Best technothriller books according to redditors
We found 1,174 Reddit comments discussing the best technothriller books. We ranked the 158 resulting products by number of redditors who mentioned them. Here are the top 20.
We found 1,174 Reddit comments discussing the best technothriller books. We ranked the 158 resulting products by number of redditors who mentioned them. Here are the top 20.
Sure. See: http://www.antipope.org/charlie/blog-static/2011/06/reality-check-1.html
Note that my views fluctuate wildly. I have another singularity novel coming out this September 4th, co-written with Cory Doctorow: "The Rapture of the Nerds":
http://www.amazon.com/The-Rapture-Nerds-Cory-Doctorow/dp/0765329107/
Thank you for supporting small publishers, OP. :)
I missed the initial selection, but I'll throw this out there on the off-chance anyone else is interested. I plan to dig through and buy a few of the books that are listed as well, because frankly, they seem damn interesting.
A few months back I released Mosaic 17K. It's a near-future cyberpunk thriller about Sophie Locke, a hacker born in 2017 and coming-of-age in 2036. If any of us had a child this year, this book is timed to land as his/her potential future.
Mosaic 17K deals with artificial intelligence, virtual reality, advanced materials science, future medical advances, and the societal effects of rising sea levels. The first half is a mounting murder mystery, with the second half being a faster, more action-oriented pace. It's a long book (kindle estimates 13+ hours for some readers), for those who like a deep read.
Main reason it doesn't have a lot of reviews yet seems to be that people are taking their time with it. It's been a nerve-wracking few months, as I distract myself with writing my first fantasy novel.
I enjoyed "Time Enough for Love"
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lazarus_Long
Also:
"Elantris" and "Warbreaker" by Brandon Sanderson
Oh! Also check out "The Mummy or Ramses the Damned" by Anne Rice!
The Difference Engine by William Gibson and Bruce Sterling. Leviathan by Scott Westerfeld. Boneshaker by Cherie Priest. Perdido Street Station by China Mieville. And more.
Doesn't look like it...
https://www.amazon.co.uk/Mosaic-17K-Christopher-Drake/dp/1521017220/ref=asap_bc?ie=UTF8
It was brutal. I wasn't that good. But there were many people who were superb. It was such a pleasure watching them perform.
Here are some sci-fi recommendations (you may have read them already, but I thought I'd offer anyway):
Serious Scifi:
Anathem the "multiverse" (multiple realities) and how all that works
Seveneves feminism meets eugenics—watch out!
The Culture series by Iain Banks, esp Book 2, the Player of Games Banks is dead, but wrote some of the best intellectual scifi ever
Brilliant, Visionary:
Accelerando brilliant and hilarious; and it's not a long book
Snowcrash classic
Neuromancer another classic
Tawdry yet Lyrical (in a good way):
Dhalgren beautiful, poetic, urban, stream of consciousness, and more sex than you can believe
Underrated Classics:
Voyage to Arcturus ignore the reviews and the bad cover of this edition (or buy a diff edition); this is the ONE book that every true scifi and fantasy fan should read before they die
Stress Pattern, by Neal Barrett, Jr. I can't find this on Amazon, but it is a book you should track down. It is possibly the WORST science fiction book ever written, and that is why you must read it. It's a half-assed attempt at a ripoff of Dune without any of the elegance or vision that Herbert had, about a giant worm that eats people on some distant planet. A random sample: "A few days later when I went to the edge of the grove to ride the Bhano I found him dead. I asked Rhamik what could have happened and he told me that life begins, Andrew, and life ends. Well, so it does."
> i will have to check out Neuromancer as it seems interesting.
the movie, Johnny Mnemonic, is also based off Neuromancer, but it's not super great at presenting the themes the book develops.
Snow Crash has a lot of Gibson/Neuromancer elements, but also includes some interesting concepts about language and religion.
here's Amazon links for both of them. $20 well spent IMO.
https://www.amazon.com/Neuromancer-William-Gibson/dp/0441569595
https://www.amazon.com/Snow-Crash-Neal-Stephenson/dp/0553380958
General
Neuromancer By William Gibson
Neuromancer spawned the Cyberpunk genre and is responsible for much of cyber culture today, despite being written before the internet entered the public consciousness. Interesting characters, poetic descriptions, and a drug-addled noir atmosphere.
>Goodreads blurb: The Matrix is a world within the world, a global consensus- hallucination, the representation of every byte of data in cyberspace . . .
>Case had been the sharpest data-thief in the business, until vengeful former employers crippled his nervous system. But now a new and very mysterious employer recruits him for a last-chance run. The target: an unthinkably powerful artificial intelligence orbiting Earth in service of the sinister Tessier-Ashpool business clan. With a dead man riding shotgun and Molly, mirror-eyed street-samurai, to watch his back, Case embarks on an adventure that ups the ante on an entire genre of fiction.
>Hotwired to the leading edges of art and technology, Neuromancer ranks with 1984 and Brave New World as one of the century's most potent visions of the future. (less)
Sure!
Cryptonomicon
Snow Crash
The Electric Church
Neuromancer
Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?
That should get you started. :)
Here's a full list:
I'm assuming that you're looking for stories set in a recognisable, modern or near-future setting, in that case:
I first saw it in neuromancer. If you haven't read neuromancer yet... You really should. Also count zero and mona Lisa overdrive; these 3 books form the Sprawl trilogy and were hugely influential in the formation of the cyberpunk genre.
You might even get a kick out of The Hunger Games or Divergent... And of course 1984 :)
Sounds like you might enjoy Neal Stephenson's The Diamond Age. I think Snow Crash is meant to be in the same universe - it's hilarious but not as dense. You might also like his Cryptonomicon, though it's not technically Sci Fi.
Tad Willams' Otherland Series is Epic Sci Fi with a huge amount of detail. Might be right up your alley.
Dune, Neuromancer and The Enderverse if you haven't already read those.
I doubt this is it, but I'll plug Time Enough for Love by Robert A. Heinlein.
http://www.amazon.com/Time-Enough-Love-Robert-Heinlein/dp/0441810764/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1371002335&sr=8-1&keywords=time+enough+for+love
Hopefully it might help you or someone else get pointed in the right direction.
