount to a bunk in a closet.....with a shared bathroom down the hall. And her food consists of gunk - mush made from algae.

Jazz is always scheming to make more money, because she has a debt of 417,000 slugs.....and she wants a decent apartment. So when one of Jazz's customers, Trond Landvik (one of the 'richest richfucks in town') asks her to sabotage Sanchez Aluminum - so he can take over the company - Jazz agrees to do it.....for 1,000,000 slugs. Jazz plans a complex, dangerous caper to destroy Sanchez's equipment, but things go wrong and a murder ensues. Moreover, it looks like Jazz's life is in danger as well.

Turns out Sanchez Aluminum is owned by a Brazilian crime syndicate called 'O Palácio', whose leaders don't appreciate people messing with their factory. Moreover, O Palácio is apparently scheming to take control of Artemis's economy by hijacking the manufacture of a valuable technology called ZAFO. Artemis's administrator - a Kenyan woman called Fidelis Ngugi - wants to stop the Brazilians.....so she gives Jazz 'the wink' to do something about them.

Jazz cooks up a complicated scheme to thwart O Palácio', and enlists the help of her family and friends. The dangerous escapade - which involves a lot of cutting and welding - is described in minute detail.....but I found it hard to picture. (Maybe it will be clearer when the movie comes out. LOL) Jazz's scheme doesn't unfold quite as planned, but she's a resourceful gal who can think - and act - fast.

To me Jazz is a likable, spirited saboteur who drinks beer, curses like a sailor.....and gamely agrees to test a re-usable condom invented by a friend/client. I enjoyed Jazz's correspondence with her Earth penpal, Kelvin Otieno, who she 'met' at the age of nine. Jazz and Kelvin become close friends, exchange confidences, and become partners in the smuggling business.

Other memorable parts of the story include: the author's description of Artemis - which seems like a place that could really exist; the manner in which Rudy - the head cop on Artemis - administers justice to a wife beater (this is stellar!); Jazz's interest in Arabic gossip sites - which she frequently cruises on her Gizmo (a sort of smartphone/electronic wallet); and Jazz's contentious but loving relationship with her dad.....who did the best he could in difficult circumstances.

My major criticism of the book is the over-description of Artemis's construction and the (often) hard-to-understand science. This is unncessary and tedious.....and it slows down the story at the most exciting moments.

Overall, this is an entertaining adventure story in an unusual setting - with a large array of engaging characters. I'd recommend the book to fans of science fiction/action novels.

Thanks to Netgalley, the author (Andy Weir), and the publisher (Crown) for a copy of the book.

Unfortunately I wasn't really a big fan of this book. It was reasonably entertaining and I usually enjoy a female protagonist but compared to The Martian I found it lacking depth. It was a relatively fun read but the kind you forget shortly after finishing. Sorry!!

Weir has a very good writing style - most of the time.
It is easy to read, as long as he isn't talking to long and detailed about science, but on the other hand, that's part of the good stuff too, so I'm willing to overlook the longer passages.
The Story was suspenseful and well formed.
Jazz wasn't very different from Weirs last leading character, but I liked her anyway for her bad-ass-ness.

After his highly successful first novel, "The Martian" plus the movie starring Matt Damon, Andy Weir's sophomoric endeavor, "Artemis" turned out to be as entertaining yet not as engaging as the first one.

For those who needs a synopsis, the Description below says it all. If I add something more, there will be spoilers. So, just like Jasmine Bashara, our heroine, I will just stick to the nitty gritty of things.

Full of wry humor but not enough for laugh out loud funny moments, Jasmine reminds of me Bruce Willis' Hudson Hawk - irreverent and full of attitude. She makes me smile, yet she does not give me enough for a full belly laugh. It's not to say that she is not interesting. But, Mark Watney (The Martian) is a hard act to follow.

The book is science fiction and set in the near future. Personally, I hope that I will live long enough to see a human colony on the moon. The earth is already overpopulated. The Moon and Mars are good candidates for future human colonization.

So, for "Artemis" to be a heist turned into a power struggle on who will control the moon colony itself was a total downer for me. Perhaps its because of my idealism. I am hoping that when humans leave earth for new homes in Mars or the Moon, we can rise above greed.

So, though I find "Artemis" enjoyable and will recommend it to be included in your reading list, I am also disappointed with it because I am faced with the same human failings that have plagued us for thousands of years.

