If you like your scifi “hard”, then The Martian is for you. This is the kind of book where our protagonist regularly does math and shares the calculations with us. And the majority of the action takes place with a single character. And yet it also manages to be emotionally compelling.

Astronaut Mark Watney is accidentally abandoned by his crew on Mars. They’ve assumed he’s dead, communications are down, and he’s got limited supplies. But he refuses to give up and struggles for survival. With lots of math. I jest (a little) but it’s also the case that once I picked it up, I read straight through to the end. It’s a great story.

FuzzyCo grade: A