The Martian (novel)

Background

Six sols into the Ares 3 crew's month-long stay at Acidalia Planitia, a wind storm threatens to topple their Mars Ascent Vehicle. During the evacuation a broken antenna strikes Watney and knocks out his suit radio and life-signs monitor, so commander Melissa Lewis launches believing him dead. Watney survives and keeps a log. He grows potatoes in the Hab and makes water for them by freeing hydrogen from leftover hydrazine fuel and burning it.

NASA spots his activity in satellite images but at first keeps the news from the crew on the Hermes. Watney drives a modified rover to dig up the old Pathfinder lander and uses it to talk to Earth, then nearly dies when an overused airlock tears and the Hab depressurises, killing his crops. A rushed supply probe is lost when its rocket breaks up after launch, and China's space agency offers the booster meant for its Taiyang Shen probe. Astrodynamicist Rich Purnell finds a gravity-assist path that sends Hermes straight back to Mars; NASA's administrator vetoes it, flight director Mitch Henderson leaks it to the crew, and all five agree.

Watney drives 3,235 km to Schiaparelli crater, skirting a dust storm on the way, and launches in the stripped-down Ares 4 ascent vehicle. When it falls short, Lewis slows Hermes by blowing open an airlock and Chris Beck, on a tethered Manned Maneuvering Unit, brings Watney aboard. The book topped the New York Times trade paperback list and won Weir the John W. Campbell Award for Best New Writer in 2016.