Hard sci-fi novels?

giftgrub

check out robert read...hes got a great book called Marrow...its all about a group of immortals living in a spaceship the size of a planet ripping stuff

you could always go back to asimov's foundation series....theyre operatic

greg bear is always good

off subject is china mielvielle...Perdido Street Station, its fanfasy but its one of the most vreative books i've read in years

ian m banks is great as well...check out Use of weapons

alastair reynolds is another guy ive gotten ninto recently...revelation space chasm city...all pretty dark..hes got a real thing for anantech as well which i find fascinating

thats all i can think of at the moment

plastic membrane

David Brin's two Uplift trilogies. Hard sci-Fi, well written.

fenris

There is always the original of the cyberpunk species - William Gibson - Neuromancer, Count Zero, Mona Lisa Overdrive.

Or Walther Jon Williams - Voice of the Whirlwind.

For good space, alien artefact exploration, enslave the universe type scifi there is Charles Sheffield - Convergence, Divergence, Transcendence etc.

And for purest cheesey no brain fluff there is Simon R Green's Deathstalker series.

hype_de_hope

hmm - am I the only one that is disappointed in Illium (Simmons) and the new Baroque Series (Stephenson)?

I struggled through Illium - found it a huge yawn, unforgiveable from the author of the Hyperion series (awesome). Really wondering whether to invest the time reading the second one...

In terms of Stephenson - read the first of the new trilogy - again a huge struggle, perhaps I am getting denser in my old age but trying to keep up with all the many many characters and plot lines in this was a nightmare. After reading a great review of the series in Salon got the second one in the series 'Confusion' and have got through the frst 100 pages or so. In short still not too bothered whether to finish it. Anyone finished this? Or even got the third, which I think is out in the US. Is it worth finishing???

Fenster

Illium was loads of fun. Its just not a book that you take seriously though.

anfionn

Ther is always David Brin,or for old school Hard sci fi:Larry Niven

Moocher

There's always the ender series by Orson scott card.
Vernor Vinge has already been mentioned but deserves another mention.
"A deepness in the sky" is just a huge fabulous novel.

LouisWu

Anything by Larry Niven
- Ringworld series
- Tales of known Space
- Protector
- World of Ptavvs
- The long Arm of Gil Hamilton
to name but a few

The Ender series from Orson Scott Card

Stephen Baxters Manifold series
Patrick Tilleys Amtrak Wars series
Anything By Robert Heinlein
Asimov's Foundation series

Two new (to me anyway) Authors are

Kevin Anderson - Hidden Empire - the start of a brilliant series
Ken Macleod - Newtons Wake - just starting this one

LouisWu

Boro

fenris wrote:

And for purest cheesey no brain fluff there is Simon R Green's Deathstalker series.

LOL... that stuff was great.. "Boost!"

LoisWu wrote:

Kevin Anderson - Hidden Empire - the start of a brilliant series

If you look at the previous page, you will see a lot of anti KJA people there. He is not exactly flavour of the month around here

Another good one to read - its been mentioned already but its worth the repeat - "Shards of Honour" by Lois McMaster Bujold. Wild space opera meets
dramatic military and strategy mysteries. Highly recommended stuff.

Fenster

LouisWu wrote:

Kevin Anderson - Hidden Empire - the start of a brilliant series

The words "Kevin J. Anderson" and "brilliant" are usually mutually exclusive

ixoy

Fenster wrote:

The words "Kevin J. Anderson" and "brilliant" are usually mutually exclusive

Hah! You can never have enough Kevin J. Anderson bashing!

Fenster I've used your threads to compile a list of books to buy for myself. I hope the recommendations are good because I've picked about ten novels from it and placed them on my Amazon wishlist. 'Hyperion's blend of sci-fi and legend sounds particularly interesting - does it have the same level of research as a Neal Stephenson work?

I'm mainly a fantasy reader but when it comes to sci-fi, I've gone for Bear, Hamilton, Stephenson, and Zindell mostly. Currently, I'm on Stephen Baxter's Manifold II: Space. Some really neat ideas there although I don't think characterisation is his strongest asset.

Now to quit my job to find time to read...

Woden

Moocher wrote:

There's always the ender series by Orson scott card.

aye the further books in the series are a bit more hardcore.

i'd second, third or fourth the hyperion cantos by simmions, not sure about the earlier books in the series but the fourth one is out of print and i had to get it shipped in from amazon marketplace (and it was the american version ) so if you see em knocking around pick em up

LouisWu

Woah...

On Anderson - I've only read hidden empire and liked it. I have not seen any of his other stuff...

I would echo what others have said about the Hyperion series

I can across a compilation in a second hand book shop last summer called Far Horizons Its a series of short stories by 11 authors but gives a great flavour of their work. It includes Ursla K, Le Guin, Orson Scott Card, David Brin, Joe Haldeman

Has anyone mentioned Peter Hamilton yet or Jerry Pournelle or Robert Silverberg

LouisWu

Fenster

Dataisgod wrote:

aye the further books in the series are a bit more hardcore.

i'd second, third or fourth the hyperion cantos by simmions, not sure about the earlier books in the series but the fourth one is out of print and i had to get it shipped in from amazon marketplace (and it was the american version ) so if you see em knocking around pick em up

Lets hope they don't dissapoint.

Undergod

moridin wrote:

... and the books in the Malazan book of the Fallen series - Steven Erikson.

Steven Erikson is excellent. I don't get your point about making it clear who the bad guys are, even the most evil character isn't really evil, just... vengeful...

For believable fantasy, read KJ Parkers "The Fencer Trilogy". Good, but not brilliant novels, but I liked them because he writes at length about various skills. Book I - blacksmithing, siege engines, Book II - bowyery, and I haven't finished Book III but it more or less says armour-craft is going to be a big theme.

