[Closed] Sci-Fi Novel recommendations

halfhead Stuart McBride

Alan Dean fosters commonwealth series

https://www.fantasticfiction.com/f/alan-dean-foster/

Children of time by Adrian Tchaikovsky

Dan Simmonds ilium/olympos & Hyperion

Ian banks Culture books

I just finished The Book of Strange New Things by Michel Faber it was brilliant.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Player_of_Games
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Consider_Phlebas
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Excession

Iain M Banks, some of the easier starting ones

I have recently enjoyed the Vattas War series by Eliabeth Moon - space opera really. I love my SF and this is one of the best I have read in a while. Its proper old skool hard SF - interstellar trading, rebellion and war

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vatta%27s_War

I also love the megapack series of golden era SF and in particular recently read the collected works of Brian Aldiss which I think is a different series.

John Scalzi Old mans war is another good series.

Alastair Reynolds is my favourite sci-fi author, you might find some of his other books more readable than Revelation Space. Chasm City is really good, detective novel more than space opera. He also has a few short story compilations.

Blindsight by Peter Watts is free on his website. I should read some of his other books sometime.

A Canticle for Leibowitz is brilliant post apocalypse fiction.

Anything by Vonnegut, though he's more loosely sci-fi.

Not sure if you'd like PK Dick if you don't want weirdness but I can't not recommend him. Dr Bloodmoney is one of my favourites but he wrote a lot.

Lots of classic sci-fi, try looking up the SF Masterworks collection and take your pick. Some of it can be amusingly dated but usually worthwhile still.

Culture novels are pure brilliance, I've not found anything as good. However I would not suggest Consider Phlebas as a starter as it's just a normal good novel rather than outstanding. Player of Games should get you off to a fine start. Some of the others are a deep, abstract and existential, a bit like I would imagine a scifi novel written by Proust to be. But they are essentially utopian, which as far as I am aware is unique in scifi.

Otherwise, for absolutely spectacular genius try Neal Stephenson, specifically Anathem or Seveneves. The former in particular is literally staggering in scope. Needs to be read at least twice tho and once more with some notes and reference work.

Having said all that, these may not be suitable for holiday reading as you may end up forgetting about your holiday altogether and spending your time staring at the skies whilst ignoring those around you...

For easier stuff but still charming and with content, maybe try some Jules Verne classics?

Charles Stross has some good stuff. His Laundry series is fun, in a not too serious horror/IT consultant style.

Seconding the Adrian Tchaikovsky recommendation, Dogs of War is also far better than its premise would seem to allow. Ted Chiang's short stories are mostly excellent. Lem's Fiasco or His Master's Voice are good starting places for his less silly and less mind-bending material.

Just bought 3 of the Culture series.. Thanks to whoever 🙂

If they're rubbish at least i know where to come to sell them 🙂

Neal Stephenson, specifically Anathem or Seveneves

I'd probably start with snowcrash or the diamond age. Didn't get on with Seveneves and the sheer length of anathem is intimidating.

If you like hard sci-fi the Three Body Problem trilogy is good and I've just started re-reading Dune which is excellent.

Also starship troopers is brilliant - nothing like the film

Blade Runner?

Iain M Banks - Goes without saying.

Another recommendation for the SF Masterworks collection. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SF_Masterworks

One of my favorite "old school" SF is Bring the Jubilee by Ward Moore, really entertaining alt history.

I enjoyed scalzi's Old Man's War a lot, not so much some of the sequels, just finished the second book in his Interdependency series, which is quite fun.

For lighter holiday reading, you could do worse than give John Birmingham's Axis of Time books a go- a modern day Naval taskforce accidentally sent back to WWII.

Richard Morgan has a new book, Thin Air.

It's harder buying SF these days. Go into the bookstore and it's mixed in with the magic fairy with a sword stuff. It's hard enough separating it out from the cowboys and indians in space.

Can't be arsed looking for a diamond amongst that dross.

Some good recommendations up there. I'll add a vintage one - Eric Frank Russell - some of his work is very subversive, plus some is funny, and some did not age well, but still worth a read.

Any of the 'classic sifi' stuff, Alldis Huxley, AC Clarke etc.
Stephen baxter - but only stuff written in the last 10yrs. his early stuff is filled with interesting concepts and sifi but the characters are week. Having said that Ring and Moon are both good.
Richard Morgan just for altered carbon, his most resent book, thin air, is good but not amazing.

