In 2016, Weir released ' The Principles of Uncertainty' a collection of short stories on the TAPAS app platform for short fiction. The work functions as a prequel to the main novel. The Wall Street Journal called the novel 'the best pure sci-fi novel in years'.Ī fan-fiction story written by Weir, ' Lacero'was published in the 2016 edition of ' Ready Player One', making it canonical to the book's fictional universe. The print version (slightly edited from the original) of the novel debuted at #12 on The New York Times bestseller list. Weir was then approached by a literary agent and sold the rights of the book to Crown Publishing Group. First sold for 99 cents, the novel made it to the Kindle bestsellers list. Originally published as a free serial on his website, some readers requested he made it available on Kindle. He was a computer programmer but given his recent success has quit his day job in order to focus more on writing as that had always been his dream. He even wrote his own program in order to predict the best launch dates and the orbit distances between Earth and Mars. He wrote the book to be as scientifically accurate as possible and his writing included extensive research into orbital mechanics, conditions on Mars, the history of manned spaceflight, and botany. Weir is best known for his first published novel, The Martian. His first work to gain significant attention was 'The Egg', a short story that has been adapted into a number of YouTube videos and a one-act play.

Weir began writing science fiction in his 20s and published work on his website for years.

Campbell Award for Best New Writer in 2016. He is an American novelist and software engineer known internationally for his debut novel, The Martian, which was later adapted into a film of the same name directed by Ridley Scott and starring Matt Damon, Jessica Chastain and other well-known actors, which was released October 2, 2015. He also mixes a mean cocktail.'Īndrew Taylor Weir is the author The Martian and Artemis. 'He is a lifelong space nerd and a devoted hobbyist of such subjects as relativistic physics, orbital mechanics, and the history of manned spaceflight.

Andy weir the astronaut