MAJOR DIGRESSION: For the past week, we have been listening to a brand new recorded book from Andy Weir, the author of the terrific sci-fi book, Mars. His new book is The Hail Mary and it is wonderful.
Although I love sci-fi as a genre, I really don’t like most sci-fi books or shows. It’s the lack of psychics that bugs me. Star Trek only lands on planets with perfect earth-air and earth-gravity. Star Wars weapons make swooshing noises in the vacuum of space. The concept of speed, time, and gravity in space are just ignored. Can you imagine the Gs you’d pull jumping into so-called hyperspace speed. They’d be scraping the crew off the back walls with spatulas.
And so many aliens are clumsy lumbering monsters with claw appendages, yet they build intricate machines able to travel through space and time. How could they even put a screw into a hole with those goofy claws.
Andy Weir was a NASA engineer. His sci-fi stories thrive on physics and engineering. His heroes are McGiver-like problem solvers tackling complicated but very plausible engineering issues. His storylines depend on real physics.
Anyway, I highly recommend both Mars and Hail Mary. The movie version of Mars, staring Matt Damon was pretty good, but the book was far superior, as it usually is. The recorded versions of the books are spectacular. The reader for Hail Mary, Ray Porter, does a masterful job. He doesn’t read it, he acts it out. His voices for all the characters are spot on.
Well, we finished the recorded book.That is both sad, as we really got sucked into the characters, and happy, as we got to experience that rare treasure that a great story gives you.
Oh, and here’s another issue with stupid sci-fi. They invent these high-tech laser guns but can’t hit the broad side of a barn with them. Wouldn’t they have come up with some kind of advanced automatic targeting system to go with that advanced laser weapon?
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