I know we don't typically cover non-Christian titles when it comes to books, but with the success of the motion picture adaptation of Project Hail Mary - and its mostly family-friendly and even faith adjacent approach - I thought it'd be helpful to offer a review of the novel the film was born from.

I always wonder about book content. When it comes to movies, it seems relatively easy to find details about what kind of things you can expect from them -- be it profanity, sex, spiritual content, violence, etc. But I've always found it more vague when it comes to book content. For Andy Weir's Project Hail Mary, I kept hearing how wonderful the audiobook was, narrated by Ray Porter, so I decided to finally devote the time to listen to it. My wife had listened to it first and loved it so much that she's listened to it several times. And when the film was coming out, and we got the chance to see an early media screening in New York City, she was over the moon about the chance. We ended up both loving the movie and saw it several times in theaters. (Our teenage son loves it, too.)

So, how does the book compare to the film? First off, the film is a pretty faithful adaptation of the book. I'm a dork in the sense that I actually enjoy reading the novelization of movies I really love. They usually add a little extra voice to the events of the story. Sometimes they're verbatim and don't add much, but other times, like with Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade and The Goonies, they can add just enough extra detail to make it worth a read. Andy Weir's Project Hail Mary novel doesn't feel like it's a novelization for the film, but it does expand the universe (if you're like me who saw the movie first). Some things definitely play out differently in the book than the film, but that's usually how film adaptations of books go. But if you love characters like Ryland Grace and Rocky, you get to spend a lot more time with both of them in the book.

The book is told from Dr. Ryland Grace's perspective. He acts as the narrator, telling his tale as he wakes up alone in space on a ship called The Hail Mary not knowing where - or who - he is, and is slowly discovering things along with the reader. The story frequently flashes back to Grace's time on Earth as a way to reveal slowly more about himself and his mission. And the flashbacks come as Grace is actually remembering them. (The film does a great job conveying this as well.) For the audiobook, Ray Porter is excellent at voicing all of the different characters and mimicking the different accents of the various foreign representatives, too. And when he voices the Eridian alien Rocky, musical beeps and boops are used behind Porter's voice for Rocky, further "performing" the character as accurately as possible. Seriously, it's pretty great. I love when audiobooks go the extra mile to tell the story in a rich and engrossing way, especially when it feels natural and not flashy for the sake of just adding some extra theatrics.

The audiobook spans 16 hours, while the film spans 2 and a half, so there's a lot of ground not covered in the film. The book spends a lot more time with various humans on Earth in the flashbacks before Grace went into space, and so we end up spending a lot more time with side characters that we either do not meet in the movie, or the time spent with them is just brief. The book is also really science-heavy. Weir digs into the details of the chemistry and mathematics of things. It's heavily dry stuff, but with Porter delivering it with excitement or with a shrug and a wink at times, it's actually entertaining. I would say the only time it started to feel a bit too dry was in the last hour or two of the book when it seems to slow the momentum down a bit. Still, though, I've listened to audiobooks that rely heavily on science and special effects sounds - like Catalyst (Star Wars): A Rogue One Novel by James Luceno (read by Jonathan Davis) - and they have felt like absolute chores to get through. This one, however? It's easily one of my favorite audiobook experiences yet. (I totally understand why my wife has listened to it mulitple times.)

The content for the book is mostly on the mild side... which makes it odd when an "F" word does surface on occasion. I may not have clocked every profanity during my listen (you can see a breakdown of what I did catch below), but the four "F" bombs I noticed were hard to miss. There's a running gag that, because Ryland is a Middle School teacher, he doesn't naturally swear, so he uses substitute profanity like "heck" and "darn" and such throughout the book. This especially makes it odd when he finally says the "F" word upon seeing an alien spaceship for the first time. All the other uses of profanity are from side characters on Earth in the flashbacks. There isn't any sexual content directly, but there's a comical moment where two scientists - a male and a female - are talking openly about their sexual relationship around Ryland, which just makes him really uncomfortable. And later, there's a moment where some of the scientists tell Ryland that they just assumed he was sleeping with Stratt, which totally freaks him out, and he's repulsed by the notion. There's some mild violence involving characters, but the heaviest moments would be Ryland dealing with waking up on a ship to find the only other two occupants already died in their sleep, and discussions during flashbacks about how the astronauts will kill themselves (as mercy killings) on this suicide mission through space. One wants to do it by heroin overdose, specifically (and she literally says she thinks it'll be enjoyable). Other intentional suicide measures are also spoken of, including using a gun if necessary. Overall, I'd say the book is PG-13 in nature (despite there being 4 total "F" words), considering the content is spread across 16 hours, or almost 500 pages.

With all this said, while the novel for Project Hail Mary isn't nearly as family friendly as the film - especially with the occasional profanity (some of it strong) and some frank sexual dialog - but for the most part, the movie is faithful enough to the book to make them excellent complements to each other. So if you love the movie (like I do), I recommend checking out the novel in either written or audiobook form.