Those edge cases are all over “Project Hail Mary.” From the moment the novel’s hero, astronaut Ryland Grace, wakes up in a spaceship with no memory of how he got there, he has to deduce and science his way through multiple scenarios to get to the truth of why he’s there. He’d be like, ‘OK, I can do this magic, but instead of calling forth some demon, I’m going to see if I can make this wheel turn around forever’ or something like that.” If I wrote a book about a magical realm or something, then my mage would basically be a scientist. “Even then, I am who I am and I would begin to explore the edge cases.

“Sure, I could just make stuff up, but if I did that it would be a completely different kind of book, which is fine, but I don’t think I’d write it in the style that you’ve seen,” says Weir, who lives in Mountain View, Calif., and once attended the University of California San Diego.

While many fantasy and sci-fi writers are content with readers having to suspend their collective disbelief, Weir prides himself on his extensive research and scenarios that, while fictional, are based on real scientific principles. It’s the type of sci-fi thriller that will certainly please fans of “The Martian” and, just as with that novel, Weir commits himself to being as scientifically sound as possible. It’s easy to overlook Weir’s technical enthusiasm when “Project Hail Mary” is such an engrossing read.

Andy weir hail mary