What are your favorite science fiction novels?

I need some ideas. I don't read that often, and I need to take back time that life is stealing from me. I am purchasing a few books (on Amazon!

Hehe), and I want a few more. The books I just bought are called Ringworld, and the other is Cities In Flight. If your favorite isn't sci-fi that is ok, go ahead and just list your top 5 favorite books and just try and land a few sci-fi novels in there.

Asked by kylejames 48 months ago Similar questions: favorite science fiction novels Arts > Books > Books - Genres.

Similar questions: favorite science fiction novels.

Some of my favorites... This list has a mixture of solid writers who are currently working--and have been for a while--and "grand Masters" of science fiction. This is also a broad range of SF topics--war, revolution, medical/phycological, the arts, technology, "history. " Orson Scott Card--Ender's Game (and the rest of the Ender books, both the original ones and the Ender's Shadow books.

This book has become a SF classic--and it's terrific. Elizabeth Moon--The Speed of Dark (This is unusual science fiction--if you remember the book Flowers for Algernon, this is more like that--only incredibly better--Moon is addressing the issue of what makes us who we are--and the hero is a high-functioning person with autism, given the opportunity to become not autistic, and it's set on Earth in a not-too distant future). The Star Dance books by Spider and Jeanne Robinson.

Spider Robinson's Callahan's Bar books. Robert Heinlein: Starship Troopers, The Moon is a Harsh Mistress (basically anything the man wrote, I was delighted to read, but these two are exceptionally good places to start). Isaac Asimov's "Robot" books and his "Foundation" books.

Sources: My bookshelves NancyE's Recommendations Starship Troopers Amazon List Price: $6.99 Used from: $6.997 Average Customer Rating: 4.5 out of 5 (based on 659 reviews) The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress Amazon List Price: $16.997 Used from: $6.997 Average Customer Rating: 4.5 out of 5 (based on 228 reviews) Ender's Game (Ender, Book 1) Amazon List Price: $6.99 Used from: $6.993 Average Customer Rating: 4.5 out of 5 (based on 2448 reviews) Ender's Game Boxed Set: Ender's Game, Ender's Shadow, Shadow of the Hegemon Amazon List Price: $22.97 Used from: $14.31 Average Customer Rating: 4.5 out of 5 (based on 14 reviews) Beyond Ender's Game: Speaker for the Dead, Xenocide, Children of the Mind Amazon List Price: $23.97 Used from: $16.997 Average Customer Rating: 4.5 out of 5 (based on 28 reviews) Callahan's Crosstime Saloon Amazon List Price: $6.99 Used from: $6.993 Average Customer Rating: 4.0 out of 5 (based on 13 reviews) The Stardance Trilogy omnibus of Stardance, Starseed and Starmind Amazon List Price: $26.998 Used from: $6.999 Average Customer Rating: 5.0 out of 5 (based on 1 reviews) The Speed of Dark Amazon List Price: $6.99 Used from: $6.999 Average Customer Rating: 4.5 out of 5 (based on 80 reviews) Foundation (Foundation Novels) Amazon List Price: $6.997 Used from: $1.20 Average Customer Rating: 4.5 out of 5 (based on 323 reviews) Foundation and Empire (Foundation Novels) Amazon List Price: $6.997 Used from: $0.54 Average Customer Rating: 4.5 out of 5 (based on 78 reviews) I, Robot Amazon List Price: $6.997 Used from: $0.01 Average Customer Rating: 4.0 out of 5 (based on 200 reviews) Caves of Steel (Robot City) Amazon List Price: $6.997 Used from: $0.01 Average Customer Rating: 4.5 out of 5 (based on 79 reviews) Since you've got Niven and Blish, here are some other strong choices...

Arthur C. Clarke Clarke wrote some really good sci-fi back in the day. He's responsible for 2001: A Space Odyssey and 2010 which were both made into movies.

If I'm not mistaken, there are 3 other books in that same series, all written over the course of a couple of decades. I think my personal favorite of Clarke's is "Childhood's End. " It's a really interesting take on the "end of the world" story.

Bochman's Recommendations Childhood's End Amazon List Price: $6.99 Used from: $0.71 Average Customer Rating: 4.5 out of 5 (based on 272 reviews) 2001: A Space Odyssey Amazon List Price: $7.99 Used from: $0.98 Average Customer Rating: 4.5 out of 5 (based on 246 reviews) 2010: Odyssey Two Amazon List Price: $14.95 Used from: $0.95 Average Customer Rating: 4.5 out of 5 (based on 98 reviews) .

Here are a couple of mine: "Halfway Human," Carolyn Ives Gilman This paperback looks like its out of print again, but you can get it used thru Amazon for 49 cents -- such a deal, you might think, and it is; but then they charge you like, $4 to ship it. Still worth it, though. I guess this book would be catagorized as more social science fiction than adventure, (definitely character-driven) and although set in the future in different worlds, it deals with ideas that our society is struggling with, like issues of race and gender and class, intellectual property, etc.(Knowledge and ideas are literally the currency of the time.) It’s well-written, involved and extremely relevant and thought-provoking.

