Artemis (novel)

Artemis

Author	Andy Weir
Audio read by	Rosario Dawson
Country	United States
Language	English
Genre	Science fiction
Published	November 14, 2017 (Crown)
Media type	Print, e-book, audio
Pages	320
ISBN	978-0553448122

Artemis is a 2017 science fiction novel written by Andy Weir.^[1] The novel takes place in the late 2080s and is set in Artemis, the first and only city on the Moon. It follows the life of porter and smuggler Jasmine "Jazz" Bashara as she gets caught up in a conspiracy for control of the city.^[2] The novel's audiobook is narrated by Rosario Dawson.

Artemis is named after the Greek goddess of the moon, the sister of Apollo (namesake of the Apollo moon program).

Plot

In Artemis, the first city on the Moon, porter and part-time smuggler Jasmine "Jazz" Bashara delivers contraband cigars to the wealthy businessman Trond Landvik. Although Jazz is well acquainted with Trond and his daughter Lene, she meets a new associate there named Jin Chu who holds a mysterious case marked with the name ZAFO. Trond announces a plan to extend his business by taking over Sanchez Aluminum, and he offers Jazz a life-changing sum of money to help him. Sanchez is a company on the moon that extracts aluminum from anorthite rocks, a process which requires 80% of the electricity from Artemis' nuclear reactors but provides the city's entire oxygen supply as a by-product. Jazz accepts the mission, which is to sabotage Sanchez's anorthite harvesters so that Trond can step in with his own.

Jazz borrows some welding equipment from her estranged father Ammar, and a small robot called a HIB from a business associate of his. She visits the Apollo 11 landing site as a tourist in disguise, leaving the HIB in place outside the airlock so that it can open the hatch for her without the assistance of a human EVA master. The next day, while an electronic device created by her scientist friend Martin Svoboda makes it seem as though she is in her living quarters, Jazz treks across the moon's surface to where the harvesters are collecting ore. She successfully sabotages one, but is spotted by the camera of another. Jazz destroys two more, but flees the arriving EVA masters before she is able to disable the last harvester. EVA masters guard every airlock to head off her escape, but Jazz is fortunate enough to be discovered by Dale, her former friend for whom her ex-boyfriend left her. Dale tells Jazz he will not report her if she will put aside her resentment toward him and rekindle their friendship. Jazz finds Trond and his bodyguard murdered, and seeks out Jin Chu at an expensive hotel. She eludes Trond's assassin, escaping with Jin's ZAFO case, which she gives to Svoboda to study its contents. Jazz learns that Sanchez Aluminum is a front for O Palacio, Brazil's largest and most powerful organized crime syndicate, and that the killer, named Alvarez, is now after her. Hoping to save himself, Jin lures Jazz into a trap where Alvarez is waiting, but Jazz uses her knowledge of Artemis to subdue both of them. They are apprehended by the city's de facto police chief, Rudy.

Svoboda discovers that ZAFO is an acronym for Zero Attenuation Fiber Optic. While a normal fiber cable provides 0.4 decibels per kilometer attenuation—the amount of light that is lost during transmission—ZAFO's fiber cable provides 0.001 attenuation and can be used without the help of repeaters. Not able to be created in Earth's gravity, the manufacture of this invaluable substance in Artemis will both boost the city's economy and make a fortune for its owners. If O Palacio is allowed to control this industry, they will take over Artemis. Jazz enlists her reluctant friends and father to stop O Palacio by destroying Sanchez's smelter, which will allow Lene to seize the pertinent contracts and rebuild. Dale helps Jazz break into the aluminum plant. She sabotages the smelter to overheat and destroy itself, but in doing so unwittingly creates deadly chloroform that is pumped into the city's air supply. With under an hour before the unconscious residents of Artemis die from their exposure, Jazz races to access Trond's stockpile of untainted oxygen. She sacrifices herself to save the city, but Dale and Loretta Sanchez are able to save her. Lene pays Jazz for her services, and she finds herself temporarily wealthy. After buying her father a new welding workshop to replace the one she accidentally destroyed as a teenager, she is forced to pay the rest to Artemis administrator Ngugi as a fine to avoid deportation to Earth for her crimes. Jazz convinces Ngugi of her value as an "authorized" smuggler who can keep dangerous would-be smugglers out of the city.

Publication

Artemis was released on November 14, 2017, and debuted at #6 on The New York Times Best Seller list.^[3]

Film adaptation

In May 2017, 20th Century Fox and New Regency acquired the film rights to the not-yet-published novel, with Simon Kinberg and Aditya Sood attached to produce.^[4] Phil Lord and Christopher Miller were announced as co-directors in September 2017.^[5] In July 2018, it was announced that Geneva Robertson-Dworet would be writing the screenplay.^[6] The film is expected to have a November 2020 release date.

References

See also

• Moon in fiction
• Colonization of the Moon