Science fiction books that you feel are way above average

[Count Chocula]

I like Peter Hamilton's works, and they're more recent books which may be up Stas' alley. His Confederation series, which starts with The Reality Dysfunction, does a good job of describing a multi-stellar human society with starships, nanotech, and genetic engineering. There are a few alien species, but they're enigmatic for the most part. The action's not bad, the starships don't have magic shields or ginormous acceleration, and the societal "flavor" of a technological society's described pretty well. The series also has a different take on the afterlife, that is, Spoiler

that it exists, the souls in it have found a way out, and will killfuck EVERY LIVING BEING! Does the reality destroy religion in humanity, or reinforce it? Read and find out.

A fine series.

The more recent Commonwealth series has a more homogeneous multi-stellar human polity and, in the beginning, not a lot of starships: Spoiler

the primary interstellar transportation is TRAINS IN SPACE! Sounds corny, but he makes it work.

The aliens in this series interact more with humans, including the main antagonists: Spoiler

hive mind hyper-industrial Destructionator XIIIs that are so dangerous to their neighbors an elder species quarantined their entire home solar system.

This series also has fairly intricate views of society, mega-rich dynasties, force fields, nanotech implant goodies, etc. They are entertaining on a technological and cultural level.

As for Heinlein: I'm a huge fan of his, even the goofier works like Number of the Beast (which I first read in its excerpts in Omni magazine), but the book that got me hooked on him was Rocket Ship Galileo. It's still an entertaining story, well-written, with lively kinda-men-a-boy-wants-to-be characters.

If you favor the psyker derivatives in sci-fi, Julian May's Pliocene Exile series of four books, beginning with The Many-Colored Land, are also good reads. Some of the characters are truly fucked up but powerful, and their antics effect whole cultures (which themselves are well-imagined).

[Jeremy]

Protector, Starship Troopers, and War of the Worlds.

[Thirdfain]

Ken MacLeod's "Newton's Wake: A Space Opera" is not exactly brilliant, but it is a lot of fun. The premise: Mankind long ago almost wiped itself out with the achievement of singularity (you know, the whole super-smart AI thing.) The survivors are this mish-mash of weird cultures which wouldn't have been affected by runaway AI godhood: American fundamentalists who eschewed computers, called America Offline, the North Korean socialists, and a bunch of Glaswegian working class gangsters. The plot revolves around the discovery of a fourth culture, a bunch of escapees who avoided the singularity by being too far physically from the Earth information network to be affected, by the Glaswegian thugs and the resulting scramble between the varied powers to take advantage of this post-scarcity society. At the worst, it's good fun, at it's best, it's speculative fiction.

Hope you enjoy!

[Eleas]

Um-Baen published a good bit of Heinlein. The early NOT creepy Heinlein.

Republished, you mean. Baen was founded well after Heinlein entered his "suck" phase, in 1983.

True. Plus that a lot of these authors publish solely through Baen (or as close as makes no difference). You can't really say that about Heinlein.

Of course, for my part I consider Heinlein a decent craftsman, certainly nothing more. Some of his books were good - I enjoyed Methuselah's Children, for instance - while others could only have been written by a white western male snugly and obliviously cocooned in his privilege. Harsh words, perhaps. But whenever bring up Heinlein as some sort of paragon of writing, all I can think of is his hackneyed mouthpieces, his love of rhetorical faux-philosophy (entirely reliant on going unquestioned), and his grizzled hick heroic patriarch self-insert. And I liked the Lazarus Long in Methuselah's Children.

I must admit to a certain weakness for David Drake's work, although primarily his earlier sci-fi. His later fantasy just seemed a bit too generic for my tastes. You forgot that they also publish horribly cheesy comedies as well.

Yes, but unlike me, your heart has not yet withered in your breast.

[Bakustra]

Um-Baen published a good bit of Heinlein. The early NOT creepy Heinlein.

Republished, you mean. Baen was founded well after Heinlein entered his "suck" phase, in 1983.

True. Plus that a lot of these authors publish solely through Baen (or as close as makes no difference). You can't really say that about Heinlein.

