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Comment by schlupp | Hacker News Reader

Nice, 2 out of 20 authors are women. Nothing like a balanced reading experience.

And every single one of the authors speaks English! Talk about unbalanced!

Seriously, they're just recommending a bunch of books which they think are interesting, insightful, and in many cases relevant to what they do. There is a large bias in the publishing industry in terms of what subjects men and women write about; YC has their hands full trying to bring more gender equity to technology without trying to fix the publishing industry.

"And every single one of the authors speaks English! Talk about unbalanced!"

You're right though. Summer reading especially, since you normally have less workload, is a great time to explore other cultures. Most of these books seem to be of the popular kind.

Read Capital in the Twenty-First Century, by Pikkety. That was originally in French. Anybody associated with money should read this.

I feel like your comment would be more useful if you were to raise your concern (which you did) and suggest some books written by women you think warrant inclusion on the list. Otherwise you're just complaining.

The Imperial Radch books are a great read as well. They take place in a future in which intelligent space ships are able to control thousands of human bodies connected (enslaved?) to them, experiencing everything these bodies experience at once - the action is great, but it also explores the philosophical implications of this, in a society in which a supreme leader thousands of years old rules over all these ships and all the planets where humans live. There is absolutely no privacy - space stations attached to each colony know everything any of their inhabitants are doing, feeling, even thinking.

This summary doesn't really do it justice - the first book in the series is at https://www.amazon.com/Ancillary-Justice-Imperial-Radch-Leck.... Oh and written by a woman too ;)

> to control thousands of human bodies connected (enslaved?) to them

I think it's quite clear that the human bodies have their original personalities wiped and become nothing more than tools of the original AI.

And the supreme leader is a form of distributed, multi-brained intelligence

Here's a recommendation for some female authored sci-fi at least:

The "Newsflesh Trilogy" by Mira Grant (Seanan McGuire). I'm not usually into zombie fiction, but this was a great series. Not your typical zombie fare... more like a political / conspiracy thriller where zombies are just part of the trappings of the story, not the focus of the story. Hard to explain, but worth reading.

I really enjoyed "Children of God" and the sequel "The Sparrow" by Mary Doria Russell. Great sci-fi.

As a counterpoint, I really disliked The Sparrow. I guess it could be interesting if you are religious, but even then: why do you have to experience horrible things on an alien planet to start wondering why god let's such things happen - aren't there enough horrible things happening on earth? Really didn't see the point... (Don't know Children of God).

Haven't read her stuff myself, but a friend was enthusiastically recommending Margaret Atwood the other day:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Margaret_Atwood#Novels

Octavia E. Butler was an amazing author, and it never failed for her books to be way-out-there. Sometimes creepily so:

https://www.amazon.com/Dawn-Xenogenesis-Trilogy-Book-1-ebook...

I don't work for free, but I'd be happy to consult for YC on coming up with a more diverse reading list

Does anyone seriously believe that there where books that didn't make the list because of the gender of the author?

It's "Alan Kay's reading list" all over again. No one discard books based on the sex of the author, perhaps except extreme feminists. Books are picked because of their content.

For those interested in historical topics, I would recommend Mary Beard's recent "SPQR: A History of Ancient Rome" (https://www.amazon.com/SPQR-History-Ancient-Mary-Beard/dp/08...) and Barbara Tuchman's classic on WWI, "The Guns of August" (https://www.amazon.com/Guns-August-Pulitzer-Prize-Winning-Ou...).

If you can recommend more female authors on par with, say, JK Rowling, Fred Vargas, Neil Gaiman or Patrick Rothfuss, I'd be happy to read them. It's hard enough to find good books, worrying about the author's gender is very pointless. Especially since I am not interested in women's issues, which nobody should be obliged to be.

I would highly recommend Lois McMaster Bujold. She is not hard sci fi though and the sci fi elements mostly act as a setting for the story.

Her Vorkosigan series is hard sci fi.

It helps to read those in order. She makes references to events five books back. You don't have to recognize them, but it helps.

Thanks, I will give her books a try!

Seconded. Her books are wonderful.

If you haven't read any Ursula K. LeGuin yet, she is amazing. Start with either The Left Hand of Darkness, The Dispossessed, or The Wizard of Earthsea, depending on whether you are most interested in gender, societal systems, or wizards, respectively.

Thanks - I've read and liked Earthsea, but it might be time for another one.

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