Science fiction recommendations

swears

preppy-kei
Gime me some good books/short stories to read. Quality New Wave/Cyberpunk stuff, no trash or space operas. It would be cool also if they've been stuck up on line somewhere to read for free.
 

mistersloane

heavy heavy monster sound
Start with Neuromancer by William Gibson, then go to Snowcrash by Neal Stephenson, then back to Gibson and read the rest of the trilogy ( Count Zero, Mona Lisa Overdrive ) then switch to Greg Egan ( Permutation City, Diaspora, Teranesia ) then go off and shave your hair into a mohican, get a motorbike, eat sushi and learn to program. Swears life sorted!
 

swears

preppy-kei
Start with Neuromancer by William Gibson, then go to Snowcrash by Neal Stephenson, then back to Gibson and read the rest of the trilogy ( Count Zero, Mona Lisa Overdrive ) then switch to Greg Egan ( Permutation City, Diaspora, Teranesia ) then go off and shave your hair into a mohican, get a motorbike, eat sushi and learn to program. Swears life sorted!

Hmmm....maybe I should have mentioned what I've already read, eg Gibson and Stephenson. I found Snow Crash a little bit too self-consciously manic and it seemed to have dated more than Gibson's 90s stuff. Greg Egan I will check out. Any quesy New Wave stuff from the late 60s/70s? Harlon Ellison, Michael Moorcock, that sort of thing?
 

mistersloane

heavy heavy monster sound
I tried and tried with Moorcock but we just never got on, which is a shame because as a person he's great. Ellison, no, in my opinion.
 

Immryr

Well-known member
i LOVE Moorcock, particularly The Eternal Champion, Behold The Man, all the Elric books, all the Corum books and all of the Dancers At The End Of Time books.


oh yeah the Hawkmoon books are great too :cool:
 

eleventhvolume

Active member
The later volume of J.G. Ballard's short stories. Samuel Delany's dhalgren. Some Burroughs. Adolfo Casares' The Invention Of Morel. I liked Neal Stephenson's Snowcrash and Diamond Age.
 

luka

Well-known member
wyndham-triffids, midwich cuckoos, chrysallids. not shitty cyberpunk i know, but much better.
 
P

Parson

Guest
Biopunk is a sub-genre of science fiction, which describes the underground side of the biotech revolution that is said to have started to have an impact in the last decade of the 20th century and the first decades of the 21st century. Characters have appropriated various biotechnologies for individualist or radical ends while struggling with their abuse by totalitarian governments or megacorporations. Unlike cyberpunk, it builds not on information technology but on biology. Individuals are therefore usually enhanced not by mechanical means, but by human genetic engineering.

One of the prominent writers in this field is Paul Di Filippo, though he called his collection of such stories ribofunk, with the first element being taken from the full name of RNA, ribonucleic acid.

[edit] Books

* Moreau series by S. Andrew Swann
* The Eyes of Heisenberg by Frank Herbert
* Ribofunk by Paul Di Filippo
* A Place So Foreign and Eight More by Cory Doctorow
* Darwin's Radio by Greg Bear



* Holy Fire by Bruce Sterling
* Oryx and Crake by Margaret Atwood
* The Xenogenesis trilogy by Octavia E. Butler
* Frek and the Elixir by Rudy Rucker
* Blood Music by Greg Bear
 

STN

sou'wester
Was gonna say exactly the same thing about Alfred Bester - I think of 'The Demolished Man' as kind of pre-cyberpunk. Would recommend Moorcock's Behold the Man and The Black Corridor (or is it The Dark Corridor? It's been a while), Ballard's Atrocity Exhibition (if that counts), The Moustache by Emmanuel Carrere (not really sci-fi or cyberpunk but fits into'queasy new wave' category quite well I think - 80s novel about a guy who's world falls apart). Would also (and perhaps rather predictably) recommend The Space Merchants by Frederik Pohl and CM Kornbluth which is about (adopts dramatic warbling voice) a terrifying corporate future.

people like to cock on about China Mieville, but I can't really get into it.
 

swears

preppy-kei
Down and out...

Yeah, I've heard that's good. Reading Dune at the moment, it's aged suprisingly well.
 

ripley

Well-known member
I found Dune worth a re-visit in light of the recent focus on Islam and cultures that live on or near deserts, oddly. Plus it's fun in its total grandeur.

Also recommend Octavia Butler.

And Liz Williams - especially Empire of Bones
and _Maul_ by Tricia Sullivan

I also found _The Dazzle of Day_ pretty interesting in an Ursula LeGuin way (a spaceship leaving earth, ship populated by quakers)

and of course the biggies from Ursula LeGuin: The Dispossessed and The Left Hand of Darkness!
 
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