The Feed by Nick Clark Windo, a slow burner but great story

Anything by Stanislaw Lem and anything by Philip K Dick

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The "Red Rising" trilogy.

Booked mark for later.

Another recommendation for Iain M Banks' Culture novels, there really is no better sci fi and I am consistently sad every time I'm reminded there won't ever be another one.

For more hard sci fi, Kim Stanley Robinson's Mars trilogy is very, very good. Start with Red Mars, all about the colonisation of the planet and everything that goes along with it.

The Southern Reach trilogy by Jeff VanderMeer is worth a go if you like your Sci-fi a bit "dream like"

the newest stuff i've enjoyed a lot is the 'dark eden' trilogy by chris beckett

heres a review of the first in the trilogy
https://www.theguardian.com/books/2012/jan/13/science-fiction-fiction

older stuff though, much of the above. masterworks for sure. i really liked william gibson around the neuromancer/burning chrome era, and still read his stuff

also, a guy i went to college with has a few self published books out now. they're more fantasy than sci-fi but really good. the fourth is due soon.

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Chris-Crockford/e/B075J3424T

Recently I've really enjoyed Ian W Sainsbury's books. First the World Walker series, and then the Half-Hero books.

The Forever War is also worth a mention

+1 for John Scalzi and Charles Stross books

The Awakened Series by Jason Tesar.
Predator Cities (Mortal Engines) by Phillip Reeve
Spinward Fringe Series by Randolph Lalonde, think there are around 15 books now
Phoenix Conspiracy Series by Richard Sanders (more space drama)
Ark Royal Series by Christoper Nutall (7-8 books)
The Redemption Trilogy by Mike Smith
Battle for the Solar System Series by Stephen Sweeney

Second vote for Macleod, the Star Fraction series was great. I really need to find my box of books that went missing when we moved (three years ago) and re-read those.

SNOW CRASH

Iain M Banks culture novels are my favourite - just finished reading them all for the second time.

Agree that Children of time (Adrian Tchaikovsky) is excellent - really different perspective from other SciFi I've read.

I like some of the stand-alone novels by Peter Hamilton, like Fallen Dragon, but didn't enjoy the Nights Dawn trilogy so much (too much Psuedo-religious crap for my liking).

I've just finished the "Field" series of books by Simon Winstanley (Field 1, Field 2, Boundary and EVA). Another interesting concept, and well written.

Also enjoyed The World walker and Half Heroes mentioned above - easy reading and fast paced.

If you enjoyed The Exapanse, you might want to try some of Paul MaCauley's stuff - "The Quiet War" etc. Similar but different.

Just beeen dipping my toe into The Laundry series. Not really SciFi, more fantasy in my eyes. Like a Tom Holt book with more computer jokes.
Big plus 1 for Snow Crash and if you like that then The Rise and Fall of DODO is worth getting.
On a classic front I'd recommend The Stars My Destination by Alfred Bester. That is the teleportation story that should have been filmed NOT Jumper.
Darwin's Radio by Greg Bear is excellent as is Heavy Weather by Bruce Sterling.

Didn’t get on with Seveneves and the sheer length of anathem is intimidating.

Yeah but you get your money's worth 🙂 Seveneves is slow at first, but I loved the hyperrealism of it - it's a story that starts with a single concept and just follows through what would happen, which appeals to me. But then there's a page about 3/4 of the way through that you turn and BOOM! Brilliant.

The problem I have with so much scifi is that it's dystopian, and consequently such a massive cliche. War, backward technological progress, cliches from either colonial era Earth, WWII or the Wild West etc etc. I have had an Alastair Reynolds on my Kindle about 1/3 of the way through for a couple of years.

N K Jemison.
I've read the Broken Earth trilogy and the inheritance trilogy.
I really enjoyed them.

Also the 'ship' novels by Anne Mccaffrey.

I always recommend the Red/Green/Blue Mars series by Kim Stanley Robinson - hopefully hasn't dated too badly!

I don't think anyone's mentioned Vernor Vinge yet. Worth reading if you like space opera. A Deepness in the Sky would be my recommendation, 2 rival ships arriving at a strange star and making first contact with the pre- space age aliens that live there.

