THE MARTIAN

R.C. Bray’s deep, gravelly voice works well for Mark Watney’s first-person account of struggling to survive on a desolate Mars after his crew left him behind. Though he finds ingenious ways to prevail despite many things going wrong, he needs to hang on for almost two years before Earth can launch a successful rescue mission. Bray deftly executes the split viewpoints, first person for Mark and third person for those on Earth trying to rescue him. However, a second narrator for the third person would have made more sense because Bray so perfectly captures Watney and listeners spend so much time with him. By the time the point of view switches to Earth, Bray IS Watney, and hearing him as anyone else is distracting. L.E. 2014 Audies Finalist © AudioFile 2014, Portland, Maine [Published: MARCH 2014]