If I want reality, I will read history books. Sci-fi is my escape but Artemis just gave me too much reality to truly find it funny.

"Artemis" is Rated M for Mature due to subject matter.

I went in thinking this would be science fiction. I mean, she lives on the Moon!!! Artemis is the name of the city and the main character is Jazz.

There is so much substance to this book, and it's all told from Jazz's perspective.

It has sci-fi elements to it. Like we aren't really to the Moon city thing yet, and Andy throws in lots of science. I can't verify what's true, but it was fun.

Jazz is a really diverse character on her own. She's kind of a pain in the rear, she admits to that. But she has a big heart and is fiercely loyal.

It's not my kind of book, but I really enjoyed myself. I felt like it had a lot of action with the occasional drag. It really picks up in the last half, with lots of surprises.

This book takes place in the near future where humans are living on the Moon. The main character, Jazz, is a lifer (as close as you can be) Artemis (the city on the moon) resident. She is crazy smart but doesn’t really apply herself much to the dismay of people around her. She works as a porter and smuggler. Then she is offered a job (heist) of her lifetime. What comes after is all sorts of crazy for not only her but Artemis itself. This author also wrote The Martian (which is amazing BTW) so I had high hopes for this one. While I don’t think it lives up to The Martian, I still enjoyed it. It has the science-y bits and the wise cracking characters, but it does’t flow quite as well. It is also really action packed, maybe even too much. But if you don’t like dark-ish (sometimes crude) humor, probably best to pass on it.

Imagine life on the moon, plus an adventure by a lowly porter and you have a great story. Jazz grew up on the moon and can’t imagine living anywhere else. She leads our imagination in how life is lived on the moon. Jazz is a smuggler of good from the earth and as a result has many interesting clientele as many want things that are forbidden on the moon. Join jazzs adventure as she moves from smuggler to hero.

Thanks to Netgalley for providing me with a copy for review - in exchange, here it is - my honest review! All opinions are my own and do not reflect the view of any organization that I am affiliated with.

Moon caper! Woo! Another Andy Weir!

So yes, it's 100% another Andy Weir. Remember Mark Whatney of The Martian? Now put him in the head of a woman of Arabic descent, who is a criminal because she botched all of her potential. You have Jazz Bashara.

She's quick-witted, gritty, down in the (moon) dirt-y, groovy and fun and just full of dirty 13-year-old boy jokes. I don't know if that'll appeal to everyone, but that's who she is an she is not apologizing for it! Nuh-uh! She's gonna be a smuggler and a saboteur for money, no matter what daddy says. But will she continue big such a pig head when things go really, REALLY bad?

It's a fun heist book with good old reliable science. And a lot of stuff about welding. But I liked it, and I trust Andy that his science-based fiction is plausible. I had a fun time, and asked a real astrobiologist to support Andy's claims. So far, so good. Except the bit about people not being able to carry a pregnancy on the Moon: that's pure conjecture, apparently. Nobody can know if a baby can grow in low gravity, and there's no way to know. But it's not plot-important, so who cares! Science!

Read this one if you liked the Martian, if you like capers, and if you like potty-mouthed protagonists who don't know how to properly be a Muslim. Enjoy :)

Weir's main character Jazz is a take-no-shit, tell-it-like-it-is porter in Artemis, the moon's only city. She earns her living smuggling prohibited items from earth when she is given the opportunity to make her fortune... in a not exactly legal way. Her nefarious past has just barely kept her on this side of what constitutes the law on the moon, but will be she be so lucky this time?
Author Andy Weir had the tough challenge of following up 2012's The Martian. Artemis has many of the great attributes of The Martian with the fun addition of being set in the future. While she is technically a criminal, she lives by her own code of honor making her a likable character.

I DNF'd this one. I could not get past how Weir thought women think or talk.

2.5ish stars.

Right off the bat I'll just say, I think the first half of this book is awful. It was like Weir conceded that plot set-up and characterization are things that novels should include, so he gave it his best shot and attempted to cover up his lack of ability in those areas by making lots and lots of (middle school) jokes. Once the heist starts, the action kicks in, and the surprisingly believable and interesting technical, science-y bits come into play, the book hits its stride and shows off Weir's strengths. It ends on a high note, so much so that I initially rated it 3.5 because I was left with such a good taste in my mouth. In hindsight, reflecting on the book as a whole, it's really not that good.

