Science Fiction Annotation- Artemis

Author: Andy Weir

Title:  Artemis

Genre: Science Fiction

Publication Date: November 14^th, 2017

Publisher: Crown Publishing Group (NY)

Number of Pages: 305 Pages

ISBN13: 9780553448122

Geographical Setting/Time Period: Moon, Unspecified (Approx. 70 years in future)

Series: Standalone

Subject Heading:  Space Colonies, smuggling, conspiracies, moon

Plot Summary:

Set approximately seven decades in the future, Artemis is the first human colony on the moon consisting of five self-contained spheres called bubbles and 2000 people, plus tourists. Jasmine (Jazz) Bashara is a 20-something year old woman, who immigrated to the moon with her father when she was six-years old; Artemis is her home. Barely scraping by with her current job as a porter (delivering things that come in on shipments), she supplements her income with a smuggling business made possible by her earth friend, Kelvin. When one of her wealthy smuggling customers offers her an amount of money too large to turn down for the destruction of one of Artemis’s companies, she accepts without second thought. Realizing too late that she only knew half of the situation that she had willingly joined, Jazz must fight for her life and safety, and ultimately the lives of all 2000+ people on Artemis.

Appeal:

Tone/Mood: Animated, comic, and whimsical

Language: Heavy use of profanity and crude, seemingly unnecessarily jokes. Jazz’s character is more reminiscent of a teenage boy than a 20-some year old woman; see characterization for more detail.

Storyline: An overwhelming amount of subplots that go nowhere, phenomenal world building, and an overused storyline.  Despite this, there is just something about the book keeps you reading it as quickly as possible and thoroughly engaged.

Characterization: No denying that Jasmine (Jazz) Bashara is a witty, snarky, and frankly badass female protagonist. However, entertaining as Jazz’s character is, it is obvious that Weir essentially took his character, Mark Watney, from his bestselling novel the Martian, and changed the gender and religion to create Jazz. There was no originality in the character; and diversity in only name but not actual implementation. The cast of supporting characters in Artemis, though, is highly diverse and memorable.

Pacing:  Contradictory. At times Weir writes in a way that glides readers through the story seemingly in light speed, then hits the brakes hard with overanalyze and overexploitation of seemingly irrelevant facts and information about the moon.

Writing Style: Severely lacking aesthetic, flat, discursive, yet somehow appealing

Science Fiction Characteristics:

·         Science and technology of the future

·         Colonies/city existing on the moon

·         Some principles of science

·         Space travel

·         Complex, futuristic world building

Read-a-likes/ Similar Authors:

·         Ready Player One by Ernest Cline

·         Luna: New Moon by Ian Macdonald

·         The Moon and the Other by John Kessell