![]() ![]() All the physics and science in there is real, including relativistic physics. I mean, we do have extraterrestrial life, but even that I have an explanation for. Weir: I went way down that rabbit hole! I keep everything as real as possible. ![]() : How far down the rabbit hole did you descend while researching this novel? Plus it's a book about friendship, so it feels good and has some humorous dialogue. Once I got all the pieces together you can just set the plot rolling and enjoy writing it. I took her and brought that into "Hail Mary" as well. She could tell governments what to do but nobody knew it. I was thinking about all the cool things you could do with that technology and the story that would become "Project Hail Mary." Also, one of the main characters in "Zhek" was a woman who had this tremendous amount of secret authority. So we're talking about monumental amounts of energy. To be able to turn matter into light and then shooting that light out the back of your ship to use as propulsion, because light has momentum. And this stuff has the theoretical best specific impulse. One of them was this notion of a spacecraft fuel that had the maximum possible specific impulse, which is the efficiency of a spacecraft fuel. But I kept thinking there were some cool aspects to the story that I shouldn't just throw away. Will it be in low-Earth orbit, on the moon, or is it going to be on Mars? Then I ended up designing the city of Artemis, figuring out why anyone would build a city there, what the economy is like and what business is like.įor "Project Hail Mary," I was writing a different book between "The Martian" and "Artemis" called "Zhek." I wrote like 70,000 words over the course of a year and then realized the book just wasn't working. "Artemis" started with me speculating on what humanity's first city that's not on Earth will be like. "The Martian" came from me speculating on how could we do a humans to Mars mission and how do we make sure they don't die if something goes wrong, and what if a bunch of things go wrong. Weir: Usually when I'm writing a book it comes from me speculating on something scientific. : It feels like you had a lot of fun writing "Project Hail Mary." How was the evolution and process different from composing "The Martian" or "Artemis?" So they make an interstellar ship called the Hail Mary and power it with astrophage and send people out into space. For some reason nobody understands, Tau Ceti is unaffected, so they need to figure out what makes it immune and how can they duplicate that to save humanity. And the reason they do this is they notice that all other regional stars are getting dimmer, except for Tau Ceti. This organism they call astrophage, which is Greek for "a thing that eats stars." So they breed it up and use that as a fuel for propulsion. Now these little critters are consuming so much of the sun's energy that Earth is in danger of extinction as the solar output goes down. It's breeding out of control and we're basically having an algae bloom on the sun. It breeds and then spores out to other nearby stars. Basically the sun is getting dimmer and there's a microscopic, single-celled organism that's an interstellar lifeform that lives on the surfaces of stars. ![]() He has some idea of who he is and why he's there, and through a series of flashbacks as he's getting his memory back you find out what's been going on on Earth. : Can you launch into a speed run of the "Project Hail Mary" plot and the main threat that propels the story?Īndy Weir: The plot is presented as a guy who wakes up aboard a spaceship. This Q&A has been edited lightly for length and clarity. spoke with Weir on the genesis of this interstellar odyssey, dropping down the rabbit hole for some deep research, reining in the narrative's nerdier scientific data, and becoming a producer on the upcoming Hollywood film adaptation linked with Gosling's involvement. Lord and Miller are also attached to direct Weir's lunar crime caper novel, " Artemis." "Project Hail Mary" has already been purchased by MGM for a film adaptation to be directed by Phil Lord and Chris Miller ("The Lego Movie"), with Ryan Gosling signed on to star as reluctant astronaut Ryland Grace. ![]()
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