Hatrack River Writers Workshop: Fun Science Fiction Recommendations

This is topic Fun Science Fiction Recommendations in forum Open Discussions About Writing at Hatrack River Writers Workshop.

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Posted by kathyton (Member # 7780) on :

My daughter works at a large university library and has the fun assignment of ordering some new books for the science fiction section of the "recreational reading" shelf. These works would be things the students, faculty and staff might pick up to read for entertainment, as opposed to books for research or class assignments. Given that the library probably already hold the "classics," what works of science fiction would the Hatrack folks recommend she buy? (someone else will order fantasy and horror, so we're talking anything that you consider primarily science fiction.)
Thanks,

Posted by WouldBe (Member # 5682) on :

There is an Orson Scott Card-edited anthology of best SF short stories that is fun. This has the advantage of exposure to quite a few authors without a large investment of time in a single story. It has three sections, The Golden Age, The New Age, and The Media Age, so you get a nice overview of the genre.

Title: Masterpieces: The Best Science Fiction of the Twentieth Century.

Posted by InarticulateBabbler (Member # 4849) on :

I liked Steve Perry's Matador series (starting with The Man Who Never Missed); Kevin J. Anderson's The Saga of Seven Suns (beginning with Hidden Empire); Steven Gould's Jumper--makes it hard when you say "classics". What would that library consider enough of a "classic" to keep?

Posted by KayTi (Member # 5137) on :

I've recently read John Scalzi's book Old Man's War, very good (he has several others.)

I'm reading an Elizabeth Moon book, she has plenty - good stuff.

I've also been reading a lot in the midgrade/YA fiction level, but I'd imagine that wouldn't pass muster at a university library.

Other titles I'd consider part of any "best of" list (just to make sure they have the classics):

Moon is a Harsh Mistress - Heinlein
Forever War - Haldeman
Mote in God's Eye - Niven + is it Pournelle?
Rama series - Clarke
Contact - Sagan
Foundation series - Asimov
Robot series - Asimov
Left hand of Darkness - Le Guin
Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep - Dick (and several others of his)
Slaughterhouse 5 - Vonnegut (and others)

There's plenty more, I'm still compiling my list of must-read Sci-fi, and keep discovering authors I've never read before but are on other people's must-read lists.

Good luck to her!

Posted by arriki (Member # 3079) on :

If you're looking for some good SF mind candy --

Tell her to look for the books by Rick Cook --
THE WIZARDRY COMPILED
THE WIZARDRY CONSULTED
THE WIZARDRY CURSED etc.

Great for computer programming nerds as well as normal people. Very funny. I quote the back blurb of the first book --

How does a shanghaied computer geek conquer all the forces of Darkness and win the love ot the most beautiful witch in the world?

By transforming himself from a demon programmer to a programmer of demons!

Come to a land where magic works like a computer program. F-15s lose dogfights with dragons. Lots of good mind candy in these books.

[This message has been edited by arriki (edited December 01, 2008).]

Posted by Patrick James (Member # 7847) on :

Fun sci-fi, hmmm, fun sci-fi, hmmm...

Well, there's The Hitchiker's Guide To The Galaxy.

I read that years ago and I'm still laughing. Seriously, I have to get my oxygen via a tube in my throat because I am too busy laughing. Okay, maybe that was a bit far.

Posted by TheOnceandFutureMe on :

Louis McMaster Bujold's The Warrior's Apprentice and The Vor Game.

Posted by kathyton (Member # 7780) on :

Thanks! These are great suggestions; some I'm familiar with, some not so much. I'm passing them along. The students at Washington University are indebted to you all.

Posted by dreadlord (Member # 2913) on :

the star stuff. star wars, star trek, that sort of stuff. or dune. dune was good.

Posted by Robert Nowall (Member # 2764) on :

Don't think we're done with our suggestions---I just found out you were taking requests.

I'll throw out a couple of names, and attached works.

Arthur C. Clarke: Childhood's End, Earthlight, Rendezvous with Rama, and, oh yeah, 2001: A Space Odyssey.

Frederik Pohl: Gateway, and (with C. M. Kornbluth) The Space Merchants.

Philip Jose Farmer: the "Riverworld" series.

James Blish: Cities in Flight and A Case of Conscience.

E. E. "Doc" Smith: the "Skylark" series and the "Lensmen" series. (Crude by modern standards but "this is where it all started")

Alfred Bester: The Demolished Man and The Stars My Destination.

H. P. Lovecraft: there's reportedly a new Barnes & Noble "public domain" volume that collects all his stories.

H. Beam Piper: Space Viking, The Cosmic Computer, Lord Kalvan of Otherwhen, and the "Little Fuzzy" series.

There are a lot of massive short story collections: I'll recommend Adventures in Space and Time (think I've got the name right), a big book collection that came out in the late 1940s and is usually in print...but if not, seek out another somewhere, and also to get some post-1940s stories.

