Can you reccomend any good sci fi books?

[FreddyNoNose]

I never liked most golden age sci fi, I must admit. I pretty much hate many of Heinlein's works with a burning passion and Foundation is some of the most boring and illogical stuff I've ever read. I do however quite like Bradbury and Sturgeon.

Pre-Golden Age, I find Barsoom (Starts with A Princess of Mars, the series is also known by the main character as John Carter of Mars) by Rice Burroughs (you know his more famous creation, Tarzan of the Apes) surprisingly enjoyable, given that I don't normally like Sword and Sorcery all that much. And really, that's what it more or less is. The adventures of a wild west gunslinger who gets lost on the planet Mars by a cosmic accident, where Mars just so happens to feature a lot of swordfights, flying ships, magic and monsters.

And princess of mars is free on Amazon Kindle. https://www.amazon.com/Princess-Mars.../dp/B0084BMGJU
Some of the others are as well.

[Kato]

I feel like we still need to know a bit more about OP's taste...

Of course you have some of the classics that I would assume you've read - Dune, HG Wells books like The Time Machine, Ender's Game (not that train wreck of a movie), Starship Troopers (again not that train wreck of a movie), Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, etc.

On the newer front The Martian by Andy Weir is a fantastic book (and a pretty decent movie but I still think the book is better).

Ready Player One is also a pretty good newer book, I hear its being made into a movie but am skeptical of the quality, but we'll see.

The Time machine has aged pretty poorly, I'm afraid. I mean, it's fine to read but.. Well, that's the best praise I feel I can give it.
Ender's game.. I always feel is not quite as good as many people claim but it's fine. It has aged a bit but not so much.
Starship troopers, as with many works or Heinlein is very much dependent on taste. I like it, or Stranger, Mistress... But he can also be pretty tiring.
Adams of course is a genius, but only if you like (British) sci-fi humor. And that doesn't apply to everyone.

Yes, the Martian is great, but I'm afraid appreciation is greatly depending on how much you like science. If you don't, you'll not like the book.

Oh please no? I can't see how you would turn RPO into a decent movie, let alone a good one. I liked the book but I feel it translates terribly..


The Long Earth series was mentioned and while I like the latter books less, I'd still recommend it.

Also of course Clarke and Assimov are great, but again, taste dependent which ones you should read (first).

[Lethologica]

Vernor Vinge was mentioned--let's add The Peace War and Marooned in Realtime. One near-future thriller, one far-future techno-utopian mystery, both dedicated to the world-changing implications of a specific concept technology.

The Mote in God's Eye was mentioned--let's add Larry Niven's Known Space series. A sprawling collection of medium-to-hard SF short stories and novels extrapolating human civilization over the next millennium or so. Ringworld is the crown jewel, but takes building up to.

Oh please no? I can't see how you would turn RPO into a decent movie, let alone a good one. I liked the book but I feel it translates terribly..

Huh. To me, the cinematic spectacle of the book is among its few good points. It's not terribly dependent on long-winded character introspection or technical exposition. The timeline is pretty manageable. The main adaptation problem is budget. (Well, that and the quality of the source material, but that's just, like, my opinion, man.)

[Leewei]

Charles Stross's The Laundry Chronicles. Think Chuck meets H.P. Lovecraft. These books feature great humor, intelligent plots, cosmic horror, and quite a bit of geek savvy.

[Olinser]

I feel like we still need to know a bit more about OP's taste...



The Time machine has aged pretty poorly, I'm afraid. I mean, it's fine to read but.. Well, that's the best praise I feel I can give it.
Ender's game.. I always feel is not quite as good as many people claim but it's fine. It has aged a bit but not so much.
Starship troopers, as with many works or Heinlein is very much dependent on taste. I like it, or Stranger, Mistress... But he can also be pretty tiring.
Adams of course is a genius, but only if you like (British) sci-fi humor. And that doesn't apply to everyone.

Yes, the Martian is great, but I'm afraid appreciation is greatly depending on how much you like science. If you don't, you'll not like the book.

Oh please no? I can't see how you would turn RPO into a decent movie, let alone a good one. I liked the book but I feel it translates terribly..


The Long Earth series was mentioned and while I like the latter books less, I'd still recommend it.

Also of course Clarke and Assimov are great, but again, taste dependent which ones you should read (first).

It's aged fine, its just it suffers from It Was His Sled syndrome. The main surprise twist of the book (that the Eloi are effectively cattle for the Morlocks) is so well-known that its not a surprise to basically anybody at this point, so a lot of the impact of the plot is lost on a modern reader.