I wouldn't call it paranoia. The media is totally sensationalizing what he says. But nothing he has said has been wrong. Nukes are insanely dangerous, but a nuke doesn't think.
I think the first nuclear tests were even extremely risky, if I recall correctly, during a documentary I was watching it was said that they weren't exactly sure what would happen... they had a good idea but it was simply an idea. (idea == theory)
Elon Musk wants to dump money into making sure our first AI is developed to be benevolent rather than self serving, I say why not? There's actually a good sci-fi book that touches on this subject: Post-Human (Amazon).
[Post-Human Spoiler](/s "Essentially, China rushes an AI to win the world war but in the process of rushing the AI essentially takes over and begins to attempt to wipe out the planet. The government is finally able to send a suicide team with a tactical nuke to take it out, at which point strong AI is banned. Meanwhile a team secretly works on a strong AI but with the intent of having it be a protector of humanity from both other strong AIs but also from itself and their environment. Long story short, it ends up doing all of that.")
Additional notes...
Basic Background
Recommended Viewing Order
Start with the first film. It's the foundation for everything else.
Next, I'd watch the two Stand Alone Complex series
You can watch the second movie or the four Arise episodes in any order.
Primer Information About the Wider GitS world (Mild Spoilers)
The below is written in a block so as to make provide optical camouflage against accidentally catching spoilers if you don't want to read them.
The goal of this section is to help ease you into understanding the politics and organization of the GitS world.
The GitS world is set in Japan, but there are also international players. Japan has gone to war against other (made up) nations (sorta like Kazakstan), and we meet some of the ex-soldiers. Cybernetic technology is now well integrated into society, but was most extensively developed, weaponized and used by the military. At the most basic level, almost everyone now has brain implants. These implants are the foundation of most of the philosophical discussion in the GitS world. They're also the foundation for most of the crime, communication and investigation. Some people only have those basic neural implants, while others are entirely or almost entirely cybernetic. Much of the philosophical discussion, then, is about the line between the physical body and the soul (ghost), about what makes us individual and unique.
Americans are not the good guys (in many respects, the series extrapolates on how WWII influenced and continues to influence Japan's development and national identity). The Japanese government is divided into self-contained groups: ministries and sections. We follow Section 9. On the surface these groups all work together, but there's really a lot of backstabbing and secret warfare between the groups.
I think that's enough to get you started.
tl;dr: Definitely watch - one of my favorite creations of everything of all time. Enjoy!
I'm almost always juggling reading material. At the moment I am reading Neuromancer by William Gibson, and Meditations of Marcus Aurelius. Just finished reading Brigham Young: Pioneer Prophet by John G Turner, which I highly recommend.
There was a cyberpunk/dystopia book published last year where the flooding of the Ohio River was a major part of the background.
It's called Mosaic 17K. It's by Christopher Drake. I really liked it. Fair warning: It's a big book.
The best SF books I read published in 2014 were:
The First Fifteen Lives of Harry August by Claire North.
The Peripheral by William Gibson.
Echopraxia, sequel to Blindsight by Peter Watts.
Lines of Departure, sequel to Terms of Enlistment by Marko Kloos.
Ancillary Sword, sequel to Ancillary Justice by Ann Leckie.
Cibola Burn, 4th in a series that starts with Leviathan Wakes by James SA Corey.
A Darkling Sea by James Cambias.
Neuromancer https://www.amazon.com/dp/0441569595/ref=cm_sw_r_other_apa_i_ixV8AbZ5SWX6N
> What if my children or a younger friend will be immortal? In a thousand years they will have forgotten the 40 years they spent with me.
If that's really what you believe, may I suggest reading Robert A. Heinlein's Time Enough for Love. ( Amazon )
I have heard good things about Public Enemy Zero and it averages almost 5 stars out of 171 reviews on Amazon. It also has the advantage of only being $0.99, so pretty much anyone should be able to join in.
Edit
I just thought of another good book that should be in the ring...and the best thing is that this one is legally available for free. Accelerando, (non free link) by Charles Stross. Unlike Public Enemy Zero, I have read this one, and can attest to it's awesome. Manybooks (free link) has the book in pretty much every format you can imagine, for pretty much any reader device or software imaginable.
Interesting, I'm reading Cory Doctorow's latest novel, which comes from a (very) roughly similar moral perspective as well. It's pretty weird. Although in the fictional universe (medium-term future) cheap 3D printing supposedly makes possible the post-scarcity conditions necessarily for "decommodifying labor and offering every human the resources to flourish". But so far the book reads a lot like a communist Atlas Shrugged, up to and including the long-winded philosophical monologues. Maybe it will get better though; the story itself has some interesting sci-fi elements, so I haven't given up yet.
https://www.amazon.com/Synthetic-AI-Apocalypse-Steven-Kratz-ebook/dp/B07J1Z5VFM/ref=sr_1_1?s=digital-text&ie=UTF8&qid=1540072265&sr=1-1&keywords=synthetic
Finally finished my ASoIaF re-read, though I think that was before December. AFfC and aDwD are so fucking underrated. I seriously have a hard time figuring out who the hell is reading that series in the first place that somehow doesn't get those two books.
Kinda want to put some more fantasy/sci-fi in the rotation but over the last couple months I've made some attempts that remind me why I gave up most genre fiction. Started into Simmons' Hyperion and holy fuck if I never hear the word "cruciform" again . . . It seems like there could be a cool story under there, but the writing is clumsy as hell (yes, even after accounting for what's up with the stretch with all the "cruciform" bullshit). Listening to the audiobook might have aggravated the repetitiveness of some portions, but uggh. I feel like I'll eventually finish at least Hyperion just because of how much positive stuff I've heard about the story but I doubt it's gonna reel me in for the two sequels.
Also tried dipping my toe into the first of Sanderson's Stormlight books and goddamn I am not going to finish that one. Turns out everything in the world is a compound word, formed of the kewlest words Sanderson knows. Storm+light. Shard+blade. Oath+pact. "Oathpact." It's a compound word made out of fucking synonyms. It's super high fantasy, which makes me leery to begin with, but every other word is a proper compound noun that I would've made up for my D&D games when I was 11. Despite all the made up words there's still no useful descriptions of the world; I know the magic armor is scaled, but have no idea who the people being killed are or why I'd care. Like three chapters of this jargony bullshit and I still don't even know what the little fairies that apparently appear everywhere, constantly, in response to everyone's emotions, even look like. People sprinting across a battlefield can still casually converse about how clever their tactics are, even while too rushed to simply grip a shield. This is why genre fiction is a ghetto, people.