Of course, for my part I consider Heinlein a decent craftsman, certainly nothing more. Some of his books were good - I enjoyed Methuselah's Children, for instance - while others could only have been written by a white western male snugly and obliviously cocooned in his privilege. Harsh words, perhaps. But whenever bring up Heinlein as some sort of paragon of writing, all I can think of is his hackneyed mouthpieces, his love of rhetorical faux-philosophy (entirely reliant on going unquestioned), and his grizzled hick heroic patriarch self-insert. And I liked the Lazarus Long in Methuselah's Children.

I don't really find Heinlein all that good either. Heresy, I know, but a heresy I am glad to live with. Granted, I've only read Starship Troopers and The Cat Who Walks Through Walls, of his novels, but the first was merely serviceable and the second a crime against eyes. Who knows, maybe if I read his other stuff, I might consider him a decent writer, but then again I am no longer fourteen. I think that, with the other two of the Holy Trinity of Sci-fi, nostalgia contributes to his reputation. And I like Asimov and Clarke, though, interestingly enough, both of them entered "suck" phases in the 80's as well. (In my book, Asimov escaped that phase for his last few works, but I know many people hate the Foundation prequels almost as much as the Star Wars ones).

I must admit to a certain weakness for David Drake's work, although primarily his earlier sci-fi. His later fantasy just seemed a bit too generic for my tastes. You forgot that they also publish horribly cheesy comedies as well.

Yes, but unlike me, your heart has not yet withered in your breast.

I really can't disagree with your general thrust, though. Drake may be good, hypothetically, but he is by far the best of the authors they have "on-staff", as it were. Weber is dull, Ringo simply awful, and let's not talk about Kratman ever again. On the other side, Eric Flint has written some stuff I've enjoyed, but he's pretty inconsistent, and 1632 is pure wankery. Baen also commits the crime of having covers that cry out for a dust jacket to shield them from the eyes of mankind, lest they draw stares of derision of bewilderment.

[Dahak]

I found the Hyperion cantos from Dan Simmons to be a exceptionally well written piece of science-fiction. It gets a bit downhill with Endymion and sequel, but the first one is really stunning to read.
Also from Simmons, Ilium and Olympos are fantastic books. Sometimes a bit crazy, but I found them to be way above the average read with fresh ideas and not your regular characters.

[Ace Pace]

Most of what Alastair Reynolds writes strikes me as quite good sci-fi. Some of it, like Prefect or Chasm City is well written adventure stories set in his quite well developed universe, and his main "space opera" set of Revelation Space, Redemption Ark and Absolution Gap are quite good. You can see prior discussions on these books in this forum.

These in a way, are far above average, but still not quite in the category of say, 1984 or other really groundbreaking novels.

[Buritot]

I liked The Mars Trilogy by Kim Stanley Robinson. It's actually three books, Red/Green/Blue Mars and describes the 200ish years of the first settlement on Mars by an international joint venture to the various political developments of Mars, heavily dependant on Earth's imports and still a place of free spirits. There are megacorps meddling in the background, various technological developments and political currents, but most is told in the POV of the characters. The narration switches between the characters in the books and the main characters of one book aren't necessarily the ones of the next one.
I love the books for the fleshed out characters and universe portrayed, every development makes sense, the character developments are comprehensible and the technology doesn't drown in technobabble but rather concentrates on the political and sociological impacts and paradigm shifts like prolonged life spans and active terraforming.
It's always good when you've finished a book and are sad it's over, regardless of the ending.

I suppose one could read all books separately, but it makes more sense to read them chronologically.

[Galvatron]

I found the Hyperion cantos from Dan Simmons to be a exceptionally well written piece of science-fiction. It gets a bit downhill with Endymion and sequel, but the first one is really stunning to read.

Agreed, but I thought the series only got better as it progressed.

[Bob the Gunslinger]

I found the Hyperion cantos from Dan Simmons to be a exceptionally well written piece of science-fiction. It gets a bit downhill with Endymion and sequel, but the first one is really stunning to read.

Agreed, but I thought the series only got better as it progressed.

Really? You liked the whole "love is a nuclear particle" concept? I myself can barely recommend Hyperion because of how far the series falls in later books, so I guess you must have a cast-iron stomach for silly writing or something.

[Ford Prefect]

The Cantos is at its strongest in Fall of Hyperion. Hyperion itself is rather hit and miss, as far as I'm concerned. As for the two Endymion books, while they're not really bad, I think their themes are too hamfisted to really be called 'great'. He really hammers home his ideas in those, especially in Rise.