I've read that Weir realizes that characterization isn't his greatest strength and that he'd rather focus on the story, which is fine! If the story is engaging enough, it can absolutely balance the lack of strong character work. Why, then, does Weir try so hard to make the protagonist, Jazz, seem clever, and oh-so-cool, and brilliant, but too badass to care about living up to her obviously enormous potential, and oh yeah, she has a lot of sex, too, and she's super hot, but she just likes to chill because she's just one of the guys, your typical, relatable dudebro. But also she's a girl. How do we know she's a girl? Because she says so. A lot.
“I giggled like a little girl. Hey, I’m a girl, so I’m allowed.”

All of the secondary characters are indistinguishable from one another except for the various races, nationalities, sexual identities, genders that they're assigned by Weir. None of these traits are ever actually evident in how the characters are portrayed, it just feels like Weir thought it would be good to have a diverse cast. Does it count as representation just because we're told that so-and-so is gay, or Irish, or Muslim? I'm not sure.

Anyway, once all of the characterization yadda yadda yadda is out of the way, the story itself ends up being exciting and a lot of fun. There's a ton of welding which, um, gets old eventually, but mostly the technical detail is interesting and contributes to the overall enjoyment level. The setting (a moon colony) is also pretty cool and Weir does a good job of making it feel real. There's tension and action and science in this science fiction. Unfortunately it's burdened down by the author himself exposing his very apparent weaknesses

Let me tell you that sci-fi is not my cup of tea. I don’t like the genre and I have big prejudices toward sci-fi and I don’t know why. I mean, I know I am not a science fan, I don’t like spaceships and I don’t like the space, even. I don’t like the robots, you get the idea, don’t you? But I’ve read a couple of sci-fi books and loved them, so yeah… I can be not the biggest fan but I don’t know why I really turn my head the other way every time I heard “sci-fi”, but it’s so.

And if you’re asking why on heart I choose to read this book, you have all the rights. But I loved the first Weir’s book, it was a big surprise, but I loved it from the start to the end, so when I saw that he was writing a second book I was really, really happy! And I was even happier when NetGalley approved my request.

And I was hooked up from the first sentence. Isn’t it wonderful? I have to be honest and say that this book is not good as the first one, even if I enjoyed it a lot. In this second book we know that we are reading fiction. Ok, that’s hard to explain, but I’ll try! When we are reading a novel we know very well that what we are reading it’s not true, it’s fiction, but while we are reading we believe that all that is happening on the pages is true, we really are there with our characters, in their time or in their world, are you following me? While, in Artemis, we know that it’s just fiction. Am I making sense to you?
I hope so. And this wasn’t a great thing for me, I like when I feel that the book is “real”.

And I think that the author would have done better with a male character. I loved Jazz, I really loved her, her sassy ways, her sarcasm and all of her, but sometimes she’s a little bit too much. But… oh well! I had to say that something is off with her, because it’s true, but she’s a great main character. She’s a rebel girl, sarcastic and self-deprecating, smart, clever, who seems to rub everyone the wrong way but that manage to obtain what she wants in any case. She’s resourceful, quick and strong.

And Artemis… it’s the first and only city on the moon. I don’t want to go and live there, that’s true (but I am not a space fan, remember?), but the city is so well described, even if not with Jazz words:

<b>The city shined in the sunlight like a bunch of metallic boobs. What? I’m not a poet. They look like boobs.</b>

We have a great main character, with some secondary characters that have great potential, a great location and… a good story, fast paced and with some twists. I have to admit that, all in all, the plot it’s the weakest point of all, and that the ending is a bit rushed, but I loved it anyway. I loved the story, and it’s fast paced so you can’t be bored even for a second, and I love the happy ending, so I can’t complain.

Trying to make it short: I enjoyed it and I was hooked up from the beginning. It was really difficult for me to put it down and to do something else, it was so captivating! And the best thing is Jazz! You have to love her!

<b>“I knew what I had to do—I just didn’t like it. I’d have to blow the remaining two at the same time.
Please don’t quote that last sentence out of context.” </b>

It can't be easy to have to follow up on the amazing success on you first book if you are Andy Weir. I loved the characters in this book and the story was fantastic. I hope we see a series based on this book. Great job Andy!

