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"Must-Read" Sci Fi books

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greenMonkey:

--- Quote from: Alchemist ---
Dune, sure, but only the first one.  After that....bleh.  Same with Ender's Game.

--- End quote ---


I disagree.  Speaker For The Dead is one of my favorite books.

Although it's somewhat true about the Dune sequels.  They're all about religion and sex.  Specifically mind controlled vaginal stimulation.

Johnny C:
William Gibson's latest, Pattern Recognition, is a very good book - and it's very-near future, too, so he's using recognizable technology. It's a pretty good read.

Rizzo:

--- Quote from: greenMonkey ---Robert A. Heinlein.
--- End quote ---

I was gonna say... It didn't seem like anyone had mentioned Heinlein.

Also;
Roger Zelazny-Lord of Light
Far future; a planet controlled by the immortal Hindu gods who maintain the balance between themselves, Buddha, a Christian saint and scores of demons. Reincarnation and fantastic technology play a huge part.
I don't want to spoil the plot but lets just say everything is not as it seems.
Don't read the Amazon plot summary, it completely ruins the book.

Roger Zelazny-Isle of the Dead/Eye of the Cat
Two fantastic midlength novels. Isle of the dead is about an immortal businessman and an intruder disrupting his life by bring his former friends back to 'life'.
Eye of the Cat is the story of a hunter set to protect a diplomat so he enlists the help of one of his captures on the condition that the 'Cat' be allowed to hunt him when the task is complete.

John Brunner-Stand On Zanzibar
John Brunner basically created ecoscifi. The world is basically fucked and this book tells some of it's story.

Neal Stephenson-Snow Crash
Tells the story of Hiro Protagonist and Y.T and their attempts to stop a computer virus that can affect people as well. Set in a dystopian corporate controlled future. Absolutely hillarious and very inventive.

Neal Stephenson-The Diamond Age
The future is dominated by nanotechnology which creates harsh divisions between rich and poor. What happens when the classless are given class?

I cannot recommend Lord Of Light, Snow Crash, Stand On Zanzibar and The Diamond Age enough. All absolutely fantastic books.

Peter F. Hamilton writes really good pulp scifi which is a lot of fun to read. Some Greg Bear stuff is good too.
Anything from Sector General by James White is pretty good too. Intergalactic hospitals are awesome.

Scandanavian War Machine:
since all the classics have already been mentioned: i have one series that i can not recomend hard enough.

Dan Simmons- Hyperion, Fall of Hyperion, Endymion, Rise of Endymion

those four books changed my life. they are amazing. and its seems like no one has read them; my dad, his friend, and i are the only people i know that have read these books.

yostinso:
Absolutely lots of Heinlein. (For some off-the-beaten-path, try Friday or JOB: A Comedy of Justice.)

Also, I have to agree with Rizzo on a couple of authors: Neal Stephenson. Snow Crash is great. Diamond Age is also very good, but less accessible if you're not ready for a lot of cyberpunk.

Peter F. Hamilton writes some really quality stuff that I tend to categorize into the "British SF" genre. The Mindstar trilogy is a good fun action romp, and plenty of fun. Fallen Dragon is a really good standalone novel, too.

In the same vein, Michael Flynn's Firestar series, referred to by some guy on Amazon as akin to Heinlein's Man Who Sold the Moon. Saving the earth through capitalism!

If you looking for something a little bit hippy and a lot of punny, try Spider Robinson's Callahan Chronicles or Lifehouse. Robinson claims Heinlein as a heavy influence, and is similarly interested in transcendentalism but a good bit more light-hearted about it.

For old classic SF (less politically correct and a little chauvinist), try "Doc" E.E. Smith's Lensman series.

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