[sirocco]

The Cantos is at its strongest in Fall of Hyperion. Hyperion itself is rather hit and miss, as far as I'm concerned. As for the two Endymion books, while they're not really bad, I think their themes are too hamfisted to really be called 'great'. He really hammers home his ideas in those, especially in Rise.

Agreed though I never read the Endymion's books.

[Junghalli]

I just finished reading Charles Stross's Accelerando and my head almost exploded from the sheer awesome. It's everything I think science fiction should be, and has a pretty entertaining story. Also I have to commend it for one of the most awesome aliens* ever: an entire civilization composed of sapient superintelligent finance-bots that had bankrupted their organic creators and FORECLOSED ON their processor cycles and raw materials. So it definitely gets my recommendation.

*Technically the Vile Offspring are not actually aliens, but they might as well be.

Singularity Sky by the same author is pretty cool too. Interesting ideas, good story, and watching a bunch of luddite assholes get their shit ruined by a bunch of transhuman traders was more than a bit of a guilty pleasure to watch (although the use of nanobots as a weapon against starships did irritate me). So I'd recommend that too.

I'd say they're both definitely a cut above the usual fare.

[The Dark]

I must admit to a certain weakness for David Drake's work, although primarily his earlier sci-fi. His later fantasy just seemed a bit too generic for my tastes. You forgot that they also publish horribly cheesy comedies as well.

Yes, but unlike me, your heart has not yet withered in your breast.

I really can't disagree with your general thrust, though. Drake may be good, hypothetically, but he is by far the best of the authors they have "on-staff", as it were. Weber is dull, Ringo simply awful, and let's not talk about Kratman ever again. On the other side, Eric Flint has written some stuff I've enjoyed, but he's pretty inconsistent, and 1632 is pure wankery. Baen also commits the crime of having covers that cry out for a dust jacket to shield them from the eyes of mankind, lest they draw stares of derision of bewilderment.

Try some of Wen Spencer's work. The only real sci-fi is Endless Blue, but it's a good bit different from the other authors.

For Baen, I also liked the (late) Robert Asprin's Time Scout series. Bujold's Vorkosigan saga I'll second from earlier. For Flint, I'm looking forward to both Much Fall of Blood (fantasy), and his collaboration with Ryk Spoor, Threshold. I also liked Elizabeth Moon, but she no longer publishes new work with Baen (Hunting Party and subsequent Serrano books tended to subvert the "military is good, civilians are stupid" meme that's common among a lot of their writers).

[Lord Pounder]

For me the best sci-fi books I ever read was the Sprawl Trilogy (Neuromancer, Count Zero and Mona Lisa Overdrive). I found Gibson's style very easy to follow and really enjoyed the characters. For me The Sprawl Trilogy are the foundation of cyberpunk.

[open_sketchbook]

That's because they are the foundation of cyberpunk.

I'll second Gibson's work, and I gotta point out it's even more impressive considering the man, by his own admission, is technologically illiterate.

[Blayne]

k I don't think I posted here:

I feel that Ender's Game was phenomenal effect of my development as a youth and shaped my understanding and passion for scifi, the rest of the books in the series I would say are good but split into two main branches one being very philosophical with religious undertonnes and the exploration of Humanities place in the Universe and its relationship with other sentient's, its a heavy read and not for everyone. While Ender's Shadow series is the other split that continues Ender's Game military but the crap out of people mindset and runs with it with the Jeesh controlling their own origin nations battling it out for supremacy. Funner to read but not as much mature seriousness the later Ender books had.

I really however can't think of any other scifi books that I've read that I felt were good enough to be worth mentioning in the above context however, I felt that some of the other books I've read are alright but not epic.

[Imperial Overlord]

Hardwired by Walter Jon Williams, one of the founding novels of cyberpunk.


Ender's Game blows.

[Eleas]

Hardwired by Walter Jon Williams, one of the founding novels of cyberpunk.

Ender's Game blows.

He's writing new Ender books now, you know. I thought I'd tell you on the off chance you find pain enjoyable.

(And yes, I know I did like Ender's Game for some time. Going back and re-reading it was, well... unpleasant, to put it mildly.)

