James Coleman
Summary
Mark Watney, a professional botanist and mechanical engineer, begins his journey aboard the Ares 3: a ship sent to mars with an elite chosen crew in order to gather research and test human living conditions. 4 Days into the trip, Mark is hit with a flying satellite dish which broke apart from the ship due to a massive dust storm. The crew presumes him to be dead, and evacuates the planet. Once Mark comes to (and surprisingly survives the ordeal) he begins planning his survival. Or hopes to. He takes count of every bit of food and resource, and starts problem solving. Amazingly, his botany knowledge comes into play as he becomes the first person to ever farm Mars--potatoes. (He even thanks Idaho for that bit). The wait until rescue (he hopes) is about four years, so he has to think of anything he can to survive until then.
Meanwhile, the NASA crew on Earth abruptly realizes that Mark is alive on Mars, because of the pictures taken frequently of Mar's surface. They immediately begin a plan to "Bring Him Home." Mark discovers a way to communicate via text by using leftover materials from the broken MAV. All seems to be going well...until the explosion. An error in his math unavoidably occurs, and part of his farmland in the HAB explodes. That means he can no longer rely on the food he is growing to be enough to last. After the attempt to send a rocket with enough supplies explodes, NASA comes up with another new, very risky plan.
During this time, the Ares 3 crew is on track for heading home. But, once they receive word of Mark's survival, there is no way they are letting him go again. They mutiny from the NASA headquarters and turn around in a desperate last effort to save Mark. In order for this plan to work, he must create his own makeshift spaceship. Long story short, he does. There is a rocket waiting for the returning crew (in the future) miles away, which he has to drive to. After crashing the MAV, he then has to walk the rest of the way and strip the rocket dangerously low on supplies and needed equipment in order to reach the necessary velocity. Once he has completed the stripping, it is time to take off.
After communicating with the crew of Ares 3, they are ready to receive him. Mark blasts off, with only a tarp replacing the nose of the rocket. That proves to be the first problem when it rips off, because it slows him down. As a result, the crew is going too fast. They blow up the front of their own ship to slow down, and use thrusters to get closer to his makeshift rocket. Still not enough. Mark ends up physically jumping out of the ship and uses the air in his suit to "fly like Iron Man" towards the reachable Ares 3. Amazingly, it works. After a tearful reunion, they all return home to a grand welcoming.