Tahleen reviews about 3/4 of The Martian by Andy Weir

Title: The Martian
Author: Andy Weir
Publisher: Brilliance Audio, 2014 (print edition available from Crown)
Narrator: R.C. Bray

How can you not want to keep reading a book with this as a first line: "So I'm pretty much f***ed."

This is the story of Mark Watney, one of the astronauts on the Ares 3 mission on Mars. Through a series of very unfortunate events, Mark ends up left alone on Mars, stranded, with the entire world thinking he's dead. He must depend on his wits, engineering skills, and botanist background to keep himself alive.

I am enjoying this book VERY much. It's a great audiobook; R.C. Bray is a great reader. But what I'm really enjoying is how funny it is. I never expected to laugh so much while listening to a book about the dire situation of a guy stranded on Mars. But it is extremely entertaining.

There is a lot of technical stuff going on, but I think that's part of the reason why I like it so much too. I'm not a technically minded person; I don't know much about engineering or space exploration or Mars. But Weir does a great job explaining it, especially to lay readers. I think it's because I can actually believe this stuff could happen. I don't really have to suspend my disbelief much. And from other reviews I've read, it sounds like most of the science is pretty solid.

I also like the writing technique of using log entries. It makes sense, considering he is utterly alone and there would be no conversation, so his goofy personality comes out and it's great. But even though it is very funny, it's also a thriller. So far Mark has almost died a BUNCH of times. So sometimes I'm in my car laughing, or sometimes I'm white-knuckled, gripping my steering wheel.

Bonus: This is going to be a movie soon starring Matt Damon. So there's that. This book would definitely translate well to film. Not to mention it won an Alex Award, which are given to adult books with teen appeal.

I don't yet know how the story of Mark Watney ends, but I'm definitely looking forward to finding out! I highly recommend this audiobook, for science buffs, nerds, or anyone who enjoys a great story.

Disclosure: I got a copy of this audiobook from my local library.

Julia Reviews "Final Jeopardy" by Stephen Baker

Title/Author: Final Jeopardy: Man vs. Machine and the Quest to Know Everything by Stephen Baker
Publisher/Year Published:2011 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
How I got this book: I got this as an eBook from netGalley
Why I read this book: I love three things. Reading, Jeopardy and computers. This book is the love child of those things
Rating: 4.5 stars

I love Jeopardy. I have no idea why, but lately I have just been so into the show that I have the DVR set to auto-record. When I heard that there was going to be a match between a computer and the two famous Jeopardy winners, Ken Jennings and Brad Rutter, I was instantly excited. But this excitement led to some questions. How was it built? Is Watson just hooked up to a search engine or were their complex algorithms involved? But even before that, how would you teach the computer enough about the English language to be able to perform a search let alone play Jeopardy?

Then I found this book.

Final Jeopardy not only holds the answers to my above questions, but really delves into the man vs. machine thought. How do we as humans learn a language? How do we measure perception? And then once we know all of this, how do we teach it to a machine? If you are even the slightest bit interested in artificial intelligence this book is for you. At the same time, it is not so down in the computery depths that someone who knows little of data-mining algorithms won't be able to understand. I think it is a very accessible book.

If you think about it, it is quite a lot to teach a computer to understand English. I remember one example from a pre-Watson project that the book points out. The question was "What was Fracis Scott Key best known for?" A computer could recognize Francis and Scott as names but Key may be a noun. "In its hunt, the computer might even spend a millisecond or two puzzling over Key lime Pies." Then, Baker points out, there isn't even a verb in the question so even if the computer went to the Wikipedia page of Francis Scott Key it could guess that he was "best known" for being an American lawyer!

But that was the beginning. This book is seriously an awesome journey into the depths of computer human interaction, as well as delving into the puzzling quirks of language. Why did it lose a half star? There were points that dragged a bit longer than I wanted, but not too badly. The way I am thinking, the things that I thought were too long were probably the part someone else really was looking forward to and vice versa.

But I still have more book left. A partial eBook was released the 26th which does not include the last chapter called "The Match." They are holding this chapter until after the match airs from the 14th through the 16th. If you buy the partial eBook, the final chapter will arrive as an update after the match on the 16th.

I am highly interested in computers and language, but I think if you are even remotely interested in the evolution of technology (the technology of the Future, if you will), give this book a try. I am excited to have read it in preparation for the match, because now I get to be the know it all who gets to say "You know how they made that right? It's not just a search engine"

A partial eBook is available now. It holds off the final chapter (which talks about the outcome of the match, which airs February 14 - 16). If you buy the partial eBook, the final chapter will arrive as an update after the match on the 16th. The hardback book will be out in stores the 17th.

Jen Weighs In On The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks

Title: The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks
Author: Rebecca Skloot
Publisher/Year Published: Crown Publishing Group/2010
How I Got This Book: Bought it for my nook from B&N
Why I Read This Book: Honestly, I needed a science-related book to fit a task for the College Students Spring/Summer Challenge
Rating: 4 stars


Henrietta Lacks. She is one of the most important women in science, yet no one seems to know her name. The contribution she gave to science was monumental...too bad it was done without her consent.
In 1951, Henrietta went to John Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore because she felt a “knot” in her stomach. The doctors did a routine biopsy, but they also took extra cells without Henrietta’s knowledge. Another doctor at Hopkins, George Gey, had been trying to grow the world’s first immortal human cells. Up until Henrietta’s cells arrived on a Petri dish he hadn’t had any luck.
Throughout the science community, Henrietta’s cells are known as HeLa. They have been growing for almost sixty year and her cells have been alive longer than she was. Her cells can be found in science labs all over the world.

I could write an entire paper about the advances in science and contributions to the medical world that were made because of HeLa. These are just a few:

• The polio vaccine was tested on HeLa first to make sure there were no negative effects
• Scientists discovered humans have 46 chromosomes, this helps in identifying genetic disorders
• Scientists learned how to isolate one cell, keep it alive, and then multiply it
• In 1960, before any astronauts, Henrietta’s cells were sent to space to make sure nothing happened to human cells (this also lead NASA to discover that cancer cells grow faster in space).

The book also tells the story of Henrietta’s family. While scientists were busy working with her cells, her family lived in poverty, they were poorly educated and most of them have disabilities but are without health insurance. Henrietta’s family didn’t even know her cells were alive until more than twenty years after her death.

Skloot did an amazing job writing this book. She was able to befriend the family and help them understand what it meant to have Henrietta’s cells alive. No one else had done that before. Doctors and scientists had just told the family that their mother was helping science, but never explained how. Skloot also took two of Henrietta’s children to a science lab to see HeLa under a microscope.

There are so many more elements to this book. Skloot touches on the topics of racism, medical ethics, tissue ownership, and patient confidentiality and privacy. This is really a fantastic book. We owe a huge thanks to Henrietta Lacks. Without her cells who knows where the medical field would be today.