[Bakustra]

Hardwired by Walter Jon Williams, one of the founding novels of cyberpunk.

Ender's Game blows.

He's writing new Ender books now, you know. I thought I'd tell you on the off chance you find pain enjoyable.

(And yes, I know I did like Ender's Game for some time. Going back and re-reading it was, well... unpleasant, to put it mildly.)

You have no idea how much that pains me. I read every one of them for some reason, back when I was younger, and I'm not sure they can get any worse, beyond him drooling on the page in order to write. It seems like any future books would merely be some sort of exercise in agony. Thanks a lot.

When it comes to Simmons, it seems he gets worse the longer he writes about something. Hyperion was okay, Fall of Hyperion wasn't so bad, except for the ending, and the Endymion books were far worse. Ilium was okay, Olympos awful. I haven't read anything else of his beyond a couple of Islamophobic screeds on his blog, though.

I walked into a small bookstore today, that had a large sci-fi and fantasy selection. It was a sobering experience, looking at the walls covered with authors that must have been popular at one point, and now are forgotten, except maybe for one story in an anthology somewhere. So I bought a few books to keep this historical treasure in operation, and one of them was a collection of Zelazny short stories, so everything was good. Meanwhile, their anime and comic book sections were also historical treasures, having ventured right out of the '90s, but of a different, comedic sort, sort.

[The Yosemite Bear]

well since I'm a sucker for the oldies, Read some frakkin Lensman

oh, and Wells, Verne, Cohen Doyle's Lost World, Edgar Rice Burroughs john carter books...

[The Yosemite Bear]

The first two hundred pages of Dune, Especially the dinner party scene, all those wheels withen wheels, manipulations and higher forms of combat, all contained inside a state dinner.

[Emerson33260]

Two excellent oldies:

The Dosadi Experiment by Frank Herbert. His second best novel. I have always wondered whether Dosadi was inspired by futher thinking on the nature and culture of Salusia Secundus from the Dune books, but it is not set in that universe.

and I would like to see back in print:

The Star Fox by Poul Anderson. Best space opera I know, without exception. Three novellas with the same cast, not part of the Van Rijn/Flandry Technic history.

[bobnik]

Stuff I personally recommend:

A Fire upon the Deep by Vernor Vinge. Like Larry Niven's books Footfall and The Mote in God's Eye, this has very well developed non-human aliens with non-human ways of thought that ascend from their biology. It also has an interstellar Usenet, which has been used to launch viral attacks on entire civillisations. It is character driven, with about three separate plot threads that combine in the end.

By Frank Herbert:

The Dune books. I know Dune has already been mentioned, but I found all six of the books very good. Please remember to avoid any of the ones written by Kevin J Anderson and Brian Herbert; they are in my opinion irredeemable shit.

Whipping Star - prequel to The Dosadi Experiment

The Godmakers - Pretty much what it says on the tin.

By Larry Niven:

Footfall - already mentioned

The Mote in God's Eye - Already mentioned, has a not-excellent-but still-good sequel The Moat Around Murchieson's Eye, featuring the exploits of the team of Renner and Bury.

By Peter F Hamilton:

The Night's Dawn trilogy - already mentioned

The Greg Mandel trilogy - A near future setting with global warming, cyberpunk and a psychic detective. The psychic powers are most definitely not superpowers though - they have limits and can be fooled.

By Greg Bear:

Eon - a deserted generational ship arrives above Earth - and the inside goes on forever.

Blood Music - what happens when your immune system is made sentient?

[Marcus Aurelius]

The Cantos is at its strongest in Fall of Hyperion. Hyperion itself is rather hit and miss, as far as I'm concerned. As for the two Endymion books, while they're not really bad, I think their themes are too hamfisted to really be called 'great'. He really hammers home his ideas in those, especially in Rise.

Agreed about Endymion books. They are not really bad by themselves, but the drop in quality from the Hyperion books is quite substantial. Rise of Endymion was difficult to read for me because of that.

As for the two original Hyperion books, I find them difficult to compare. Hyperion is actually a collection of short stories and novellas set around a common theme, much in the same way as the Decameron or the Canterbury Tales. Some of those stories are simply great and among the best scifi short stories I have ever read, but some are merely OK or average. Fall of Hyperion has more consistent quality and a true novel form, although I still find the best parts of Hyperion better.