*****

I really don't know which of these is in print or out of print...a good scrounge at a used book store should turn up some paperback copies of just about anything you care to name.

Posted by steffenwolf (Member # 8250) on :

I really enjoyed the "Otherland" series by Tad Williams. It's fantasy-like but with an SF framework.

Posted by debhoag (Member # 5493) on :

How about Spider Robinson? David Gerrold?

Posted by Cheyne (Member # 7710) on :

Robert Silverberg
David Brin
William Gibson

Posted by Kathleen Dalton Woodbury (Member # 59) on :

Neal Stephenson comes to mind.

Posted by Kathleen Dalton Woodbury (Member # 59) on :

And Mike Resnick -- his space opera stuff is great entertainmnt.

Posted by KayTi (Member # 5137) on :

Oh yes -

Gibson - Neuromancer
Stephenson - Snowcrash
How about China Mieville - Periodio Street Station (or something close to that? It might be more into Urban Fantasy than Sci-Fi)

I was at the library today and got talking to one of the librarians about female sci-fi writers, preferably those who are publishing new stuff today. In addition to any I've previously mentioned, here's the list we came up with (by no means complete, but it's a start):

Anne McCaffrey
Mercedes Lackey
Lois McMaster Bujold
Octavia Butler
Piercy - He/She/It
Mary Doria Russell - The Sparrow
Julie Czerneda - Species Imperative
Connie Willis
Andre Norton
Kage Baker
Margaret Atwood

What a fun project! I hope they enjoy digging through the book reviews and finding a good collection for the library.

Posted by Kathleen Dalton Woodbury (Member # 59) on :

I second the Lois McMaster Bujold and Kage Baker.

Posted by extrinsic (Member # 8019) on :

Easily overlooked, frequently overlooked, Julian May's novels are library worthy, for entertainment reading, though not as "light" as other works from the same era. I've read the Pliocene, Milieu, and Trillium series, not the Boreal or Rampart ones.

From Wikipedia's bibliography of May's titles;

The Saga of Pliocene Exile
The Many-Colored Land (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1981). ISBN 0-395-30230-7.
The Golden Torc (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1982). ISBN 0-395-31261-2.
The Nonborn King (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1983). ISBN 0-395-32211-1.
The Adversary (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1984). ISBN 0-395-34410-7.

The Galactic Milieu Series
Intervention: A Root Tale to the Galactic Milieu and a Vinculum between it and The Saga of Pliocene Exile (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1987). ISBN 0-395-43782-2. (Released in the USA as two mass market paperbacks: Surveillance and Metaconcert. Released in the UK as a single volume)
Metaconcert (Intervention no. 2) Separate paperback. ISBN 0-345-35524-5 Publisher: Del Rey (January 13, 1989)
Jack the Bodiless (New York: Knopf, 1991). ISBN 0-679-40950-5.
Diamond Mask (New York: Knopf, 1994). ISBN 0-679-43310-4.
Magnificat (New York: Knopf, 1996). ISBN 0-679-44177-8.

Trillium
The Trillium series began as a three-way collaboration. After the first book, the three authors each continued the series on their own.

Marion Zimmer Bradley, Julian May, and Andre Norton, Black Trillium (New York: Doubleday, 1990). ISBN 0-385-26185-3.
Blood Trillium (New York: Bantam, 1992). ISBN 0-553-08851-3.
Sky Trillium (New York: Del Rey, 1997). ISBN 0-345-38000-2.

The Rampart Worlds
Perseus Spur (New York: Ballantine, 1999). ISBN 0-345-39510-7. (First published 1998 in UK.)
Orion Arm (New York: Ballantine, 1999). ISBN 0-345-39519-0.
Sagittarius Whorl: An Adventure of the Rampart Worlds (New York: Ballantine, 2001). ISBN 0-345-39518-2.

Boreal Moon
Conqueror's Moon (New York: Ace, 2004). ISBN 0-441-01132-2.
Ironcrown Moon (New York: Ace, 2005). ISBN 0-441-01244-2.
Sorcerer's Moon (New York: Ace, 2006). ISBN 0-441-01383-X.

Posted by kathyton (Member # 7780) on :

this is awesome. Kelly says thanks for the suggestions.

Posted by Fox (Member # 3871) on :

Pretty much anything by Alfred Bester. Personally, I found "The Demolished Man" to be incredibly fun.

And you can't go wrong with short story anthologies of the "greats"--Clarke, Asimov, etc. I'd only read his novels until recently, but a few months ago I found a collection of Asimov's short stories... and I was impressed.