Got The Peripheral for my birthday a bit ago, and I'm about to be unemployed and sober for a bit so I'm going to be just straight blasting through this bitch. Got some book on a mathematical proof of natural selection for Christmas, should take about an afternoon it looks like.
After that I'm'a stack a couple serious sounding things -- Wittgenstein's Blue and Brown or Philosophic Investigations, go back and reread The Prince, like serious-taking-notes-and-shit style. Mebbe raid my buddy's library of political philosophy textbooks. And 1:1 salt in some lighter stuff -- still got a stack of Thompson's later shit to work through, still need to read Confederacy of Dunces, etc.
Here's a transcript and web audio / web video / download audio, 43MB MP3, 1hr 33min / download video, 197MB MP4, 1hr 41min of the full interview. He also reads a chapter from his upcoming novel The Peripheral, which you can now pre-order (Amazon.com / Amazon UK).
Never been to a reading, date or otherwise. Are they any good? I tend to like just reading my books, you know.
I have no OKC dating-related reading stories. I saw a girl on tram reading 'Infinite Jest' once and I wanted to ask her out so bad. But rude, so I didn't.
Some girl came to me at the bookshop and started talking to me once. I think she was flirting, but honestly, I was too engrossed in my book so I blew her off. Reading is serious business.
Right now I'm reading 'The Blockade Breakers: The Berlin Airlift' by Helena P. Schrader and re-reading Charles Stross's 'Halting State'.
Literary Fathers of VR
1950: Ray Bradbury's 'The Veldt'.
1981: Vernor Vinge's 'True Names'.
1984: William Gibson's 'Neuromancer'.
The book has already been written: Avogadro Corp: The Singularity is Closer Than It Appears
It's actually a series. It's an interesting approach to how the singularity could occur, and they actually aren't "trying" to create an AI, it happens by a fortunate accident. And the second book in the series is called "The AI Apocalypse", where a battle begins between two completely different AI architectures.
I've sold a little over 45,000 books in the last year. Most of those are either through Amazon or Audible, and covers like this are the ones dominating science fiction. I don't sell in book stores, so I can't speak for that market.
I can speak for online retailers, which are providing me with an excellent living. Trust me when I say this cover is going to kill it. The preorders already show that.
The book isn't even out yet and it's already in the top 10,000 on Amazon.
Edit: Some examples of the top selling science fiction covers on Amazon right now, the ones moving hundreds of copies a day:
Constitution by Nick Webb
Man of War by M.R. Forbes
The Lost Starship by Vaughn Hepner
All four of the covers you posted don't lend well as thumbnails. Thumbnails are critical when you're selling through online retailers.
I like a lot of Non-Fiction and just finished Think Like A Freak, by the Freakanomics authors and really enjoyed it! If you like novels, I highly recommend The Peripheral
> Also, what are you reading lately?
I got the first Saga book (already had #2 and #3) and blew threw that today. Getting ready to start The Peripheral.
I'd recommend Halting State and Rule 34 by Charles Stross. In form they are near-future poilce procedurals, in a world where virtual reality increasing impinges on the real world. "Halting State" involves a robbery in an MMORG that has real-world consequences. "Rule 34" involves a series of murders in Edinburgh, Scotland, that lead to a deep conspiracy rooted in a former Russian republic. The stories use the implications of virtual reaiity and online communications jumped up well beyond what we have now, and their representation of how virtual reality will affect everyday lives and police work will have you thinking.
If you want to a book by Stross that's just pure, balls-to-the-wall ideas, try "Accelerando" available for free, here. It's not representative of his later work, but if you want something to get you mind working ... it'll do.
What are your top five must-own books?
Mine, in no real order are:
(I'll put in links when I get home)
edit: with amazon links
I have several good recommendations for this one. First I will give you two fiction books you MUST read if this subject is a real interest of yours.
Islands In The Net by: Bruce Sterling
https://www.amazon.com/Islands-Net-Bruce-Sterling-ebook/dp/B00PDDKVXK/
Neuromancer by William Gibson
https://www.amazon.com/Neuromancer-William-Gibson/dp/0441569595
For non-fiction the one book that really did it for me was again by Mr. Sterling it's called The Hacker Crackdown and it is so amazing!!
https://www.amazon.com/Hacker-Crackdown-Disorder-Electronic-Frontier/dp/055356370X
Good luck. PM for more recommendations if you need them. This is a genre I am very interested in myself and have read extensively.
For sheer 'play in the virtual world' stuff, you MUST read Snow Crash by Neal Stephenson. You'll blaze through that, so follow it up with Stephenson's The Diamond Age
Good YA dystopic future stuff:
The Windup Girl
Station Eleven
Finally, get into Neuromancer, by William Gibson. It's a fantastic--some would say genre-defining--cyberpunk novel.
Then go devour everything Stephenson and Gibson put out there. That should get you through at least the first half of the summer. Happy reading!
Good fiction excites the mind and teaches new concepts. Most future minded scientists are science fiction fans for that reason.
Snow Crash is just a fun ride. Pulp fiction, not more complex or involved than that. Enders Game is the same.
Try the fanfiction I recommended, or Understand (pdf) by Ted Chiang, or The Last Question by Asimov, or Baby Eating Aliens by Yudkowsky. All of these are free, by the way, and relatively short.
Each have important lessons embedded in good stories, philosphical quandries that we are rapidly approaching, like what will it mean to be human when we are no longer entirely biological?
Also, if you want just a reeeeeaallly good scifi book, I don't think you can go past Neuromancer by Gibson. Less thought provoking but seriously well written.
Believe it or not there are quite a few good sci-fi books exploring these ideas already. Here is an incomplete list you may want to check out:
Do you read cyberpunk? Looking at art is great but I find reading to be the biggest inspiration because how I imagine the world is unique and original to me. Likewise, how you imagin the world will be unique and original too and completely different from how I see it. Check out books like Neuromancer, the book that started cyberpunk.
