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Adam Shields

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Project Hail Mary

by Andy Weir (Goodreads Author)

bookshelves: currently-reading

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read in March 2026

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Adam Shields said: " Summary: An astronaut works to recover his memory and save humanity.

I was surprised when I looked back at the Martian that it has been 12 years since I read it. I purchased Project Hail Mary four years ago when it was on sale and just had not gotten Summary: An astronaut works to recover his memory and save humanity.

I was surprised when I looked back at the Martian that it has been 12 years since I read it. I purchased Project Hail Mary four years ago when it was on sale and just had not gotten around to listening to the audiobook. It won a number of awards when it came out and I have had more than a few people comment to me that it is their favorite audiobook. (My favorite audiobook is the Colin Firth narration of The End of the Affair by Graham Greene.)

I have purchased, but not yet listened to Artemis. (I wrote about it here) Generally that has not been as well liked as Project Hail Mary and The Martian. But there is a similar thread to the two books by Weir. It is not that the stories or themes are the same, but there is a dogged determination that is the same. I would argue that "life is worth living" is part of what people like about these books. Yes they are well written hard science fiction. Yes, Weir is writing good character and compelling plots with lots of action. But I think what draws people to them is that the protagonists don't give up and the reader gets to root for a hero that lives up to their hero status.

The protagonists are not perfect. There are lots of mistakes, both "wrong calculations" type of mistakes and character flaws. But those are humanizing flaws. The actual brass tacks of the story have protagonists that do what it takes, but also are good honorable people. And the world needs more stories that have flawed humans that are still good honorable people.

I am looking forward to the movie coming out. There is lots of humor in Project Hail Mary and Ryan Gosling seems like perfect casting for the character, Ryland Grace. My daughter has a social studies teacher that she loves. She talks about him almost every day. As Project Hail Mary develops and the protagonist overcomes his initial amnesia, we come to know that Grace (as he is mostly referred to in the book) was a middle school science teacher. The book portrays him as that beloved teacher that also is a great teacher who inspired their students that is how my daughter talks about her teacher.

Project Hail Mary also is a first contact story. This is not an "Arrival" (aliens are so different it is hard to understand) type of first contact, but an "in spite of everything about us that is so different, we are surprisingly similar" type of first contact story. Again, there is a lot of humor amidst the near constant action.

If you are an audiobook person, this is a very good audiobook. I have listened to about a half dozen book narrated by Ray Porter (he has hundreds of books), but it is definitely well narrated and edited and the voice matches well with the story.

This was originally published on my blog at https://bookwi.se/project-hail-mary/ ...more "

3 hours, 19 min ago · see review

Adam Shields is currently reading

Galahad and the Grail (Merlin's Isle, #1)

by Malcolm Guite (Goodreads Author)

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3 hours, 57 min ago

Adam Shields is currently reading

The Souls of Black Folk (The Norton Library)

by W.E.B. Du Bois

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Adam’s Notes & Highlights

Book cover for Destiny and Power: The American Odyssey of George Herbert Walker Bush

Destiny and Power: The American Odyssey of George Herbert Walker Bush by Jon Meacham

2 highlights

Americans tend to prefer their presidents on horseback: heroes who dream big and sound the trumpets. There is, however, another kind of leader—quieter and less glamorous but no less significant—whose virtues repay our attention. There is ...more

See Adam Shields’s 295 books with notes and highlights…

Adam’s Quotes

“Sometimes, you read a book and it fills you with this weird evangelical zeal, and you become convinced that the shattered world will never be put back together unless and until all living humans read the book.”
― John Green, The Fault in Our Stars

tags: books, power-of-words, reading

26938 likes

“This last point is only beginning to dawn on us white Christian Americans, who still believe too easily that racial reconciliation is the goal and that it may be achieved through a straightforward transaction: white confession in exchange for black forgiveness. But mostly this transactional concept is a strategy for making peace with the status quo—which is a very good deal indeed if you are white. I am not trying to be cynical here, but merely honest about how little even well-meaning whites have believed they have at stake in racial reconciliation efforts. Whites, and especially white Christians, have seen this project as an altruistic one rather than a desperate life-and-death struggle for their own future.”
― Robert P. Jones, White Too Long: The Legacy of White Supremacy in American Christianity

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