[GloatingSwine]

So much of this is down to personal taste, but if you don't mind a long series (20ish books and not yet complete) a some us like the Honor Harrington books by David Weber.
Start with 'On Basilisk Station', but don't read the main thread on this forum because the spoilers are set for how far Cikomyr has got with the series.

If you want the Great European Powers iiiiin spaaaace! then go back to the source. The Legend of the Galactic Heroes is starting to be available in English and is fantastic.

[navas]

So much of this is down to personal taste, but if you don't mind a long series (20ish books and not yet complete) a some us like the Honor Harrington books by David Weber.
Start with 'On Basilisk Station', but don't read the main thread on this forum because the spoilers are set for how far Cikomyr has got with the series.

Thanks for this recommendation.

[Jonzac]

If you'd like a more hard-core science based book, try "Live Free or Die" by John Ringo. The science in the book is fleshed out and real, which is a nice change of pace.

If you like Golden Age writing, try the Lensmen Series, by E.E. "Doc" Smith. I find the writing interesting, especially if you think of when he wrote in in the 30's and 40s.

[White_Hood]

I don' know if it's been suggested yet. But Starship's Mage is a fun read.

[joggler45]

Charles Stross's The Laundry Chronicles. Think Chuck meets H.P. Lovecraft. These books feature great humor, intelligent plots, cosmic horror, and quite a bit of geek savvy.

Yeah, check out this one. Worth reading

[Vogie]

If you enjoy more recent Sci-Fi, look at Daniel Suarez - his style is a look at "20 minutes into the future" genre of scifi. Dameon / Freedom (tm) is an awesome pair of novels, and I've heard good things about his most recent book, Change Agent. And Andy Weir's The Martian was great as well.

[Mouse@GBN]

I'll second William Gibson's Neuromancer if you haven't read already, but I'll also add one I've been into lately called Altered Carbon by Richard Morgan. Great inspiration for Nova Praxis or Eclipse Phase if that's your thing.

[Feytalist]

Oh good, someone mentioned Richard Morgan.

If you're in the mood for post-cyberpunky hard SF, check out his Kovacs Trilogy (Altered Carbon, Broken Angels, Woken Furies). Far-future setting, brain-uploading is a central part of the setting and plot. Alien ruins have been found, but no actual aliens. The series has been called grimdark, but it's really just not as happy-go-lucky as your average Golden Age SF. Oh, but with a fair amount of sex and violence. But his prose is wonderful; noirish, biting and evocative. He's a master at the show-don't-tell trick. Probably my favourite SF series out there.

His other standalone books are really good as well: Black Man (Thirteen in the US) and Market Forces, the former focusing on genetically modified humans and the latter being something like a mix of the movies Death Race 2000 and Wall Street.


Then there's also Peter Watts, if you like even harder SF. He's known for inserting bleeding-edge science into his works (so bleeding-edge, he occasionally gets proven right or wrong before the novel even publishes), and attaching a bibliography and list of references to the back of his novels that rivals many peer-reviewed papers. He focuses on "big-idea" stories and likes philosophising about the nature of consciousness and sentience in his books. He writes in a very concise, bitten-off tone and doesn't talk down to his readers at all, but if you're not daunted by his dense prose, his stories are very well-written, thought-provoking and definitely worth a look. The Rifters Trilogy (Starfish, Maelstrom, Behemoth) is a near-future dystopia and focuses on humans enhanced to live at the bottom of the ocean, and his Firefall series (Blindsight, Echopraxia) is a not-so-far-future first contact story with spaceflight and vampires.

And best of all, his first four novels are available for free on his website under Creative Commons!

[rooster707]

If you enjoy more recent Sci-Fi, look at Daniel Suarez - his style is a look at "20 minutes into the future" genre of scifi. Dameon / Freedom (tm) is an awesome pair of novels, and I've heard good things about his most recent book, Change Agent. And Andy Weir's The Martian was great as well.

I just started Daemon a few days ago. I like the premise, but so far all the tech stuff feels, I don't know, dated. Painfully so, which is weird, since it's only like 8 years old, I think.

Oh good, someone mentioned Richard Morgan.

If you're in the mood for post-cyberpunky hard SF, check out his Kovacs Trilogy (Altered Carbon, Broken Angels, Woken Furies). Far-future setting, brain-uploading is a central part of the setting and plot. Alien ruins have been found, but no actual aliens. The series has been called grimdark, but it's really just not as happy-go-lucky as your average Golden Age SF. Oh, but with a fair amount of sex and violence. But his prose is wonderful; noirish, biting and evocative. He's a master at the show-don't-tell trick. Probably my favourite SF series out there.

