Books is Books

The Martian by Andy Weir was recommended to me by one of the writer/hosts of Writing Excuses, a podcast about, well, writing. I'm going to give you the same pitch I got from the show: It's a science fiction Robinson Crusoe story.

That's all I really remember from the pitch. It was a long time ago, before I traded podcasts for audio books during my commute to work. Advertising for Audible can be dangerous for podcasting. Though I highly recommend Writing Excuses if you're even remotely interested in the craft. One day when I've written a wheel barrel full of books I hope to give a little back as well.  

The Martian is about a man who gets stranded on Mars. He wields the power of science to keep himself alive. Will he survive? Or will he die, tragically of starvation, exposure, or -dare we even think it: martians of the little green variety?

Read the book.

Despite being overly saturated with hard science, it was a very exciting read and you really felt for both the main character as well as everyone else. In a way I was reminded of Armageddon, only without the meteor, Steve Buscemi, or terrible acting from the rest of the cast.

Writing is Books

I spent the weekend feeling anxious about the progress of the novel. My wife thinks I'm being too hard on myself. I probably am. I want to get this revision done. I've had a lot of trouble reworking Chapter 2. Sunday was spent restructuring it. Part of the problem has been that there isn't any good action happening at the beginning of the story. I think I may have fixed that by putting an action scene in Chap 2. We'll see how it goes. I have some writing to do, but I'm working off of a foundation, stuff I had written that needs to be tweaked here and there to fit into the chapter. Once those changes are made, and a few more chapters written, I should have Parts 1 and 2 complete. On to the rest of the story!