32 Sci-Fi novels that you should add to your reading list | Hacker News Reader

32 Sci-Fi novels that you should add to your reading list

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30 pointssocalsamba43 comments

The Orion SF Masterworks collection is much better, exhaustive, and actually published as a series (not in the US unfortunately). Take a look lots of awesome books you may or may not have read... http://www.sfsite.com/lists/orion01.htm

it's been awhile since I've seen a sci-fi list with books i haven't read. thanks for the link.

With all due respect, and it's a great novel, Animal Farm is not a science fiction.

Neither is Atlas Shrugged.

anyway, who wants to add 32 books to their reading list all at once? it's more useful to know which are the best 3.

I think Atlas Shrugged might qualify -- it takes place in an alternative universe and deals with the implications of a couple of fictional technologies (Rearden metal and John Galt's engine). Animal Farm is really pushing the definition, though.

Since I'm sure everybody's idea of the best three will differ, a list of 32 with summaries so you can pick out the three (out of those which you haven't read) which are likely to appeal to you is probably more useful.

No, it was more of a fantasy, or as Orwell put it, a "fairy story".

In other words: 32 science fiction books by someone who has read most of the bestsellers in the last few years, and a few classics. Or is there some other reason that Accelerando and Spook Country are on the same list as PKD?

Yeah, I haven't read Spook Country but I did read Pattern Recognition...I don't like the direction Gibson's going in. Idoru and the Bridge series or whatever it was called was cool.

So why did Timeline make the list?

I was thinking about leaving it off because it is really, really bad for anyone who actually reads Sci-Fi. I put it on the list because despite the fact that it's almost completely unreadable because the Wal*Mart set needs their Sci-Fi too. I wanted the list to cover as broad a spectrum of sci-fi as I could without making it 100 items long.

I left off a lot of greats including:

Vernor Vinge Dan Simmons Arthur C Clarke Iain M. Banks

and other works by Stross and a few others

Why is Rand on this list? Well, besides the Bible (go figure) Atlas Shrugged is apparently the most influential book ever written. Do I agree with the whole Objectivist shtick? Not hardly but it is still worth mentioning.

The Giver? Like Anthem it's Sci-Fi for grade schoolers, worth mentioning because a lot of people were introduced to Sci-Fi with books like this.

Leave suggestions, as many as you want. If you don't see it on the list it probably would have been there if I had remembered it while I was compiling.

Suggestions, eh?

I personally love Stanislaw Lem's books. Two of my favorites: - The Cyberiad: a set of short stories that read almost like silly little fairy tales, complete with probabalistic dragons, poetry machines, and kings, and electroknights. - His Master's Voice: A rather cynical look at deciphering a message from the stars.

I'll second Cyberiad.

Also, I've heard some people describe Lem's "Solaris" as one of the few science fiction novels that also qualify as great literature, although I must admit I didn't enjoy it as much as Cyberiad.

There are a couple odd choices on that list. I thought Timeline was pretty entertaining, but it's a typical Michael Crichton made-for-tv story and probably not worthy of such a list. I guess it sort of makes quantum physics palatable to the average joe but you could hardly say it's pushed the boundaries of the genre.

It's also worth mentioning that Minority Report isn't even a novel. It's a short story than spans maybe thirty pages. Still, virtually anything by Philip K. Dick could make it onto a list of the best sci-fi.

Anyway, there's still quite a bit of good stuff there- even the ones that aren't exactly sci-fi.

There was also a list of the top 100 sci-fi books that was going around on Reddit or Digg a while back that looked really good. Here's the link for anyone interested: http://home.austarnet.com.au/petersykes/topscifi/lists_books...

Snow Crash is awesome. I finished it and "The Diamond Age" last week and I can vouch for them as a worthy read.

I really don't like Snow Crash much.

Firstly, it's dated quite badly, since it was written in the recent past about roughly-now. He gets the technology pretty much right, but the speculation about how that technology will change society pretty much all wrong.

Secondly, Mr Protagonist, as a protagonist, annoys me in that he seems more like the kind of character that a fourteen-year-old boy would think was awesome (greatest swordfighter in the world, for no good reason!) than somebody I want to read a book about.

Cryptonomicon, on the other hand, is a must-read. I don't really even like science fiction that much, but Cryptonomicon is a must-read.

I think it's great fun to read it now. Imagine thinking Meese would still be famous in 2008!