No mention of Neal Asher yet?
His Polity stuff is in a similar vain to Iain M Banks Cluture universe (maybe a bit darker)

Smashed my way through the 'Expanse' series (next book ti due soon) and now doing the same with the 'Field' series.

Surprised no one has suggested the murderbot diaries by martha wells yet.
They're only novella length but very entertaining

Seconding the Adrian Tchaikovsky recommendation, Dogs of War is also far better than its premise would seem to allow.

Another vote for both these books. Great reading. If it’s action packed you’re after I’d recommend Richard Morgan’s Altered Carbon series, Black Man and Market Forces.

I thought I'd manage some suggestion that no one else has mentioned, and boom SOY and FM get in there first.. Richard Morgan & Martha Wells, both very good.
I really enjoy Scalzi's humor so would suggest trying his Fuzzy Nation and Agent to the Stars, alongside the Old man war series (Sagan diaries is a bit 'deep' but the only one I struggled with)
As most of the modern classics have been mentioned hows about:
Andy Weir - The Martian, though not so keen on his follow up Artemis
Marko Kloos - Frontline series, though it seems to be trailing on now, I'm sure he'll sort it
Craig Alanson - Expeditionary Force, I love this but it could be seen as repetitive (ala Laundry files)
Ann Leckie - Ancillary Series, warms up as you go, though the setting is weird.
and Dennis E. Taylor's 'The Bobiverse Trilogy' is by far my favorite of late.

The forever war

Babel 17

I can second the broken earth trilogy, got through them I’m short order earlier in the year.

I’ve also enjoyed Ann Leckie’s ancillary justice (and the rest of that series) and Becky Chambers’ the Long way to a small angry planet (and the rest of the wayfarers books).

Bookmarking and bumping.
Monkeyboyjc and eddiebaby’s tips remind me of this clip:
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=rqU8EQ6G1i0

Currently reading Alisdair Reynolds’ Galactic North, having finished the Revelation novels suggested in a previous thread here.

Just enjoyed Peter Cawdron’s Losing Mars. Fairly short but enjoyable.

Seveneves is the last book I read, took a bit of work to get into it, but really enjoyed the scope of it, although I’m not quite sure about the slightly unsubtle storyline dividing society into red and blue.
I’m now reading Anathem, didn’t have a clue where it was going, and only have a vague idea roughly ⅓ of the way into it, but I’m taking every opportunity to dive back into it to find out.

Anyone mentioned the Gibson trilogies - Neuromancer and the bridge trilogy? Fantastic books.

Southern reach trilogy (start with annihilation)

Roadside picnic is a classic that’s aged brilliantly IMHO

OP I share your non-enthusiasm for Wool. Padded and predictable, nice premise but nothing special at all.

Im a sucker for the Sprawl and Bridge trilogies and then came Blue Ant that I loved but suddenly I stumbled with The Peripheral. I love his work rating Neuromancer quite a bit higher than Dreams of Blood and Sand by WT Quick that felt derivative but folk like Rudy Rucker really got into the cyber too.
I'm not certain why I'm so hesitant about The Peripheral. Maybe other stuff it starting to outweigh it. Cryptonomicon is my go to WTF book. its density is amazing but it is not SciF really.

Can I just point out tho that thee genre is Science fiction or SF. Sci-fi is for dorks only!

I think this is my most successful thread ever!

Thank you for all the recommendations, some of which I’ve read on the back of the last thread on here, Children of Time, Wayfarers series, Red Mars etc but plenty of new series to look in too!

I also had a very kind offer of receiving a copy of Children if Time in the post! Whilst I have already read it it for me thinking that maybe we could set up an STW book swap shop, new reads and recycling for the cost of a couple of stamps? Just a thought...

This is as much of my SF collection as I can get in one photo! In the next couple of years I have to get rid of the lot 🙁 It varies from a full set of EE "doc" Smith to Golden era collectons to Modern stuff like Stephenson and Moon
[url= https://farm5.staticflickr.com/4849/32413212308_8ed666ec35_b.jp g" target="_blank">https://farm5.staticflickr.com/4849/32413212308_8ed666ec35_b.jp g"/> [/img][/url][url= https://flic.kr/p/RofbL5 ]DSC_0703[/url] by [url= https://www.flickr.com/photos/25846484@N04/ ]TandemJeremy[/url], on Flickr

I don't know if that works with Kindle books...