I read it 10 years ago, and it still remains one of the ones I'm always trying to get people to read. "Passage," Connie Willis Connie Willis is a great writer, and has written a lot of my favorites.In this story, researchers have found a way to duplicate near-death experiences with drugs and are studying the participants and their reactions to their experiences. Because of the subject matter, it dips a bit into the metaphysical.

And there’s one point in the book where, if you’re like me, you’ll go, "NO! I can’t believe she’s going to do this! " Don’t worry, she isn’t--it’s not what it seems!

Also, I really liked how she used the parallell for the torn-up hospital going through all the construction... I better quit before I say more than I should."Contact," by Carl Sagan Excellent book! But how could it not be, considering the author? The movie they made from it a couple of years ago with Jodi Foster is one of my all-time favorites.

But the book is able to go into even more depth and description -- as usual w/ books vs. movies-- more of peoples’ thoughts and motivations can be revealed. I think one of the reasons I liked this book so well is that it is so very true-to-life. If we DID make contact with another world, I can see how it would probably be VERY much like it’s pictured here -- a wonderous opportunity reduced to petty squabblings and egos and budgets and, of course, the nut-jobs who have their own agenda!

You can get a hardcover reissue through Amazon, but one of their resellers has the paperback for a lot cheaper, so I put that one on my list. "Carnival," by Elizabeth Bear In the future, Earth supports a population of only 50 million, chosen for their various assets and talents. Everyone else has been "assessed" (exterminated).

Population is rigidly controlled by "Governors," and although Earth now can support its population, life leaves a bit to be desired. This story concerns the adventures of a diplomat and his aide as they travel to a planet called New Amazonia (yep! It’s run by women, but not in the stereotypical way--not a bare breast to be seen!) to return art that was stolen in a previous war.

This book’s a bit more of an adventure--there are spies and double agents, rebels and counter rebels, politics and plotting. Nothing terribly deep, but it really held my interest."On the Beach," by Neville Shute I just reread this classic cautionary tale, and while it is definitely dated, it still holds up--largely, I think, because of the humanity of its characters. I’d first read it years ago when I was a kid, and I was surprised at how much I enjoyed this second go-round.

I tried to pick a variety of different types -- hope you find something of interest here! Umbalia's Recommendations Halfway Human Amazon List Price: $5.99 Used from: $0.49 Average Customer Rating: 4.5 out of 5 (based on 21 reviews) Passage Amazon List Price: $7.99 Used from: $0.90 Average Customer Rating: 3.5 out of 5 (based on 200 reviews) Contact Used from: $1.47 Carnival Amazon List Price: $6.99 Used from: $1.39 Average Customer Rating: 4.5 out of 5 (based on 5 reviews) On the Beach Amazon List Price: $6.99 Used from: $0.01 Average Customer Rating: 4.0 out of 5 (based on 194 reviews) .

So far the Original Star Wars world has been fun - everything from "A New Hope" forward. Read them in order. I can also recommend the S.L. Viehl "StarDoc"series, as well as Alan Dean Foster's "Humanx Commonwealth" series about the adventures of a boy and his pet minidrag.

Anything by Spider Robinson, Mike Resnick (Widowmaker series), Simon R Green (Deathstalker series) Chris Bunch, Willian C Dietz or Steve Perry (not, I assume, the lead singer for Journey). If you like war and sci fi, try David Drake, Rick Shelley and David Weber. For fantasy, try the thieves world saga, and if you want a good laugh, look into Asprins "Myth" series.

I recently stumbled into some well written "Vampire romance" novels, and some really good writers are Kim Harrison (Rachel, Jinx and Ivy), MaryJane Davidson (Betsy the Vampire Queen), Charlaine Harris (Sookie Stackhouse) and Lydsay Sands. Sources: read them all; still have them .

I only sometimes read sci-fi but... I do have some favorites. Good Omens by Neil Gaiman and Terry Pratchett, The Book of Flying by Keith Miller, the Night Watch trilogy by Sergei Lukyanenko, A Canticle for Leibowitz by Walter M Miller. Some books that aren't sci-fi but are still really great are Oryx and Crake by Margaret Atwood, The Stolen Child by Keith Donohue and I just finished reading Everything Is Illuminated by Jonathan Safran Foer and I think it is the most amazing book!

Some of my all time favorites, that I always recommend to people are The Dictionary of the Khazars by Milorad Pavic, and Shame by Salman Rushdie. Sources: the bookshelf .

I am looking for the author of science fiction books featuring the character "Cormac", a secret agent in the future...

Please name some of your favorite non fiction books.

Good books on writing fiction, particularly writing mysteries and science fiction, but good ones on fiction writing, too.

I cant really gove you an answer,but what I can give you is a way to a solution, that is you have to find the anglde that you relate to or peaks your interest. A good paper is one that people get drawn into because it reaches them ln some way.As for me WW11 to me, I think of the holocaust and the effect it had on the survivors, their families and those who stood by and did nothing until it was too late.