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As a songwriter, I wonder why I write so many sad songs. Like, a lot of them. Really, really sad songs.

I just wrote one last week, inspired by a scene from a science fiction novel. It tells the story of a small fleet of spaceships fleeing a doomed Earth for the stars, and one ship attacking the rest and killing their crews in order to steal their fuel and spare parts. It's not just that what they did is a crime... they knew it was wrong, did it anyway, and feel terrible about it, but they also knew that if they didn't do it, another ship would have done it to them. So it's all guilt and shame from making a totally selfish decision.

Why would I write that way? And it's not like this is an unusual subject for me.

Part of it, I think, is that I do a very good job of covering up some deep depression in my day-to-day life. I'm a much sadder person than I appear to be.

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> they knew it was wrong

I know which book series this was part of, and this action was the correct one to take. I feel as if the entire point of the book is that at some point, we need to make collective decisions, and when we do so, we all need to share in the responsibility of those decisions.

The decision not to protect each human life as some kind of infinite well of value is an unusually narcissistic form of collectivism, I think, and only possible in highly developed nations. I believe that at some point, the reality of resource depletion or pollution, possibly war, will come to a head, and we will have to abandon this view.

I've heard some criticism of that series of "Can't relate to the characters". I suspect that it's because the perspective is so strongly Chinese, rather than American. The situation of the scene isn't something an American would even think of, y'know?

A big part of the beauty and thrill of that scene, for me, was all of these people recognizing the problem, and the solution, and the horror of the solution, at the same time.

Do you have any recommendations for other books, movies, or shows that "sparked horror" as well as that event did?

The closest I think I've come since was Blindsight's revelation on how the aliens functioned, but it wasn't nearly as cinematic.

I would have recommended Blindsight!

Along the same lines, I really loved A Fire Upon the Deep, by Vernor Vinge, and its "sequel" A Deepness in the Sky has aliens that remind me in many ways of the Trisolarans. But A Fire Upon the Deep gets some of that horror.

Vernor Vinge (or his publishers at least) have just made another $20. Thank you so much!

Blindsight was great.

The Martian Chronicles and The City and the Stars both reliably produce a kind of satisfying melancholy, if that makes sense, at least for me. Not unlike To the Lighthouse, actually. Might not quite be what you're looking for, but... similar-ish?

There's a short story collection called Beyond Flesh that has some solid horror moments of the sort you're looking for, I think.

Satisfying melancholy is the “cellar door” of vibes in my opinion, these recommendations could have been airport romance titles and I’d probably still have checked them out!

Had no idea Bradbury fit “There Will Come Soft Rains” into a novel of sorts, that was probably one of the very first SF stories I ever read and loved.

All have been added to my reading list (To the Lighthouse included) thank you!

The Martian Chronicles is more like a concept album, but with short stories instead of songs, than a novel. There are some connections here and there but the vibe is always more important than the details or any broader narrative, as far as linking the stories together.

Fair warning: To the Lighthouse is a (gently!) stream-of-consciousness work of Modernist fiction, and the entire middle act is mostly a description of a vacation home aging for a time, largely absent any people. It's also one of my favorite books, but it's, ah, subtle, I guess. Think a series of impressionist paintings of everyday life, nature, and empty rooms, but in book form.

I hadn't thought about it a lot but on reflection that "satisfying melancholy" effect is one of my most treasured feelings I can get from fiction. There's something childlike about it that really appeals to me—and now that I think about it, a lot of the big children's classic films, especially of 80s, went for this in a big way. Almost everything by Don Bluth. The Neverending Story. That kind of thing. Might be why I make that association.

Just scanned my shelves looking for more. The short stories of Dinesen, a bit? The Call of the Wild, but I think that might just be a "me" thing. It's a lot more common in poetry, where you can read through an anthology for any famous poet and probably encounter it many times, than in fiction. Possibly it's more common in bodies of literature outside of English—I'm thinking especially of Russian and French—where I'm even less well-read than I am in English. I just don't know.

As someone who grew up on their mid-late 80’s siblings’ leftover films alongside my own late 90s/early aughts movies, I can see that association looking back now! Might even feel it thinking solely about the VHS cases, either the cardboard slip ons or the hard, flexible sharp edged ones that were the bane of my little hands.

The call of the wild & white fang were early favorites of mine that I haven’t revisited yet, but will now. Definitely also be taking a look at Seven Gothic/Last tales!

Honestly though, I think I might be most excited about To the Lighthouse out of all the recommendations, it sounds like it’s right up my alley, at just the right time.

I have very little experience with solid literature outside what was assigned, and absolutely none with poetry despite a (somewhat shortish) lifetime of constant reading, but over the past year or so I’ve really taken to some more serious movies that paint these absurdly captivating, familiar and utterly foreign perspectives/experiences/vibes over stripped down, or nonexistent plots without much in the way of dialogue either.

Think a series of impressionist paintings of everyday life, nature, and empty rooms, but in book form. is absolute catnip, and even if don’t take to this work in particular, is a thread to pull at now.

Serious, serious thanks to you for all of this.

Made my first account here since 2015 to upvote a book about databases, and left with a completely new, cross pollinated perspective on modernist fiction (and poetry!). Very good day.

Outside of the recommendations that I see, all of which I agree are excellent, I would say "The Broken Earth Trilogy" by N.K. Jemesin.

I’ve heard really good things about those over the past few years but never took a serious look for some reason, reading the synopsis now... I can definitely see the “horror” I’m looking for happening, thanks for putting them over the top!

I thought you might enjoy this last verse, too...

Sixty thousand years to get there

Five ships waste fuel you need to stay alive

Eden's just another word for graveyard

So kill and steal, leave Eden and survive

Light a candle in the darkness

Drift forever in the gloom

Four thousand comrades sacrificed to save you

Their ships you gutted serving as their tomb.

What book series is this from? Or even better, what specific book? I'd be keen to read it.

The Three Body Problem, by Cixin Liu. The scene is actually from the second book in the trilogy, The Dark Forest, but they are really meant to be read in order, and I don't think The Dark Forest would make much sense without reading The Three Body Problem first.

Outstanding books, highly recommended if you like old-school hard science fiction. I'm currently reading the third book in the trilogy. But when I read this one scene... I had a song a day later. It really knocked me out.

The book was probably Liu Cixin's _The Dark Forest_.

If you want to read it, start with _The Three-Body Problem_, the first in the series.

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