Just started Richard Morgan’s new book Thin Air. Seems decent so far, dirty cyber punk noir. I just hope that there’ll be less of the embarrassingly written sex scenes in this one. Not holding my breath though.

I’m now reading Anathem, didn’t have a clue where it was going, and only have a vague idea roughly ⅓ of the way into it, but I’m taking every opportunity to dive back into it to find out.

I don't think Stephenson had a clue where it was going when he started it. It grows exponentially in scope as it goes on.

First time I read it I didn't really understand the ending or fully get what was going on. Second time I knew how it ended so I was able to take it slower and think about what I'd read. That's when I was really blown away on so many levels from so many directions.

Another shout for Alastair Reynolds and Ian M Banks. Reynolds especially, made twelve hour night shifts fly 😉

Mentioned before, but Dune is a great read. Also try Borne by Jeff VanderMeer is a great read - bit odd but not too much. Also I'd agree that Snow Crash by Neil Stephenson is really good.

Yep, Dune
Neuromancer
Shadow of the Torturer( Gene Wolfe)

Neuromancer has been mentioned, but William Gibson’s later books are all well worth reading, especially as they run in loosely-linked trilogies, despite his best efforts to do otherwise. Here’s a list of his published works in order:
Publication Order of Sprawl Books
Neuromancer (1984)
Count Zero (1986)
Mona Lisa Overdrive (1988)
Publication Order of Bridge Books
Virtual Light (1993)
Idoru (1996)
All Tomorrow's Parties (1999)
Publication Order of Blue Ant/Bigend Books
Pattern Recognition (2003)
Spook Country (2007)
Zero History (2010)
Publication Order of Standalone Novels
The Difference Engine (1990)
The Peripheral (2014)
Publication Order of Short Story Collections
Burning Chrome

The Periferal is no longer a standalone story, Gibson’s next book, which should have been published earlier this year, had to be completely re-written after dTrump won the Presidency, and everything he’d written couldn’t match the reality of what had actually happened - the original story imagined the US with Hilary Clinton as President, and the new book will link in with the events of The Periferal

+1 for Iain Banks, Peter Hamilton, Alistair Reynolds, Dune #1 & Gibson.

Not mentioned yet but I really rate River of Gods (& slightly less so) Cyberadad days by Ian McDonald. Future Indian subcontinent AIs, tech wars, quantum mechanics, a new sex, ageless children & Krishna cops.

Not quite Sci Fi but I also rate Perdido St Station & the Scar by China Mieville. Amazing world building science steampunk fantasy fiction. I don't like fantasy but would read anything else set in Bas Lag.

Richard Morgan - Takeshi Kovaks series (Altered Carbon, Broken Angels, Woken Furies).

I don’t think anyone has mentioned it yet, but I’d definitely recommend ‘The Three Body Problem’ by Cixin Liu, some of the most inventive SF I’ve had the pleasure to read since the Culture Novels.

I also really rated Simon Winstanley’s Field series.

If you can stomach giving the Wool series another go, do so. It ranks in my top 10.

Yep, Dune
Neuromancer
Shadow of the Torturer( Gene Wolfe)

I finished a reread of Book of the New Sun last month - Jesus Christ that is some book.
G. O. A. T. SF novel and for me it's not even close. Obviously a ridiculous statement to make for an entire genre, but honestly I couldn't name anything in the same league. Not everyone's cup of tea, though, as you would expect from something at this level.

I found it hard to understand how Wolfe wrote that book. Like with most of the classics you have an inkling of the author's motivations, what they're trying to achieve, what the point of the book is. To be such an exceptional writer, and write that obscure a novel, it's sort of hard to make sense of the process.

I’m a big fan of Gibsons Blueant trilogy, especially Spook Country (def my fave Gibson). I’ve pretty much everything (bar difference engine I think).

Stephenson, yeah, read everything I think. Anathem, Snow Crash & Cryptonomicon are his jewels. Just finished DODO which I found a slow start. Picked it up/put it down a couple times but enjoyed it.

Anybody mentioned Neil Gaimans American Gods yet?

Bearing in mind the above can anybody recommend ‘similar’ stuff for me to try?

Bearing in mind the above can anybody recommend ‘similar’ stuff for me to try?

Zachary Mason's Void Star. Dense, somewhat endebted to Gibson, written by someone with a better understanding of AI than most.