[edit] One of my favorite quotes from the book
> His eyes were eggs of unstable crystal, vibrating with a frequency whose name was rain and the sound of trains, suddenly sprouting a humming forest of hair-fine glass spines.
Paints a different kind of picture than you can get from images.
Neuromancer by William Gibson.
Other works of fiction that contain the concept of a metaverse;
Books
Anime and Manga
Film
----
I know I haven't even begun to scratch the surface of the genre, because if there's one thing humans are good at, it's writing fucktons on what we like.
So feel free to comment additions to this list, or opinions on what I've currently included. I have by no means read/watched all of these, so having someone with actual experience with each of these weigh in would be nice.
My nomination might be quite a difficult read but it is short in comparison and may leave us invigorated.
Neuromancer by William Gibson [SCIFI,NS]
> * The Matrix is a world within the world, a global consensus- hallucination, the representation of every byte of data in cyberspace . . .
Case had been the sharpest data-thief in the business, until vengeful former employees crippled his nervous system. But now a new and very mysterious employer recruits him for a last-chance run. The target: an unthinkably powerful artificial intelligence orbiting Earth in service of the sinister Tessier-Ashpool business clan. With a dead man riding shotgun and Molly, mirror-eyed street-samurai, to watch his back, Case embarks on an adventure that ups the ante on an entire genre of fiction.
Hope you like it.
Heinlein's Time Enough for Love is like this. Lazarus Long starts out in full depression and even has a [Spoiler:](#s "button he is told will kill him but really just erases his memories for the past few hours") and uses it, several times. He abducted, OD's on drugs, gets shot, gets sent to the wrong [Spoiler:](#s "time by several years and his child self is an asshole to him"). He has to deal with several deaths including the deaths of people he loves.
It is Scifi and it is heinlein so it can be weird, he also did A Stranger in Strange Land and Starship Troopers. The main character is functionally immortal and has lost the will to live, and there is a bunch of non-conventional sex. If you can get past or enjoy ;) that then you will likely enjoy Time Enough for Love.
If you're seriously interested in augmented reality and its future implications I recommend reading Daniel Suarez's Daemon and the sequel Freedom.
I highly recommend The Difference Engine, cowritten by William Gibson and Bruce Sterling, in which novel Lord Byron's daughter figures highly.
Quoth Amazon.com: "A collaborative novel from the premier cyberpunk authors, William Gibson and Bruce Sterling. Part detective story, part historical thriller, The Difference Engine takes us not forward but back, to an imagined 1885: the Industrial Revolution is in full and inexorable swing, powered by steam-driven, cybernetic engines. Charles Babbage perfects his Analytical Engine, and the computer age arrives a century ahead of its time."
Fiction Books
Cryptonomicon - Very few books make up a cypher system based on playing cards, have a story that spans WW2 through the present day and in large part revolve around creating an alternate digital currency, a data haven and startup life.
Neuromancer - this is the book that created cyberpunk and that inspired all those bad movie ideas about hacking in 3D systems. That being said, it marked a real turning point in SciFi. Without this book "cyber" security specialists would probably be called something else.
Snow Crash - This is much more breezy than the other two but still has very recognizable hacking/security elements to it and is just fun.
Non Fiction
Surely You're Joking Mr. Feynman - This isn't a book about technology so much as deduction and figuring things out (while being hilariously entertaining).
I included all these here in large part because they are what inspired me to get into development and sysadmin work and I bet that I'm about 20 years older than you if you're just getting into the field - so there's a decent chance that your coworkers are into them too.
BV Larson's Star Force series is pretty decent.
Love this series highly recommend it up until the third book but the fourth book... His other series on silver wings fits the bill as well though.
A few other great reads though that are fairly similar listed in the order of my preference.
Also sorry about high jacking this started writing this as a response then ended up recommending a bunch of other books .
Thats the premise of this book, though technically there not zombies. It's a really good book and a unique take,on the subject
http://www.amazon.com/Public-Enemy-Zero-Andrew-Mayne-ebook/dp/B0052ZUXPA/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1394933976&sr=8-1&keywords=Public+enemy+zero
Related sci-fi novel Avogadro Corp.
The premise is "What if Google invents the world's first AI, and it's a paperclip maximizer of language?"
Greetings! Acquiring editor and freelance editor here. Thought I'd give you some info on what I know to be the TRADITIONAL PUBLISHING ROUTE.
Agents are the way to go for traditional publishing. Get a good query letter, a nice synopsis, and a polished manuscript. If you have a good hook and a clean manuscript, then you're in the green.
Check out your favorite authors (the ones that have similar work to your own) and find their agents. See about their agencies as possible places to send queries.
If you're looking for editors (which you should only do once you've done a good deal of revising yourself), a great place to try is your favorite authors again! Check out their publishers and find out if they use in-house or freelance editors. See if you can get in contact with them. Of course, this is going to cost some cash money as this level of editor runs $30-60/hour, if not more.
On the opposite end, college students can make for adequate proofreaders for much less money. However, they won't be the best help when it comes to actual revisions.
When it comes down to it, you need a professional for professional work. There are some editors here on the writing subreddits with varying degrees of skill and expertise. I've done work for fellow redditors at relatively low prices (relatively is the key phrase, as even a 50% discount is putting you at $15/hour) with some good success. If you want more info, send me a PM and I can give you the lowdown on hiring a freelance editor (preferably a local editor so you can go shake their hand).
Even self publications need good editors, though. I spoke briefly with the author of Avagadro Corp. who spoke to the difference in the sales of his first two self-published novels. His first went through low quality editors and he got a lot of flak for it. The second time through, he paid a pro and got great results! William Hertling: He's even got a book on how to maximize the chance of your self publication to hit critical mass.
Avogadro corp series: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B006ACIMQQ
AI isn't omnipotent, but close, and a very good description on how the AI comes to be.
