good sci-fi?

[asthmatic camel]

I forgot to mention this one. "The Legacy Of Heorot" by Niven, Pournelle & Barnes. A stonkingly good alien adventure.

The sequel "The Dragons Of Heorot", was disappointing. I had to read it though, just to find out what happened.

The same thing hapenned with Brian Herbert & Kevin Andersons' prequels to Dune; OK but nowhere near as good as the originals.

AC

 

[Bikewer]

For years, I'd seen that Delaney's Dhalgren was considered one of the "classics".
Finally found a copy in a used-book store and read it. Found myself saying, "Uh, what was that all about?"

I tried one of the Dune "prequels", and havn't been tempted to try another. I should have gotten a clue from the fact that the younger Herbert's co-writer is from a graphic novel background...

 

[Wudang]

I think Dhalgren was a concious exposition of the idea that SF is "ordinary people in extraordinary circumstances" and as such can highlight "the human condition". He was trying to highlight oddities of the minutiae of peoples behaviour by placing mundane behaviour in a surreal context. I think he did rather better with Titan.
FWIW, I've never been quite sure what "the human condition" is. I think I had it once but got better.

 

[asthmatic camel]

~snip~
Clarke is one of my favorites in part because of his apparent lack of verbosity - he has a way of just suggesting something and letting the reader's imagination fill in the details. I'm recalling the lines from The Songs of Distand Earth - something along the lines of "an embarrased cough was heard from an orbiting lab; a minus had been turned into a plus, and the secrets of the universe had been revealed." Little said, much suggested.

I think I need a longer lifespan to get through all the things that look interesting, and this thread ain't helping...

did

Contrarily, this is the problem I have with Clarke, his novels read more like technical manuals than literature. He writes a good story but where is the passion, pain, joy and emotion ? I want to know how Bowman actually feels when he approaches the obelisk in 2001. The author has invited me into the world of his imagination and denied access to certain sections of it in order to frustrate me.

Oh well, the bookshelf calls.

AC

 

[BillyTK]

Yes, basically. I get the impression that Gibson gets blank versey when he wants to sound profound.

There is that bit at the end of Neuromancer when they figure out the key to freeing the AIs, but the overall impression I got was that Gibson's narrative gets even sparer than usual when he's got Something Important To Tell Us (and I actually quite like that–like the final scenes of All Tomorrow's Parties, for instance).

We can agree to disagree, but I also get that impression from Heinlein as well.

As for cynicism, I'm using it in the less common sense of calculating. Mona Lisa Overdrive was the only time I felt that Gibson was really speaking to me, as opposed to running some modern variant of Plotto. I did enjoy in The Difference Engine, which seemed obviously written pairwise like the old Pohl/Kornbluth collaborations, how Gibson started out with his stock hopped-up, tough-talking Cowboy character and how Sterling killed him off. But it degenerated into mush and showed a complete lack of understanding of the Entscheidungsproblem. On the plus side, Ada Byron reminded me a lot of Donna Cox, a real person who used to be big in computing.

I'm not too sure if I found The Difference Engine's "alt.Ada" convincing—what is it that Gibson's got about batty European women?— but that could be because I found the whole novel hard going; the colloquialisms felt clumsy and the dialog was a bit too Mary Poppins for my likin', guv'nor!

Well, Willis isn't for everyone. As I've already pointed out (I think), she's for people who like Wodehouse.

I've never read any Wodehouse, always found the guy a bit too upper-class for my tastes. My class prejudices aside...

It's funny, and it's generally light social commentary. The number of awards only enters into the fact that people should have heard of her.

I'd recommend the short stories, either Impossible Things, which has the short story "Even The Queen," a big FU to people who criticized her for not writing more about "women's issues." "The Last of the Winnebagos" is one of the best stories about dogs I've ever read. Or her book of Christmas tales. I can't remember the name. On the other hand, if you like relentlessly grim, you could start with The Doomsday Book.

Thanks for the recommendations, I'll keep an eye out for them. "Last of the Winnebagos" sounds familiar, I might've read something by her after all.

It's eminently true, but I'd like to hear your spiel anyway. I have an inherent distrust of people who insist that what they write is not SF just so they can get the BJ from mainstream lit-crits. This seems a peculiarly American disease; the British have always been more accepting.