Seconded, just finished that last week (I've been on a bit of a cyberpunk kick lately) and it is excellent. Aside from the gratuitous, detailed sex scenes.

[Feytalist]

Aside from the gratuitous, detailed sex scenes.

Funny you should mention that; he has some serious thoughts on that exact point on his blog. While I don't agree with everything he says, he does make some good points I think. Do check that post out; it's an interesting counterpoint to the usual criticisms.

[rooster707]

Funny you should mention that; he has some serious thoughts on that exact point on his blog. While I don't agree with everything he says, he does make some good points I think. Do check that post out; it's an interesting counterpoint to the usual criticisms.

Huh. Can't say I agree with him... at all, really, but it's nice to know he's actually thought about this stuff.

[Bohandas]

Funny you should mention that; he has some serious thoughts on that exact point on his blog. While I don't agree with everything he says, he does make some good points I think. Do check that post out; it's an interesting counterpoint to the usual criticisms.

With regard to the paragraph about Max Payne to me it would seem that anything that did npt in some way enhance the action would be gratuitous. This was, for example, the biggest flaw of the Half-Life series, and is the reason why most games let you skip cutscenes.

EDIT:
As a counterpoint to his whole point I'd hold up the musical guests on Saturday Night Live, as entertaining as these musicians might be you can't deny that they really do disrupt the flow of the program because they honestly have no business being on a comedy sketch show. Something can be entertaining and still gratuitous

[~Corvus~]

Heinlin can be as long-winded as Steinbeck in Grapes of Wrath with all the symbolism of Hawthorne's Scarlett Letter. Thus, while many of his novels can be enjoyable reads, they are so burdensome and needlessly protracted that they are no longer what we might consider progressive or entertaining.

A fundamental part of the Sci-fi genre as a whole is rarely read these days: Left Hand of Darkness, by Ursula K LeGuin. It looks at human personality and identity in a fascinating way. You may know LeGuin from her (better known) Wizard of Earthsea, but the latter is fantasy.

Ender's Game (not that train wreck of a movie)

On the newer front The Martian by Andy Weir is a fantastic book (and a pretty decent movie but I still think the book is better).

Ready Player One is also a pretty good newer book

I second all three of these. Furthermore, if you enjoy Ender's Game, I recommend Ender's Shadow (about Bean), but any other books in the areas will delve further into society and religious exploration than fun science-fiction.

Ready Player One is a very good book for the consideration that the author is new to the genre.

Now, although it's not QUITE Sci-fi, there's a comic called East of West that is absolutely fantastic: an alternate-history of the US, in a very technological and political landscape that's both science-fiction heavy while subversive of mythic tropes.

[rooster707]

I just started Daemon a few days ago. I like the premise, but so far all the tech stuff feels, I don't know, dated. Painfully so, which is weird, since it's only like 8 years old, I think.

Okay, finished it, starting the sequel now. The technobabble (can you call it that if it's real technology? ) got less annoying later on, and the Darknet stuff is actually really cool. My main problem by the end was that there are *no* sympathetic characters in the entire book.

[Knaight]

A fundamental part of the Sci-fi genre as a whole is rarely read these days: Left Hand of Darkness, by Ursula K LeGuin. It looks at human personality and identity in a fascinating way. You may know LeGuin from her (better known) Wizard of Earthsea, but the latter is fantasy.

There's also The Dispossessed, A Fisherman on the Inland Sea, and The Lathe of Heaven, all of which are relatively well known and really good.

[~Corvus~]

There's also The Dispossessed, A Fisherman on the Inland Sea, and The Lathe of Heaven, all of which are relatively well known and really good.

And the Dispossessed is in the same universe as The left Hand of Darkness. A short wiki-walk later, I've learned what a term tête béche is.

[Wookieetank]

I'll add a second to anything by Alastair Reynolds & Iain M. Banks.

For things not yet listed:

Peter F. Hamilton's Commonwealth Saga (Pandora's Star & Judas Unchained) is pretty neat. Very heavy on politics/intrigue at times and with a wide cast of characters/POVs. Overall a lot of fun, and interstellar travel by train was an amusing concept.

For fun sorta sci-fi:

Doctor who novels are a lot of fun. If you like the show at all, you'll like these. I'm finding that most anything with the 4th Doctor in it to be absolutely brilliant.