Having read and loved The Martian I was excited to read Andy Weir’s new book . Jazz lives in her moon colony home Artemis . She works as a porter with a sideline of smuggling. she would like a bigger place to live other than her coffin size house which leads her to take on a very dangerous an$ illegal mission . Fun read with science, murder and revenge . Jazz is an intriguing anti hero that you wil love getting to know

I like Jazz. No, not the Jazz you listen to (although some is pretty cool), but Jazz who grew up on the colony of the moon. She's sassy and witty and super smart, while kind of being a jerk. Jazz wants to rake in the big bucks (but they aren't called bucks on the moon), by being a tour guide, but when offered an opportunity to really make lots of money by destroying some large pieces of equipment, she can't refuse. But, then it kind of all goes wonky, murder happens, and then she calls for help with her friends and favors. Lots of technical stuff again that I tended to gloss over. But reading this book made me think that the second book must be scarier than the first. People expect the same level of greatness as the first blockbuster, so there was lots of pressure on Mr. Weir. But here's how he did it- he had the same kind of setting of realistic future space, but completely different characters and plot. And they were both great. Jazz is the protagonist that shows all her faults, but you almost love her more for them. Her band of friends and followers rival that of Ocean's Eleven, and the mean guy? He is still mean. Well done, Mr. Andy Weir!

It had lots of good aspects:
The world is truly so though out
The main character: is different and intriguing
The plot: fast paced and had lots of aspects going on
It doesn't have the tone as The Martian, but I kind of liked how very different it is. There is still the aspect of space and the science though, which I really enjoy when done well.
Artemis comes out next week and I really think a lot of you would enjoy it so I wanted to talk about it.
I had some problems going into the book mainly about the nature of the main character and the tone of the book not being what I expected, which wasn't like the one in the martian.

Short Summary: Jazz Bashara is a full-time resident (and smuggler) of Artemis, the only city on the moon, but when she’s offered a sum of money that would solve all of her problems she accepts, the only problem is this job is completely out of her comfort zone and causes her more problems than she had before.

Thoughts: This story wouldn’t have been nearly as fantastic if it wasn’t narrated by Rosario Dawson who transformed this oftentimes comical heist on the moon into an actual performance.

Verdict: I loved The Martian and I loved Artemis so Andy Weir can just keep those entertaining Sci-Fi stories coming.

I received this book free from Netgalley in exchange for an honest review. This does not affect my opinion of the book or the content of my review.

I haven't read The Martian yet, but I loved the film, so when I found out Andy Weir was coming out with a new book -- Artemis -- I requested a review copy, and here we are!

Jazz grew up in Artemis, the moon colony that has no home country. People who live there and visit there are from everywhere, and due to the restrictions on imports, Jazz runs a booming underground economy for her clients. One evening while delivering contraband to her best client, Trond, he tells her he wants to hire for her a job -- a life changing job. The only problem is that it's super illegal and could get her killed, but if she succeeds, she will be rich beyond belief and can finally live a life outside of just scraping by. When she takes it, she finds herself on the ride of her life -- or is for her life?

I was quite pleased by this novel and its caper quality. I will say that it was not the deepest piece of fiction I have ever picked up, and there were many times where it was clear that a man was writing from the attempted perspective of a young woman. I found myself rolling my eyes a couple of times at the internal comments Jazz would make at the audience, as they were very unauthentic, but I was willing to look past this for the sake of the story. After all, I wasn't in it for character development, but rather for the story.

Weir does an outstanding job of doing his homework and presenting the science thoroughly and, more importantly, interestingly. I ended up purchasing this book twice over the holidays, once for my brother and again for my brother-in-law. It's a great piece for just about anyone -- you can enjoy the story and skip past the science if it doesn't interest you or you find it tedious, or if you like the science, you can totally geek out on it and criticize it and be in awe of it and focus on that. It was what I think was the best part of this book -- it's a caper that has a story that grabs you and has a little something for everyone.

For myself, I'm not so sure after reading this book that I would be open to living on the moon. My anxiety was over the top reading about the precautions the residents had to take in order to live in a vacuum, and that's just not for me. I think that the idea of creating a colony on the moon, however, was fascinating and got me thinking long and hard about sustainable solutions for life on Earth. Would I at least want to take a once-in-a-lifetime vacation to Artemis?

Why, yes, I would. Thanks, Mr. Weir. I'm looking forward to it.