Anybody read Poul Anderson's Tau Zero? Not an exciting novel but an interesting attempt to be scientific about fiction. Would be grateful if anyone knows other books he's written which are also good.

Anybody read Poul Anderson’s Tau Zero?

Yep, picked it up for 20p in a charity shop, enjoyed it but found it very slow going.

Enjoyed Lucifer's Hammer by Larry Niven. Short single novel but a weekend well spent.

Have read Wool which was ok, but not such I immediately sought out the sequel.

I read all three. Meh, was okay but not amazingly so, Dust felt unfinished. Good concepts but not great execution.

For more hard sci fi, Kim Stanley Robinson

Is that hard as in hard to see why it would be classified as such? I read 2312 and it was more of a social sciences fiction than anything else focussing just about entirely on gender politics (take your pick of at least 6) to the expense of everything else. Plus veeeeery monotonous with pretentious characters you just want to slap.

Is Red Mars more of the same or was 2312 just a miss?

Okay, my recommendations - as always Ken MacLeod if you are into Banks. Not so much his Culture as opposed to Taysiders in Space. A couple of Banks' non-M books like Walking on Glass and Transition are worth looking at as well, they are more M than not tbh. Andrew Bannister's Spin series isn't bad either though the stories are only connected by the universe they are set in.

Here's what's currently on my Kindle that fits the brief, hasn't been mentioned yet and I'm willing to own up to reading:

The Calculating Stars and The Fated Sky by Mary Robinette Kowal
Embers of War by Gareth Powell
The Wrong Stars by Tim Pratt (I think the sequel to this is just out as well)
The War Dogs Trilogy by Greg Bear
The Last Good Man and the The Red Trilogy by Linda Nagata

Not quite Sci Fi but I also rate Perdido St Station & the Scar by China Mieville. Amazing world building science steampunk fantasy fiction. I don’t like fantasy but would read anything else set in Bas Lag.

Leave it at that. Don't bother with the third in the trilogy, "Iron Council". Very weak.

Another recommendation for Iain M Banks’ Culture novels, there really is no better sci fi and I am consistently sad every time I’m reminded there won’t ever be another one.
For more hard sci fi, Kim Stanley Robinson’s Mars trilogy is very, very good. Start with Red Mars, all about the colonisation of the planet and everything that goes along with it.

These would be my recommendations too plenty there to keep you occupied for two or three holidays...

Coyote

Member
Not quite Sci Fi but I also rate Perdido St Station & the Scar by China Mieville. Amazing world building science steampunk fantasy fiction. I don’t like fantasy but would read anything else set in Bas Lag.

Leave it at that. Don’t bother with the third in the trilogy, “Iron Council”. Very weak.

I didn't mind Iron Council - I think there is a good book in there trying to get out, but there are structural problems that bog it down.
Actually reads like an author's first book - good ideas, characters etc but the writer doesn't yet have the skill to make it all work together. So it's strange that it came later on - PSS and the Scar are fantastically accomplished books given Mieville wrote them early in his career.

Skimmed through the thread and didn't see: The Quantum Thief trilogy by Hannu Rajaniemi.

I found them hard work but really rewarding. Abstract ideas based on various concepts, stretched to the ridiculous. Took me a few reads to 'get' the worlds but once it clicked, it's a fun adventure through a crazy and bizarre story.

Ringworld FTW.

I seem to remember a mote in gods eye buy Niven and Pournelle being good but it has been a loooong time since i read it.

*by...
(come back edit button!)

Becky Chambers’ the Long way to a small angry planet (and the rest of the wayfarers books).

Great books, hugely enjoyable. I’ve got a massive list of books by Larry Niven ebooks, aquired through a Chinese ebook site that’s no longer accessible, many of them are books that haven’t been in print for many years. The Man-Kzin Wars books, a shared universe series written by a bunch of other writers are great fun, but Niven wrote lots of short stories later put into collections, and many have a sense of humour as well, some of his stories are magical fantasy, like The Magic Goes Away, and What Good Is A Glass Dagger.
I also have to mention Roger Zelazney as well, one of SF’s finest writers, who wrote great fantasy stories as well as SF, and co-wrote a book with Alfred Bester, considered to be the father of Cyberpunk with his books Tiger! Tiger!, also known as The Stars My Destination, and The Demolished Man.
I don’t think there’s anything written by either Zelazney or Niven that I haven’t read, most of them several times, quite a few many times over the years.