That's pretty much it; I found Atwood's objection that Oryx... is speculative fiction, not science fiction, wryly amusing in its snobbery and ignorance. I don't know if it's a singularly American disease—in that British SF writers to some extent have "prove" themselves as "proper" writers—but overall (I'd like to believe) good writing gets appreciated as such regardless of its genre. But I do sometimes get the sneaking impression that some of our American and Canadian cousins are more than a little envious of our British class structure and its associated cultural elitism.

 

[Giz]

One author who hasn't been mentioned so far is Jack McDevitt. His characters are very 3-dimensional and sympathetic, and the plots and writing style are pretty good.

I second that! "A talent for war" (actually not a gung-ho book) has everything: Mystery, Archeology, Detective, War, History, Politics, Romance, Relationships, Aliens (nicely done).

Slow Lightning etc are very good too.

What do people think of Peter F Hamilton? I think rather highly of his Mindstar trilogy...

 

[Wudang]

I like Hamilton but you do have to suspend disbelief a bit - something of a return to classic SF there. Good old-fashioned ripping yarns and none the worse for it.
I do like Mandel's veteran character.

 

[Reaver]

I like Hamilton but you do have to suspend disbelief a bit - something of a return to classic SF there. Good old-fashioned ripping yarns and none the worse for it.

I agree infact it was reading the _Nights Dawn_ trilogy that got me back into SF. I've just finsihed _Pandoras Star_ and that's a great read as well.

 

[CBL4]

There are list of best SF available online.

If you are looking for good, older books I suggest you read David Pringle’s Best 100 book. It ended at 1984. I disagree with a lot of his choices but it is an excellent place to start. There are lots of lesser known books that are great (Limbo, Wild Seed and The Year of the Quiet Sun). Here is a online link that lists his top 100.
http://www.majure.net/best100scifi.htm

Here is another online list:
http://home.austarnet.com.au/petersykes/topscifi/lists_books_rank1.html

My favorites are:
LeGuin – Dispossed
LeGuin – Left Hand of Darkness
Herbert – Dune
Brunner - Stand on Zanzibar
Card – Speaker for the Dead
Stephenson – Snow Crash
Bester – The Demolished Man
Dick – The Man in the High Castle
Spinrad – Bug Jack Baron
Octavia Butler – Wild Seed
Wilhem – Where Late the Sweet Birds Sang
Wilson Tucker – The Year of the Quiet Sun
Bernard Wolfe – Limbo
Asimov – Foundation, etc.
Charles Harness – The Paradox Men
Greg Egan – Permutation City
Zelazny - Amber Series
Farmer - To Your Scattered Bodies Go

CBL

 

[epepke]

Asimov wrote novels set in a human (and Robot) only universe. This was (I felt) a mistake.

This was, by Asimov's own admission, a sop to John Campbell. Campbell was a person who was essentially an idiot but who had an enormous amount of power over what could and could not be published. (Compare Gardner Duzois, who plays much the same role now.)

One of Campbell's dicta was that in a conflict between humans and aliens, humans always had to win. Asimov invented his all-human universe so that he could have some sort of dramatic conflict.

 

[Mycroft]

If you like Space Opera, try the "Honor Harrington" novels by David Weber. The first one is "On Basilisk Station"

Oooh! Excelent choice! It is space-opera, and doesn't have much value otherwise, but a hell of a fun read!

 

[Hutch]

I forgot to mention this one. "The Legacy Of Heorot" by Niven, Pournelle & Barnes. A stonkingly good alien adventure.

The sequel "The Dragons Of Heorot", was disappointing. I had to read it though, just to find out what happened.
AC

IIRC, The Legacy of Heorot was a sequel to their book "Grendel". I wasn't aware that there was a third book out there...guess I'll have to read it, disappointing or not, just to keep up.

And doesn't it seem that the third novel of a continuting series seems to be where they run out of steam? I'm thinking Ringworld, Foundation, Rama, 2001....the third books in those series were all much less compelling than their predecessors, IMHO

 

[wollery]

IIRC, The Legacy of Heorot was a sequel to their book "Grendel". I wasn't aware that there was a third book out there...guess I'll have to read it, disappointing or not, just to keep up.