Part of the point of Hiro is that he's a loser and an asshole. There wouldn't be a plot if he started out as a good guy, because he wouldn't find himself mixed up in the mafia and cults the way he did.

i've enjoyed pretty much everything that he has done, with the exception of the Baroque Cycle, Confusion, System of the World series ( great reads, just an awful lot to digest and keep straight).

Cryptonomicon is a geeks must read.

About that "greatest swordfighter in the world" part - there is a real good explanation for that one. He was the guy who wrote the software for the swordfighting simulation.

To my knowledge I might still be the best racer in the world in some racing game I wrote last year, so I can absolutely relate to that ;-)

As I recall, in the end he also turns out to be a great swordfighter in real life though.

Something about single-handedly assaulting an aircraft carrier using only his katana? That was pretty much where the book lost me.

He also had the help of a railgun called Reason.

"They won't listen to us, but they'll listen to R.E.A.S.O.N.!"

Here is a real list, shorter and MUCH higher quality: 1. The Cyberiad 2. Babel-17 3. The Stars My Destination 4. The Sheep Look Up 5. More Than Human 6. Lord of Light 7. To Your Scattered Bodies Go 8. Earth Abides 9. Dying Inside 10. City 11. Last and First Men 12. Slan 13. The World of Null-A

The only one I've read from your list is The Cyberiad - but that's enough to make me take the rest of your list seriously :)

The Sheep Look Up++ - a book that makes it possible to imagine how bad things could get, a faculty that helps keep you alert, and out of thinking "How bad could it be? Everything will go on as normal". Funny, we have a lite version of it - we have risen+rising cancer rates, and chemicals being 'innocent til proven guilty' here in the States. Something that still awes me, though perhaps it shouldn't, is the way organic food fits the role of Puritan so exactly.

no greg-egan or ian-m-banks or arthur-c-clarke...what gives ?

After The Algebraist and Matter I never want to read another word of Iaiaain M Banks. Consider Phlebas was genius, but he's lost it.

try "use of weapons" and "excession". imho they are much much nicer than "consider phlebas".

I've read everything he's written to date. Which is why the last two were such crushing disappointments.

Awesome, that had 3 books I hadn't read.

My list of remarkable sci-fi: http://www.reddit.com/info/72lt/comments#c735f

Interesting list.

Timeline by Michael Crichton is only worth reading because of how it portrays history. As sci-fi or entertainment it’s horrible and it basicly assumes everyone is an stupid but it does show history far more accurately than most books.

The entire Timeline plot is a bit pathetic, your company builds a time machine and what does it do with it? Go back to the 1960s and buy Berkshire Hathaway stock? Of course not where is the money in that...

They go and study the 14th century using the time machine so they can build an accurate historical theme park.

Fail

There's a 2004 movie called Primer where the main characters made a time machine and the first thing they think of is making money off the stock market(though at lower levels, since their machine can only go back to the point it's turned on)

After that, though, it gets weird.

Neuromancer is even better than I remember. I saw it at a book sale for $1 and picked it up and started re-reading it. Its awesome. Very believable - gritty and messy like real life. Great characters and just flat out virtuoso writing by Gibson.

The Andromeda Strain is really, really dated. Shouldn't be on the list.

A lot of these books are really, really dated. It doesn't mean that they shouldn't be on your must-read sci-fi list.

It seems to be a list of "classics" more than necessarily a list of good books or good scifi books.

I'd put Andromeda Strain on there before Timeline or Down and Out.

It's funny that Down and Out is one of the few modern books on there - it's more notable for the buzz around its distribution than being any good.

And 20,000 Leagues is so 1870's. ;)

Really, really glad to see that Down and out in the Magic Kingdom made the list!

If you liked Down and Out, you should try John Varley's short stories, especially The Phantom of Kansas.

thanks!

most of those got turned into movies. Speaking of which, I'd love to see Ender's game movie but it'll probably suck since it'll be a bunch of new young actors

An Ender's Game movie is in pre-production now actually. Apparently it finally happened because Orson Scott Card got a deal which included the level of creative control he required.

A lot of films never make it past pre-production so whether this film is actually finished is yet to be seen.

Good to hear he's still working on it, although as I recall they've been trying to get the movie made for decades now. (Meanwhile, Dune is being adapted for the third time...)

Where's "Dhalgren"?

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