Star Wars EU. The books range from decent to fan-fic, but most of them are fun (except for Truce at Bakura & Crystal Star *shudder* just...don't). The Thrawn Trilogy is especially well put together.

[TeChameleon]

I'll toss another suggestion on the webcomic list- www.schlockmercenary.com. Just... fair warning: the early art is... awful is probably putting it gently, and it's a massive read. Put it this way; it's updated daily for slightly over 17 years, and the closest it's ever come to missing an update was when the server at the host provider exploded. As in 'took out a wall and the building was on fire'. And the comic was a few hours late, which the author apologized for O.o Great fun to read, though, and the art gets much better as time goes on.

For more traditional sci-fi... I'll second, third, whateverth the Vorkosigan saga- great fun to read, especially the earlier stuff. John Ringo's Live Free or Die as well- it's an odd cross between a rollicking space adventure, surprisingly hard Sci-Fi, and 'American Free Market Enterprise Saves the World', and so utterly weird that it's hard not to love (barring being a die hard Communist, I guess?). Hrm- Nthing Larry Niven's Known Space series as well- it's a fascinating universe, and home to one of my favourite quotes about Science-Fiction Humans, regarding how the local Proud Warrior Race regarded humans with disdain, since the 'hairless monkeys' had given up the practice of war- "The reason the hairless monkeys from Earth stopped practicing War was because they were so very, very good at it." Cue the Kzinti Lesson (read the books ).

Another one I'll toss out there that I am tremendously fond of is Keith Laumer's Retief series. Laumer is much better known for his Bolo series (the two series appear to share a universe, actually, as Bolo tanks turn up in Retief every so often), which is rather good military SF, but I love the sardonic edge in the Retief series, which is said to be based on Laumer's own experiences in the diplomatic corps shortly after WWII. I know they're a bit older, but I can't resist recommending them >.>

... right. The Retief series is about Jaime Retief, who appears to be the lone sane member of the star-spanning Corps Diplomatique Terrestrienne, and the the last, best hope of many a hapless human against a myriad of hostile alien races, using guile, cunning, and the occasional well-placed sledgehammer right hook. Cheerfully cynical and with a wit sharp enough to shave with, it's an oddball hidden gem of science fiction, at least in my (ever-so-humble ) opinion.

[Thrudd]

Peter F. Hamilton - If you are not daunted by long books, The Void trilogy which takes place in the same universe as the Commonwealth Saga was really enjoyable for me - "Dreaming Void", "Temporal Void" and "Evolutionary Void" - they are long space-opera-esque, full of intrigue and cool technology and action, lots of characters and different points of view, and great trans/post-human speculative stuff. It's not necessary, but if you read the Commonwealth books first some of the characters and situations will make a little more sense.

Dan Simmons - Hyperion/Fall of Hyperion was mentioned, I also like "Endymion" and "Rise of Endymion" that are the sequels/conclusion to that series - they answer/tie up a couple loose ends from the first two books. I enjoyed his "Illium" and "Olympos" as well - though maybe it's just the historian/classicist in me enjoying the idea of a main character that is a classicist watching the Trojan War happen in real-time (complete with the "gods" doing their thing). But I also like its take on the far future solar system's civilization.

Stephen Baxter - For wild speculative sci-fi on the harder side, I really liked his "Manifold" series, "Manifold Time" "Manifold Origin" "Manifold Space". Rather than an actual series that take place in a sequence, they are books which feature the same main characters in parallel realities, each one presenting a different take on aspects of the Fermi Equation/"Where are the aliens?" question. They deal with questions about the origin of the universe and multiverse theories and panspermia, all that sort of thing.
His collaboration with AC Clarke, "The Light of Other Days", I found interesting, too.

For sci-fi classics, pre 90's, I think there are some must-reads, even while some of them are obviously dated in terms of technology and scientific information.

Frederik Pohl's "Gateway" is fantastic. I like a lot of his other stuff, too, he has tons of one-off books that are fun and cool to me - I think he has great alien species designs that are exotic and weird and totally believable. I liked "Narabedla Ltd." more than probably a lot of people - again, this is probably a niche thing since I got a kick out of the main character being an opera singer (I dated a girl majoring in opera/performance for a while, so I prolly have a fondness for that stuff uncommon in people my age lol). Think that Rick and Morty episode "Get Schwifty", but without the threat of planets getting blown up.

