I had heard really positive comments about The Martian, so for my recent holidays I decided to grab it for my Kindle and read it. I could just say that I enjoyed the reading a lot, each day spending at least one hour (but usually was two or three) reading as much as possible from the adventures of Mark Watney, an astronaut sent to Mars who due to a storm gets hit and left for dead by his crewmates. When he wakes up, wounded but alive, refuses to die and starts surviving at the red planet while trying to think how to solve the main problem of being stranded in Mars.
The book is full of (interestingly) adventures, and really the only negative point I see of it is that our main character, being "just" a botanist and engineer actually solves every kind of problem in record time, from food shortages to all kind of accidents and environmental adversities. I am not saying he should "fail" to solve more challenges he encounters, but he is a so fast thinker that he feels so clever (like as if MacGyver went to Mars).
The story is thrilling, the topic is really specific and technical but well written so that a broad audience can understand, and I definetly recommend it to any sci-fi or adventures reader.
I also think that the best merchandising they should have done for this book (and maybe the movie, as I haven't watched it yet) is to have a LEGO kit with the rover vehicles and the habitation hub (plus Watney as a minifig).