Bad Biscuit

This thread is anyone who'd like to recommend a book in the sci fi genre.

Please give a brief synopsis and your thoughts on it.

Currently Im reading Ken McLeod, Learning the World.

Its about first contact, except this time we are the alien arrivals. Usually i find his writing slow going. But I think he's probably getting better with each book.

All questions will be answered.

BB

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Lachean

My Current Favorites:
Ender's Game
2001 Space Odyssey (and its sequels)

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FluffyNinja

The Legacy of Heorot, by Larry Niven and Jerry Pournelle. A futuristic take on the classic Beowulf Saga set on a distant planet recently colonized by humans. The story is fast-paced and the analogies to the original story are interesting.

also

Ringworld, by Larry Niven of course. In my opinion, one of the most original works of sci-fi since Bradbury or Aasimov. But, then, what true sci-fi fan hasn't read Ringworld already?

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quatrotritikali

I would suggest the following: Where Late the Sweet Birds Sang, by Kate Wilhelm.

Kate Wilhelm sketches a very believable story of a post-apocalyptic survival group that starts cloning themselves, because they no longer are fertile. And how these cloned descendents start their own type of society, in which individualism only exists in a few prosecuted deviates, and where people increasingly are bred for special purposes and become more and more dispensable (there are always other copies left). The community ultimately fails in the long run, because valuable human assets, such as the ability to have new ideas, and to reach out beyond what is teached, become extinct.


Brothers Of Earth, by C.J. Cherryh.

This novel is very characteristic of many later works by this author. The storyline is much like the Chanur stories: a lone human is stranded among aliens with strange customs and has to learn new ways.

The plot involves the contending ethnic cultures of Nephane and the city's rivalry with the metropolis across the sea from which its original colonists came. (Think Greek vs. Persian and Doric vs. Ionic, which is reasonable because Cherryh has a strong background in the classics.) But the real theme is the nature of society, civil vs. religious culture, and recognizing The Other -- or even just accepting its existence. This is anthropological science fiction of high quality, remindful of Ursula LeGuin, and I think it's still one of her best works.

Highly recommended for Cherryh fans and for anyone else who enjoys tales of humans adjusting to alien ways.

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Bodhisattva

Any of Orson Scott Cards books:
Ender's Series
The Shadow Series
Memory of Earth Series

Others:
Stranger in a Strange Land
A Brave New World
1984
Fahrenheit 451

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Bad Biscuit

Ive read all the enders and the Beans. Theyre pretty good, though ender is astonishing really. Card is very easy to read.

Ive read the sequels of the space odysseys. Pretty hard going alot of the time, and the monoliths remain as enigmatic as ever.


Anyone read Iain M Banks?

1069

Well, my one of my dad's favorite authors is Jack Vance.
I don't know much about sci-fi myself; it's not a genre I'm real interested in.
I do like a lot of "near-future dystopia" types of books, and I can recommend some of my favorites if that's the sort of thing you're into, but as far as guys running around in spacesuits or stories that take place on other planets or anything like that, I don't have much expertise in that area.

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talloulou

I read the Idlewild Trilogy by Nick Sagan this year. It was really good. Books 1 & 3 were the best so you have to suffer a tad with book 2 which gets a tad tedious in places.

rathi

Snow Crash Neal Stephenson

When the main characters name is Hiro Protagonist, you know its a winner...

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Bad Biscuit

Whats that about?

BB