Niven has been mentioned already. "Ringworld" is a classic. His collaborations with Jerry Pournelle are also fun - "Mote in God's Eye" is a must.

For Heinlein, a lot of his stuff isn't great, but there are a couple classics - I don't think "The Moon is a Harsh Mistress" should be skipped, despite its aged take on computers. I also don't think "Stranger in a Strange Land" should be skipped, even though it is not exactly what a lot of people expect when they think of sci-fi. It's just an overall culturally important book.

Asimov's longer series, "Foundation" and the three "Robots" books featuring Daneel Olivaw, I actually really like despite the aging. But if those are not to taste, I would say at least read a shorter novel, "The End of Eternity". It's not a long time commitment, and a fun take on time travel.

Everyone has already mentioned LeGuin's "Left Hand of Darkness" and I agree. It isn't long and a must read. A lot of these earlier sci-fi novels aren't terribly long - the 700 pg tomes of modern times were not something often tolerated by publishers "back in the day". A lot of these you can knock out in one or two sittings.

[~Corvus~]

For Heinlein, a lot of his stuff isn't great, but there are a couple classics - I don't think "The Moon is a Harsh Mistress" should be skipped, despite its aged take on computers. I also don't think "Stranger in a Strange Land" should be skipped, even though it is not exactly what a lot of people expect when they think of sci-fi. It's just an overall culturally important book.

(emphasis mine)

Funny, a close friend gave me this novel to borrow and it's surprisingly good. I still don't think much of Heinlein's works have aged well, but it is good.

[The Glyphstone]

I'll toss another suggestion on the webcomic list- www.schlockmercenary.com. Just... fair warning: the early art is... awful is probably putting it gently, and it's a massive read. Put it this way; it's updated daily for slightly over 17 years, and the closest it's ever come to missing an update was when the server at the host provider exploded. As in 'took out a wall and the building was on fire'. And the comic was a few hours late, which the author apologized for O.o Great fun to read, though, and the art gets much better as time goes on.
John Ringo's Live Free or Die as well- it's an odd cross between a rollicking space adventure, surprisingly hard Sci-Fi, and 'American Free Market Enterprise Saves the World', and so utterly weird that it's hard not to love (barring being a die hard Communist, I guess?).

Don't forget that LFoD is, by its own admission, a sort of unofficial Shlock Mercenary prequel about the human First Contact incident.

[BWR]

For more traditional sci-fi... I'll second, third, whateverth the Vorkosigan saga- great fun to read, especially the earlier stuff. John Ringo's Live Free or Die as well- it's an odd cross between a rollicking space adventure, surprisingly hard Sci-Fi, and 'American Free Market Enterprise Saves the World', and so utterly weird that it's hard not to love (barring being a die hard Communist, I guess?).

Not a die hard Communist, but I definitely tend more in that direction than the unbridled capitalism that Ringo likes. His rather jingoistic economic ideas, and the rest of his stuff being at best OK, has put me off reading more of him.

[Otomodachi]

Some echoing, some new material.

Dan Simmons is a fantastic writer, in my opinion, although I could also see a person seeing his stuff as slightly pretentious. He is definitely a huge literature nerd, and feels to me like he has a natural tendency to disappear into his own belly-button. It works FOR ME, and the Hyperion Cantos are enjoyable even if you don't care about his Lit Major obsessions. If you DO like that kind of stuff, hey guess what? You might have a new favorite author.

Someone also recommended Years of Salt and Rice. I haven't read that one, but the author (Kim Stanley Robinson) also did an AMAZING trilogy (Red Mars, Green Mars, Blue Mars) about the colonization of Mars and what it would mean for humanity. The guy has a really good sense of pacing and scale, and his wife is an Actual Scientist, which kept him honest in terms of realistic sci-fi. Please understand that "realistic sci-fi" does not mean boring... if you read these books, be prepared to join me in fervently praying to see them done on a big screen some day. Just WOW.

Something NOT in a series is The Gone-Away World by Nick Harkaway. It's cool. It's like a sci-fi adventure book. There's a lot of deep ideas behind the scenes. It will probably be something you'll binge in a day or two. I can't say much specifics cuz spoilers. It's good.

Lastly, if you don't mind getting your sci-fi in my peanut butter... er, sci-fi in my creepy pseudo-horror elements, John Dies at the End and This Book is Full of Spiders (Seriously, Dude, Don't Touch It) are worth a look. They seem like silly puff pieces at first but in my opinion there are some worthy, headier veins to be mined, there.