And doesn't it seem that the third novel of a continuting series seems to be where they run out of steam? I'm thinking Ringworld, Foundation, Rama, 2001....the third books in those series were all much less compelling than their predecessors, IMHO

Grendel was a short story about Beowulf Shaeffer, and I don't believe that it had anything to do with Legacy of Heorot, beyond the obvious name connection.

 

[J Coplen]

If nothing happens in the first 500 pages, ain't nothin' gonna happen...

Egads, man! How can you read that far into a crappy book before quitting? If I'm bored by page 50 I quit.

 

[lofgoernost]

I enjoyed the WWII era installments of Cryptonomicon, but couldn't really get into the contemporary storyline. To be honest, it's been a few years now and I can't remember if I finished it or not. I had just read Simon Singh's book on cryptography, and without the enjoyment of that bolstering me I may not have gotten as deep into Stephenson's book as I did.

I'll echo Zelazny's Lord of Light, and mention some of the novella length stuff - "A Rose for Ecclesiates" and "He Who Shapes". I also have To Die in Italbar gathering dust on the shelf...have to crack that spine one of these days.

Ender's Game is one of my favorite summer reads. Nice to find a hammock in the shade and just escape into it once every few years.

 

[epepke]

I enjoyed the WWII era installments of Cryptonomicon, but couldn't really get into the contemporary storyline. To be honest, it's been a few years now and I can't remember if I finished it or not.

What kept me interested in the modern installments of Cryptonomicon was the mystery of Enoch Root, who seems to me to be an Elijah metaphor.

 

[blackpriester]

Want something disturbing?

Chaos, my German friend (are you from Hesse, too?), this is what you should read if you appreciate something really DISTURBING from a real-life medical doctor who turned to "close-to-reality-science-fiction":

"The Brains of Rats" by Michael Blumlein.
You can buy it at

http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0440213738/102-3423284-1505707?v=glance


I quote:
Reviewer: Robert Chatham (see more about me) from Memphis, TN
I'd never heard of michael blumlein before I read The Brains of Rats. I picked a copy up at a local library - and i've never been so fascinated. Blumlein has a wonderful writing style and his stories are some of the most bizarre pieces of fiction ever. This is one of the best authors of dark fiction that I've ever found.


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3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

Astonishing, December 4, 1998
Reviewer: philm4 from Los Angeles
The short stories in Michael Blumlein's "The Brains of Rats" are very difficult to classify by genre. In another sense, they're quite easy to identify; they're all very well written and fascinating. Though the book's spine identifies the collection as "horror," that label applies only to some of the stories. The title story, for example, deals with the questions of gender and gender identity. My personal favorite story is the second, a little opus entitled "Tissue Ablation and Variant Regeneration: A Case Report."

Written in a clinical manner, this story is heavy in medical terminology and describes an operation on a conscious albeit paralyzed man. Blumlein's style here is both complex and powerful. Though the writing seems to attempt to give maximum attention to the clinical nature of the operation, there is a subtext of the feelings of the man on the table; it is almost impossible not to empathize with the patient, to feel his agony to at least some degree.

The stories in "The Brains of Rats" are extraordinarily diverse, from relatively benign fantasy at times to the significantly darker aspects of "Tissue Ablation." Almost without exception, they are fascinating and engrossing. This book is highly recommended for those who enjoy well-written, short fiction of a speculative nature.

 

[Chaos]

Re: Want something disturbing?

Chaos, my German friend (are you from Hesse, too?),

I am. I live near Frankfurt. The world is small, isn´t it?

 

[Hutch]

Grendel was a short story about Beowulf Shaeffer, and I don't believe that it had anything to do with Legacy of Heorot, beyond the obvious name connection.

Good catch, it was the creatures that were called Grendels.

But it was the third book set in that storyline, #1 was the Legacy of Heorot, 2nd was Beowulf's children (not bad) and #3 was the Dragon's of Heorot, which I haven't read yet.

 

[blackpriester]

Meet?

Salve Chaos,

If you are in the mood, we could meet sometime and have a beer - I'm sure my Wiccan wife would be delighted to meet another "Randi-Geek" .

Anyway, we could drop a message to zee_dscherman and start a little Randi-Forum chapter here .

- m.