An episode set in the backdrop of a NYC Blackout would be really cool. Like a parody of the real NYC blackout of 1977. Maybe it's the dark army's real motive for working with Elliot on "Stage 2". Elliot even says something in beginning of s2e9 like "we never questioned the dark army's motives"). It is totally plausible, even likely, that the Dark Army is sponsored by the State (China), maybe they want to have the first strike in a true Cyber War with the US. First they break down society by aiding the crash of the financial system and encouraging dissent. Next cut the power, civilization starts to unfold, next bring the telecom systems down, invade, WWIII! Ok I'll put my tin foil hat back on.
edit - this is also a part of the plot of a book I read recently called Cyber Storm
amazon.ca link for any other cannucks http://www.amazon.ca/Post-Human-Books-1-4-David-Simpson-ebook/dp/B00H0D5NTI/
The post-human series is one of my all time favorite tanshuman series. It's got some good character development, A.I., most may consider it leaning towards fantasy in some aspects. I always just remember the quote "Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic." - Arthur C. Clarke.
https://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/B00H0D5NTI/ref=mp_s_a_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1488172906&sr=8-1&pi=AC_SX236_SY340_FMwebp_QL65&keywords=post+human+omnibus&dpPl=1&dpID=51nKxcjtmcL&ref=plSrch
There are a lot of dystopian future books that really aren't that similar to The Hunger Games or Divergent. Did you want books about people competing in cruel games in a dystopian future, or is it just the dystopian aspect you want to explore?
Either way, there's a huge field to choose from. Neuromancer. The Electric Church. The Running Man. Just to name a few.
After loads of reading on the bus to work every day, here follows my reading list for military aviation:
Modern
Vietnam
WWII
Overall/Other
Bonus non-military aviation
I highly second the recommendations of Snow Crash, Cryptonomicon, and Diamond Age. I would also recommend:
Careful, if they become sentient they could start subtley creating their own sleeper agents. The Book
I'm going to chip in Stephenson's Snow Crash should be on the list, as well as Gibson's Neuromancer.
I've recently read two books that I absolutely fell in love with:
1.) Stories of Your Life and Others: http://www.amazon.com/Stories-Your-Life-Others-Chiang/dp/1931520720/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1413578672&sr=8-1&keywords=stories+of+your+life+and+others
2.) Neuromancer (A classic that I've just gotten into): http://www.amazon.com/Neuromancer-William-Gibson/dp/0441569595/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1413578739&sr=8-1&keywords=neuromancer
Neuromancer https://www.amazon.com/dp/0441569595/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_api_bQNQBbPVB7VPK
That’s the copy I have.
The sky above the port was the color of television, tuned to a dead channel.
http://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/0553380958?pc_redir=1404734999&robot_redir=1
Snow crash
http://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/0441569595/ref=mp_s_a_1_1?qid=1404785560&sr=8-1&pi=SY200_QL40
Neuromancer
http://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/0307887448/ref=mp_s_a_1_1?qid=1404785598&sr=8-1&pi=SY200_QL40
Ready Player One
I'm reading Time Enough For Love by Robert Heinlein right now. It takes place in the year 4272 in an interplanetary human civilization with "the Senior", who's been alive since the 1940's (and who's genes aided research into 'rejuvenation clinics' for the wealthy and connected), giving his life stories and wisdom to the leader of a planet who wants to leave and colonize a new world. It's a fascinating read, and gets into some decent scientific detail too. Heinlein also wrote Stranger in a Strange Land and Starship Troopers.
Time Enough For Love!
(page 3)
Question (revjeremyduncan):
> For someone who is unfamiliar with your work, what book would you suggest as a good starting point (if it's available for Kindle, I will get it as soon as I see your answer)?
>
> Any plans to follow in L. Ron's footsteps and start a religion?
Answer (cstross):
> I'm an atheist (subtype: generally agree with Richard Dawkins but think he could be slightly more polite; special twist: I was raised in British reform Judaism, which is not like American reform Judaism, much less any other strain of organised religion). So: no cults here.
>
> Starting points: for a sampler, you could try my short story collection "Wireless". Which contains one novella that scooped a Locus award, and one that won a Hugo, and covers a range of different styles.
>
> Otherwise ... if you like spy thrillers/Lovecraftiana, try "The Atrocity Archives", if you like space opera try "Singularity Sky"[], if you like singularity-fic try "Accelerando", if you like near-future thrillers try "Halting State".
>
> [] Which was originally titled "Festival of Fools"; the "Singularity Sky" title was imposed on it by editorial fiat ("hey, isn't the singularity kind of hot this month? Let's change the title!").
Question (danielwb):
> What's your favorite book and movie? :) Thanks for doing an AMA.
Answer (cstross):
> My favourite movie is: "Dr Strangelove". (I haven't seen any films released in the past 2-5 years, I'm afraid: I don't do TV/cinema).
>
> Favourite book ... that's a lot harder! I have a different one every day.
Question (AndrewDowning):
> Can you please expand on that?
> In what way did your views change?
> Accelerando is one of my all time favourites.
Answer (cstross):
> Sure. See: http://www.antipope.org/charlie/blog-static/2011/06/reality-check-1.html
>
> Note that my views fluctuate wildly. I have another singularity novel coming out this September 4th, co-written with Cory Doctorow: "The Rapture of the Nerds":
>
> http://www.amazon.com/The-Rapture-Nerds-Cory-Doctorow/dp/0765329107/
Question (JesusLasVegas):
> Did you end up with an American agent because all the British agents passed on you? Or did you actually want to do things that way?
Answer (cstross):
> A bit of both. I wanted an agent who would actually sell stuff. After two British agents failed comprehensively, I was reading Locus (the SF field's trade journal) and noticed a press release about an experienced editor leaving her job to join an agent in setting up a new agency. And I went "aha!" -- because what you need is an agent who knows the industry but who doesn't have a huge list of famous clients whose needs will inevitably be put ahead of you. So I emailed her, and ... well, 11 years later I am the client listed at the top of her masthead!
Question (slimme_shady):
> hahahha I'm 15 now. Every time when i have to do an assignment for school, i don't really know how to start, could you give me some advice, please?
Answer (cstross):
> Nope. Because I'm nearly a third of a century older than you, and any advice I could give you about school assignments would be slightly out of date ...!
