Artemis by Andy Weir: Review
The genera of Hard Sci Fi struck me as something that would be difficult to get into due to my own biases. I thought it was going to be a myriad of boring concepts that required a degree in multiple sciences to really understand or even enjoy. Thankfully I was very wrong in this aspect as most sci fi writers are very eager to explain how everything works, but at the same time, they know when the audience doesn’t care enough to have this explained to them. Enter Andy Weir author of The Martian who managed to get me into sci fi proper with his latest novel, Artemis.
The idea of putting anything on the moon always struck me as a little wacky and made me chuckle every time I heard about it and I honestly couldn’t tell you why. Maybe it’s a byproduct of old pulp sci fi that had aliens living on our moon. Despite taking place exactly on earth’s moon, the concept behind Artemis feels very grounded within our reality. The lunar colony is a boom down much like in days of America’s wild west where cities would rise and fall around oil wells or mining sites. On top of that, its also a massive tourist destination because who wouldn’t want to spend a few weeks on the moon. The whole concept feels grounded, but at the same time it also feels really fun and interesting while being able to keep itself the right amount of serious.
The plot of Artemis revolves around one Jasmine ‘Jazz’ Bashara a smuggler for the lunar colonies that traffics contraband such as anything flammable or what ever the colony would otherwise prohibit. Its with this underground smuggling ring that Jazz becomes the target of interest for Trond Landvik, a wealthy business man willing to pay big money for an underhanded job. At the promise of a million dollars, or Slugs as they’re called in Artemis, Jazz can’t say no fast enough. But its with this deal that she becomes embroiled in a larger conspiracy gripping the industry of Artemis and her own stubborn pride and perhaps even a sense of patriotism for her home keeps her from walking away. It’s a great story, nothing too complex and its easy to follow along. It’s that ease of getting into a story like this that really makes it appealing too and hard to put down.
The total word count of Artemis is about eighty thousand words long, give or take a few thousand judging by its size. The chapters themselves are also kept longer at about fifteen pages a chapter. Its with this that the book feels like its constantly making progress and I found myself not really paying attention to how time flew by as I read it. It was because of a lack of a chapter break that kept it going and kept everything paced out at a decent rate. Each chapter felt self-contained in a day on Artemis at the same time, Andy Weir knew when to end a chapter on a cliff hanger to spike the tension and mood and really make you hunger for the next chapter. As a whole, it was a wonderfully paced novel.
I’m not about to pretend I’m a fan of first person narrative. It annoys the crap out of me for several reasons that I won’t list here, but if you’re looking at the five out of five and scratching your head then I have some explaining to do. The style of Artemis is within first person but not in the same way The Martian was, that being a series of diary entries. Rather the style is a present tense account of the events as narrated by Jazz and its really well done at that. It keeps the illusion of danger alive in the story while also having a few funny quips about what is going on around the world. Since this is also narrated from the perspective of a local on Artemis it also gives the narrator an excuse to sprinkle in exposition about the world around them. On top of that, the colony is no bigger than a small midwestern town so it makes sense that Jazz would know as much as she does about the world around her. So that really ties it all together for me and removes nearly every problem I have with first person narrative.
Let me ask you something; have you ever had that mental disconnect with a fictional character where you had to stop and tell yourself that what is on the page amounts to the author’s imaginary friend? That is the issue I had through the whole of Artemis, I loved all of the characters that I got to meet and there was almost a pang of betrayal at realizing that these are all the figments of Andy Weir’s imagination. Jazz alone reminded me so much of a friend of mine who also read the book that whenever she’d make a reference to what Jazz said it was almost like I was talking to the real character.
To really give this score the gravity it deserves, I have four shelves filled with books I’ve read over the years. All the books there aren’t even all the books I’ve read or owned over the years either. Out of all of these stories though, only one other novel has managed to get a perfect score out of me and that was Promise of Blood by Brian McClellan. Artemis by Andy Weir will be the second book in my library to earn this perfect score and it earned this through every last page and word. A wholly wonderful story that I am really happy I decided to give a chance and I hope you will too.
