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Comment by djaychela | Hacker News Reader

I'd have to recommend 'A deepness in the sky' and 'A fire upon the deep' by Vernor Vinge. Both really good science fiction books where your initial perception is slowly shown to be incorrect as more details appear about the characters, and with great storylines. Despite being thick tomes with small print, I got through both reasonably quickly as they were so addictive to read - 'just one more chapter', etc...

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If you enjoyed those books, I'd recommend Children of Time by Adrian Tchaikovsky as well! It explores the concept of a race of spiders evolving into sentience and how wildly different it's civilization and technology would be.

Also enjoyed that one. Reminded me of the whole series that started with ‘Three Body Problem’ which I read around the same time.

> I'd recommend Children of Time

I agree! Like the Vinge books mentioned by the GP, the interactions between aliens and humans are well written, and nicely bring out the quirks of the different species.

Finished the first last year, stalled halfway through the second. I’ll finish it sooner or later. The series is entitled ‘Zones of Thought’ IIRC.

Also check out Alistair Reynolds. House of Suns is probably my favorite, which is a pity because it’s a standalone not a series. The whole Revelation Space series is good too.

Lately it’s been the new ‘Expanse’ book, and ‘The Culture’ series.

If we're recommending scifi I'd like to add Dragon's Egg by Robert L. Forward.

Except he's now up to three books.

It's hard scifi of a neutron star passing through the solar system and Earth scrambling to research it. At the same time life is developing on the neutron star.

No limits on genres or types of books. There are so much wonderful stuff to read I've never heard of, so by imposing any kind of limits or suggesting genres I would limit people to suggest stuff I might already like, not stuff I might like but would never otherwise hear about.

This book inspired the Star Trek: Voyager episode "Blink of an Eye"[1].

I haven't read the book but the Star Trek episode was awesome.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blink_of_an_Eye_(Star_Trek:_Vo...

I did not expect to see sci-fi here but I'd like to add anything in the Revelation Space universe by Alastair Reynolds. I just got done reading it for a 2nd time, and Elysium Fire for the 1st time and I'm in love with his style of writing and the universe he's created.

I just want more information about all the things like Ultras, Rust belt, Glitter band, Belle epoque and so forth.

In my opinion it's not as poetic as Dune but it's not action filled like The Expanse. The fascinating parts that make me keep reading are all the cultural and technical details he brings out between the story line.

I could not imagine a thread like this on HN without sci-fi.

I also like this series but starting a new book in the series takes to long to drag me back in every time... I wish it would zoom into the main characters earlier...

Yes! Verner Vinge wrote some great stuff. Go read “Rainbow’s End” if you liked A Fire Upon The Deep.

Still my favorite SF writer of all time. I read the Witling in the 80's in high school. I have read every book he has written before and after that book. He peaked with the two books you recommended and has slowly gone down hill since then.

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