Question (cheradenine_Zakalwie):
> Wow, I didn't realise the ideas flew in so fast. Is it morbid to ask if you worry about getting it all written before you die? (Im thinking of Terry Pratchett here...)
Answer (cstross):
> Yes, I worry about that. I'm 47. I reckon I can count on 30 more writing years, averaging a book a year (I can't keep up the 2-2.5 a year I used to do these days). And these days I've gotten round to wondering, for each new idea, "do I want to be remembered for this?" before I get to the point of spending a year on it.
Question (argibbs):
> I believe Roald Dahl used to keep a little notebook with all his ideas in, and would jot stuff down whenever and whereever the idea struck. (might not have done, it's been years since I read that nugget). Do you keep a stash of ideas on file (and if so in what format?), or is it simply you write whatever idea strikes most recently? (Related to but not the same as having extra books filed away for when writers block strikes.)
Answer (cstross):
> No, I don't keep anything on paper (except within an actual novel in progress, at which point I need a file to keep track of plot threads, characters, and so on). If an idea is compelling enough it'll stick in my head until I am forced to write it. If it's forgettable, who cares?
Question (DrLocrian):
> Hi!
> Would you consider Halting State and Rule 34 Cyberpunk? I was heavily reminded of Neal Stephensons early books (the craziness of Snow Crash mixed with more current-day themes like Cryptonomicon).
>
> While I love the Laundry books I consider A Colder War one of your best works, is there a chance that we will get another 'serious' story with Lovecraftian themes?
>
> Thanks!
Answer (cstross):
> "Halting State" and "Rule 34" are cyberpunk only insofar as we are living in a 1980s cyberpunk dystopia, and these are very much novels of our time (plus 10-20 years). What I've learned during my life is that the near future is 90% identical to the present -- if you buy a new car today, it'll probably still be on the road in 2022. Another 9% is predictable from existing tech roadmaps: Intel's projected roadmap for where their processors are going, SpaceX's order book for satellite launches, and so on. And 1% is totally bugfuck crazy and impossible to predict. (Go back to 1982 and the idea that the USSR would have collapsed and been replaced by hyper-capitalist oligarchs would have earned you a straitjacket, never mind a book contract. Go back to 1992 and the idea that the USA and Iran would be fighting a proxy war on the internet would have ... well, ditto.)
>
> Lovecraftian seriousness: well, book 5 or 6 of the Laundry series is due to get epically grim.
Question (ihateidaho):
> What was your biggest influence to get you to begin writing?
>
> Thank you for doing this AMA, by the way, I'm a big fan of your work.
Answer (cstross):
> Biggest influence: my mother.
>
> Who is one of those unpublished authors. But when I was about 6, I vividly remember her spending an hour every day hammering away on her typewriter on the kitchen table, trying to write a novel.
>
> She never finished it, much less sold it, but ihat I somehow internalized from this was that writing was something normal adults were allowed to do. And so it didn't look like an insane move when I was thinking of what I wanted to do when I grew up.
Question (canyouhearme):
> Nice to see a bit of social marketing, it will be interesting to hear how it compares to the publishers' marketdroid efforts in terms of sales (if you can tease out the stats).
>
> Now the important question, favourite beer?
Answer (cstross):
> My regular session beer is Deuchars IPA (http://www.caledonianbeer.com/deuchars.htm). It's not an American-style bitterness wars IPA; it's a light, Scottish ale with just enough hops to tell you what it is, and it's weak enough that you can keep drinking it continuously for hours without any risk of waking up in a puddle with KICK ME tattooed on your bum.
Question (cuidadollamas):
> How long did it take you to become comfortable writing in the second person? I finished reading [Rule 34] (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rule_34_(novel)) and it was the first novel i had read.
>
> I'm not counting the choose your own adventure book series since they're not traditional novels in my view.
Answer (cstross):
> It took me about a hundred pages of "Halting State" to get the hang of it, and another hundred pages to feel comfortable. I also needed a reason to start doing it (2nd person is the natural voice of the text adventure game -- "you are in a maze of twisty passages, all alike").
>
> Other writers have done this (Jay MacInery, "Bright Lights, Big City"; also chunks of Christopher Brookmyre's thrillers) but I must be weird or something because I'm doing an entire trilogy this way.
Question (plainsnailing):
> Asimov or Clarke?
Answer (cstross):
> Neither, although I'm marginally less averse to Clarke's style.
Question (vladimir_puta):
> How are your wrists doing?
Answer (cstross):
> When I stop answering questions here you'll know they've blown out.
(continued below)
Oh man. I've been waiting for a thread like this to pop up. I loved Neuromancer to no end, along with House of Leaves. Containment was good shit too, very interesting read, but relies on easy plot fixes. It doesn't ruin the story, in my opinion.
You also can't go wrong with anything by Kurt Vonnegut and Phillip K. Dick.
There's this thread on similar books to the count of monte cristo and here are the current suggestions ordered by page length:
The Stars My Destination by Alfred Bester - 236 pages
Neuromancer - 271 pages
Ender’s Game - 5 books with the first (the linked one) around 250 pages
River God - 676 pages
Shogun & Tai Pan - 1000+ and 700+ pages each
I'm debating the first 2 really. Not sure if you happened to have read them and would have a recommendation.