Again, I like the usual. Banks Use of Weapons is one of my favourite novels, I've read most of Stephenson's work (his more obscure stuff is more "Scientific Fiction" than SF, Zodiac is all based in real chemistry as far as I can tell) and most of Gibson's (anyone else read his semi-cyberpunk books "Virtual Light" and "All Tomorrow's Parties"?)

Undergod

giftgrub wrote:

off subject is china mielvielle...Perdido Street Station, its fanfasy but its one of the most vreative books i've read in years

Yes, Perdido Street Station was excellent, as was the scar. Haven't read Iron Council, nor any of his modern fantasy (king rat and one other book, I think).

Has anyone read any James White? I've been told a lot about his Sector General books, but I can't find any

ixoy

Undergod wrote:

Yes, Perdido Street Station was excellent, as was the scar. Haven't read Iron Council, nor any of his modern fantasy (king rat and one other book, I think).

Excellent. Just picked up 'Perdido Street Station' from my house last night, ordered off of play.com. Hopefully I'll enjoy it.

David Stewart

Sadly, James White's books have been out of print in Europe for many years now. the good news is that Tor Books in the US is reprinting them in Omnibus format. You might find them if you look on Amazon.com Or better still, check out www.sectorgeneral.com which is the official James White Website

Fenster

I didn't like Pedidro Street Station. Having read the cover, I was expecting some sort of pseudo-fantasy political backstabber novel (ala George Martin's works), especially consdiering its thickness, but I was left sorely dissapointed.

Undergod

Really? I guess it's really the kind of thing I'm into, I love steampunk of all sizes. Throw a couple of George Martin's names my way, I don't think I've heard of him.

That's a pity about James White. I know where to get a loan of the Sector General Omnibus, but whether I'll be able to wangle it is a different kettle of salmon.

Carpo

At the risk of being shot down...

Steer well clear of the 3rd and 4th parts of the Hyperion Cantos ie Endymion and the Rise of Endymion.

I absolutly loved the first two parts (particularly Fall of Hyperion which is one of my all time favourites) but I was utterly disgusted with these two later books. All the style and depth was gone and replaced with bad characters and a rather tedious and cliched chase story, everything that was cool and intimidating about the Shrike from the first books was undermined in a 'bad killing machine turned good killing machine' way that I half expected it to say 'Hasta la vista, baby' and have done with it, and all the mystery of the originals was gone too. The whole thing just reeked of 'Hollywood sequel cash-in' to me.

The Fall of Hyperion ends with all the loose ends tied and all the questions answered. My advice is to leave it there and dont suffer the attempt to reopen these questions which comes with the follow-ups. I wish I had.

madrab

use of weapons...fantastic but consider phleabas is my favourite of the series

what about Gateway by Frederick Pohl

good but a bit short, nice and bleak

Peace

madrab wrote:

use of weapons...fantastic but consider phleabas is my favourite of the series

Both excellent books. The lady Sharrow was my kinda girl.

Consider Phleabas gets top rating from me too.

Boro

David Stewart wrote:

Sadly, James White's books have been out of print in Europe for many years now. the good news is that Tor Books in the US is reprinting them in Omnibus format. You might find them if you look on Amazon.com Or better still, check out www.sectorgeneral.com which is the official James White Website

I actually have a few of those sitting on my shelf at home. Picked them up in a car boot sale a while back. Fun reading.

Undergod

Sharrow is from Against A Dark Background. Which, I must admit, is an excellent book.

I wouldn't really consider Iain M. Banks to be hard science fiction.

madrab

what about excession?

or due you refer to hard sci-fi as in really gritty and depressing

in that case the gap series is really "hard"

Undergod

I don't know... I think it's too vast in its scope, especially excessipn. What excession implies is way beyond our ken... that sounds so up myself...

I'd think of hard science fiction as not too far in the future (few hundred years advanced) but less dystopian than cyberpnuk.

ixoy

madrab wrote:

or due you refer to hard sci-fi as in really gritty and depressing

I think of hard sci-fi as science fiction where there's a good basis on the science. It's not saying everything in the book is plausible, but that the author has thought about the science behind it and extrapolated why it might happen. So say, for example, Assimov, Clarke, or Baxter all have a good grasp of scientific principles that they apply to their writing whereas, at the other end, we might have the likes of Kevin J. Anderson producing pulp sci-fi - big ships, battles, whatever - that has more emphasis on the fiction element than the science part of science fiction.

Zaph

A few more authors for your consideration:

Greg Egan
Michael Marshall Smith - particularly Only Forward
Bruce Sterling
Jeff Noon - although I want to know what drugs he's on
Richard Kadrey - only ever read one of his books, Metrophage, but really enjoyed it
David Wingrove - the Chung Kuo series. Don't know if all 8 are still in print, but it's an amazing series of books (apart from the last one which brings in stuff that was never even hinted at in the first 7 and is a real let down)
George Alec Effinger - the Budayeen trilogy (When Gravity Fails, A Fire in the Sun and The Exile Kiss). Again not sure if they're still in print. Best way to describe them is Islamic cyberpunk crossed with Raymond Chandler. Weird, I know, but it works.

Undergod

ixoy wrote:

I think of hard sci-fi as science fiction where there's a good basis on the science...

There's also a distinction between (Hard Science Fiction) and (Hard Science) Fiction... the latter being Neal Stephenson's term (to the best of my knowledge) to describe some of his own novels, like Zodiac and Cryptonomicon. Based on actual science, excellently researched and maybe even possible. So not actuall s-f, but sorta similar