A lone astronaut. An impossible mission. An ally he never imagined.
Ryland Grace is the sole survivor on a desperate, last-chance mission—and if he fails, humanity and Earth itself will perish.
Except that right now, he doesn’t know that. He can’t even remember his own name, let alone the nature of his assignment or how to complete it.
All he knows is that he’s been asleep for a very, very long time. And he’s just been awakened to find himself millions of miles from home, with nothing but two corpses for company.
His crewmates dead, his memories fuzzily returning, Ryland realizes that an impossible task now confronts him. Hurtling through space on this tiny ship, it’s up to him to puzzle out an impossible scientific mystery—and conquer an extinction-level threat to our species.
And with the clock ticking down and the nearest human being light-years away, he’s got to do it all alone.
Or does he?
About the Author:
Andy Weir grew up in California in a scientifically minded household, the son of a physicist and an electrical engineer. That environment surrounded him with space-science books, computers, and the kind of technical curiosity that shaped both his early hobbies and his later writing. He began programming as a teenager and briefly studied computer science at UC San Diego before moving into a long career as a software engineer, working for organizations such as Sandia National Laboratories and tech companies including AOL and Blizzard.
For years he wrote fiction on the side—webcomics, short stories, and serialized novels shared online—building a small, loyal community of readers. The Martian grew out of that period, first appearing chapter by chapter on his website before being self-published and eventually launching his full-time writing career. Since then he has become a leading voice in accessible, technically grounded science fiction. He lives in California and remains deeply engaged with aerospace research, often consulting scientists and engineers to keep his stories rooted in real-world problem solving.
Description:
A lone astronaut. An impossible mission. An ally he never imagined.
Ryland Grace is the sole survivor on a desperate, last-chance mission—and if he fails, humanity and Earth itself will perish.
Except that right now, he doesn’t know that. He can’t even remember his own name, let alone the nature of his assignment or how to complete it.
All he knows is that he’s been asleep for a very, very long time. And he’s just been awakened to find himself millions of miles from home, with nothing but two corpses for company.
His crewmates dead, his memories fuzzily returning, Ryland realizes that an impossible task now confronts him. Hurtling through space on this tiny ship, it’s up to him to puzzle out an impossible scientific mystery—and conquer an extinction-level threat to our species.
And with the clock ticking down and the nearest human being light-years away, he’s got to do it all alone.
Or does he?
About the Author:
Andy Weir grew up in California in a scientifically minded household, the son of a physicist and an electrical engineer. That environment surrounded him with space-science books, computers, and the kind of technical curiosity that shaped both his early hobbies and his later writing. He began programming as a teenager and briefly studied computer science at UC San Diego before moving into a long career as a software engineer, working for organizations such as Sandia National Laboratories and tech companies including AOL and Blizzard.
For years he wrote fiction on the side—webcomics, short stories, and serialized novels shared online—building a small, loyal community of readers. The Martian grew out of that period, first appearing chapter by chapter on his website before being self-published and eventually launching his full-time writing career. Since then he has become a leading voice in accessible, technically grounded science fiction. He lives in California and remains deeply engaged with aerospace research, often consulting scientists and engineers to keep his stories rooted in real-world problem solving.