http://www.amazon.com/Road-Vintage-International-Cormac-McCarthy-ebook/dp/B000OI0G1Q/ref=tmm_kin_swatch_0?_encoding=UTF8&sr=&qid=
http://www.amazon.com/1984-George-Orwell-ebook/dp/B003JTHWKU/ref=sr_1_1_ha_twi_1?s=digital-text&ie=UTF8&qid=1419607743&sr=1-1&keywords=1984
http://www.amazon.com/Brave-New-World-Aldous-Huxley-ebook/dp/B00JTYQJ3K/ref=sr_1_1_ha_twi_1?s=digital-text&ie=UTF8&qid=1419607785&sr=1-1&keywords=brave+new+world
http://www.amazon.com/Altered-Carbon-Takeshi-Kovacs-Novels-ebook/dp/B000FBFMZ2/ref=sr_1_1_twi_1?s=digital-text&ie=UTF8&qid=1419607819&sr=1-1&keywords=altered+carbon
http://www.amazon.com/Neuromancer-William-Gibson-ebook/dp/B000O76ON6/ref=sr_1_1_ha_twi_1?s=digital-text&ie=UTF8&qid=1419607849&sr=1-1&keywords=neuromancer
http://www.amazon.com/Fahrenheit-451-Novel-Ray-Bradbury-ebook/dp/B0064CPN7I/ref=sr_1_1_ha_twi_1?s=digital-text&ie=UTF8&qid=1419607872&sr=1-1&keywords=farenheight+451
http://www.amazon.com/Cats-Cradle-Kurt-Vonnegut-ebook/dp/B003XRELGQ/ref=sr_1_1_twi_1?s=digital-text&ie=UTF8&qid=1419607936&sr=1-1&keywords=cat%27s+cradle
http://www.amazon.com/Slaughterhouse-Five-Kurt-Vonnegut-ebook/dp/B003XVYLDU/ref=sr_1_3_twi_1?s=digital-text&ie=UTF8&qid=1419607936&sr=1-3&keywords=cat%27s+cradle
Rendezvous with Rama the whole series is pretty good.
2001: A Space Odyssey (Arthur C. Clarke Collection: The Odyssey) that series as well
Neuromancer
Homeland: The Legend of Drizzt, Book I: Bk. 1
the dark elf trilogy is pretty good
for amazingly deep and rich backdrop you can't beat the Dune (40th Anniversary Edition) (Dune Chronicles, Book 1) at least the first three.. others that were wrote by his son and other authors are ok but dont live up to the originals imho
pretty much all of Robert Heinlein's stuff stranger in a strange land, starship troopers (nothing at all like the movie), Glory Road, Have Spacesuit will travel.
Hmmm...could it be Swarm! book 1 of the Starforce series?
I've enjoyed both of those authors, so I guess I'll recommend some books I've liked.
In no particular order (links to the first book in the series, on amazon):
The Lost Fleet by Jack Campbell
Spinward Fringe by Randolph Lalonde
Star Force by B.V. Larson
Honor Harrington series by David Weber
Valor series by Tanya Huff
Not counting shipping, this is only a penny (but costs four bucks with), or there is this for 99 cents total.
This pretty purple dress is $36.99, free shipping.
Congratulations on having your first contest!! And thank you. :)
Yeah, Im fully into ebooks, but the cost really is BS. I think there is some drama between publishers and amazon that always inflates the prices. Some self published authors have really cheap Ebooks (I loved this book and its sequels and they're only $3-$5 each). So there is a chance the prices may go down at some point if something changes between amazon and publishers.
I actually got into Ebooks while pirating them, so cost wasn't an issue, after awhile i got so used to the convenience of having it on my phone I couldn't go back to print. Then i had a little more spending money and decided buying them was even more convenient.
I felt Billy Burke was billy burke, he's always the same character, be he 'revolutionary' on revolution or serial killer extraordinary on The Closer / Major Crimes. It's always the same.
The girl who was the lead was weak, her brother was worse. The woman from Lost never impressed me. Actually my favorite actor/character on the movie was the guy who went 'rogue' and was the partner of billy burke.
TV shows end on cliff hangers because they expect to be renewed. Unless they know in advance it's the last season expect a cliff hanger or at least 'unpleasant' ending.
See "we learn from our parents" that's a purely human thing - that's not how AI would learn per se - they would learn from data, their evolution would be quick but it would also be very not human.
I got the authors name wrong (my fault) - it's William Hertling - the Singularity Series first book here is a more interesting take on how AI would evolve.
You don't 'understand' human emotion - you have it or you don't - you can fake it - but you can't really have it - at best you have a three laws situation - because if you don't - you're going to get ai with sociopathic like tendencies.
You are born with emotion, you come out crying, you learn emotion through life events that AI would never experience, human beings can barely program a learning process, you then expect them to work emotions and morals into it? It's not likely, not in real life, to program human emotion you have to understand not only what it is but where it comes from and how it evolves, and humanity is nowhere close to that...the speed with which AI is evolving is PURELY learning- nothing else - the only 'emotion' these AIs will have is if they choose to.
Now that I think about it, the hertling series and the sawyer series about AIs are interesting with two similar 'endings' (in the gross outcome of what happens to humanity but for entirely different reasons) but very disparate AIs.
Cyberstorm by Matthew Mather
​
https://www.amazon.com/CyberStorm-Matthew-Mather-ebook/dp/B00BT4QRHG
I recommend the Posthuman series.
http://www.amazon.com/Post-Human-Series-Books-David-Simpson-ebook/dp/B00H0D5NTI
Very good AI themes. I do admit it gets pretty deep scifi pretty quickly, I think he takes it a little too far to be honest. That said, read all 4 books, they're short and the 4th one redeems that 3rd one.
[Post Human series] ( http://www.amazon.com/Post-Human-Books-1-4-David-Simpson-ebook/dp/B00H0D5NTI/ref=sr_1_1?s=digital-text&ie=UTF8&qid=1419915451&sr=1-1&keywords=post-human+series)
Best action sci-fi I've ever read. Lots of twists and turns. If anyone knows similar books please tell me so I can read them.
I'm certain this is the Post Human series - https://www.amazon.com/Post-Human-Omnibus-1-4-Book-ebook/dp/B00H0D5NTI
You might like this. It's somewhere in the middle between soft and hard sci-fi in my relative opinion, but I found it a good read.
https://www.amazon.co.uk/Post-Human-Omnibus-1-4-David-Simpson-ebook/dp/B00H0D5NTI - books 1-4
https://www.amazon.co.uk/Inhuman-Book-Post-Human-David-Simpson-ebook/dp/B00HYLX4R4 - book 5
These are all great books too
https://www.amazon.co.uk/Forever-War-3-Book/dp/B00W6RJ6SC - Joe Haldeman's Forever War
https://www.amazon.co.uk/All-Sins-Remembered-GOLLANCZ-S-F-ebook/dp/B005HRTA4I Joe Haldeman's All My Sins Remembered
Granted not exactly to your spec, as it's 1980's sci-fi and thus based around now, HOWEVER very good story.
https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B00J3EU5RC - Greg Bear's Eon books
There's a series of books that I found on kindle that's literally called Post Human.
Book one is good.
A plot point from book two onward is kind of odd. [Spoiler](/s "Divorce seems to be not a thing? and everyone's medical status is always being broadcast to their spouse so if you see someone attractive who is not your spouse then they instantly know. And since everyone is effectively immortal this comes up a lot, which is why divorce not being an option seems kind of stupid." )
Anyway, it's a minor plot point and just really odd which is why I mentioned it.
As to the tech, it's maybe magic? I'm not sure but it's definitely on the softer side of sci-fi.
Still worth a read if you have kindle unlimited.
Actually this is one of my favs too http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00H0D5NTI?keywords=posthuman&qid=1452216671&ref_=sr_1_1&sr=8-1
I have an unrelated recommendation, William Gibson's newish book "The Peripheral". It makes no sense and I had to read the first seven or so chapters twice (they are short). But once it took hold and I understood it-wow. Its science fiction/cyberpunk. Amazing book. You have to be smart to get it. Its probably even a rung too high on the ladder for me, but I was able to power through with help from wikipedia and a slow pace. Its fantastic. Gibson once again reinvents science fiction. Check it out!
The Peripheral comes out on the 28th here in the U.S. Gibson's return to hard sci fi/cyberpunk. A few people I know had ARCs and have said it's triumphantly Gibsonian.
Evan Currie, Marko Kloos, Craig Alanson, Josh Dalzelle; these are all writers I know for certain started as self-published authors. Also, probably H Paul Honsinger and Nick Webb.
If you want to sell self published MilSF, read and study the first books in all those series, and then emulate them.
https://www.amazon.com/Synthetic-AI-Apocalypse-Steven-Kratz-ebook/dp/B07J1Z5VFM/
Sprawl Trilogy, if you've been living under a rock.
Halting state (http://www.amazon.com/Halting-State-Ace-Science-Fiction/dp/0441016073)vis apparantly good.
Sometimes Stross is so accurate it hurts.
http://www.amazon.com/Halting-State-Ace-Science-Fiction/dp/0441016073
I choose Neuromancer.
I have never read it but I have been told I need to. Also, Neuromancer is the first novel to win the Sci-Fi triple crown (Hugo, Nebula, and Philip K. Dick award). It came out in 1984 and coined the term "cyberspace" for online computer networks. Other terms such as ICE (Intrusion Countermeasures Electronics) were also coined or given significance through this novel. Also the term "Matrix" when referring to a computer network was used here (Suck on that Matrix trilogy).
Great! My address is 126 Albert Street, Waterloo, Ontario, Canada, N2L 3T1. The edition I'm sending is http://www.amazon.com/dp/0441569595, and is in like-new condition.
I want that cover. All I have is this one. So lame.
https://www.amazon.com/Neuromancer-William-Gibson/dp/0441569595
 
Check out r/cyberpunk
 
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Altered_Carbon_(TV_series)
 
Neuromancer is coined as the novel that started it all in terms of what is known as cyberpunk today. Altered Carbon is a new show on netflix coming tomorrow and Blade Runner as far as I am concerned is the best sci fi movie ever made. r/cyberpunk is a good place to start your journey but feel free to message me and talk about cyberpunk stuff anytime you want.
So far as you know.
Slant by Greg Bear
Neuromancer by William Gibson
Childhood's End by Arthur C. Clarke
Here is the mobile version of your link
That was so much fun!
And by the way. You are looking STUNNING today. Like, I can't look away! So... so... beautiful...
(also, I think I would like this from my wishlist)
No. The Lazarus Long story was great, but consider the downside.
>> Real men jog home from their vasectomies! (I took a bus.)
> I've read this from you about 10 times now and I still giggle.
I do tend to repeat myself. Sorry about that. I'm glad you're still enjoying that one.
> Really? I looked this up and I got spouses. Are you sure?
Mouse -> mice. Spouse -> spice.
I am sure it's a joke. And, it's not original on my part. It's from Heinlein.
> Btw, there is a (suspected) finch family nesting in my mom's clothespin bag. When I saw them I thought of you. Noisy little things. Chirping their fool heads off, hopping around the deck, flying all over the place. They are entertaining. I don't know if there are babies yet, but I've seen the adults bringing bugs into the clothespin bag. No tweeting yet, though.
Cool! I hope you get to see the chicks. With birds that small, they grow up fast. You're most likely to see them when they're about the same size as the adults but more drab and fluttering their wings, chirping, and begging for food. Watch for a bit and you'll see the parents feeding them.
If you get to see them younger and featherless in the nest, that's really lucky. I usually don't.
> If I get a pic I'll send it to you.
Cool. Then maybe I can identify them for you.
P.S. The full quote, though I'd like more context but not enough to dig out the book, is:
> Among such people the plural of spouse is spice.
> --Lazurus Long, Time Enough For Love, pg 339
One of Heinlein's rules of life in his most massive opus, Time Enough For Love, was "Everyone lies about sex. Period."
See Daemon and more importantly Freedom tm for how the world works with game theory. Read them before they become movies.
Books! Yeah, baby! Here are three:
Daemon and
Freedom
by Daniel Suarez. The first was self-published, became a hit, and the second is the recently-released sequel. Excellent near-future SciFi about a tech billionaire who sets up an internet daemon to take over the world, basically, after he dies of cancer. Violent, thought-provoking, and absolutely worth reading. My wife liked them also.
The Unincorporated Man by the Kollin brothers -- also new authors; also very talented. The chapter on the "virtual reality plague" alone is worth the time and price of the book, but the whole thing is very compelling.
[Edit because I can't type more than a sentence w/o a typo]
> Your last point is interesting, and I do like the idea of using someone's reputation as a gauge for future interaction and trustworthiness. Cory Doctorow's novel Down and Out in the Magic Kingdom takes place in a society in which one's reputation level is used as both a currency and an indicator of character.
You can thank the original cypherpunks with coming up with the notion. Another useful novels playing with the idea are Daemon/Freedom by Suarez
http://www.amazon.com/Daemon-Daniel-Suarez/dp/B003L1ZXCU/
http://www.amazon.com/Freedom-TM-Daniel-Suarez/dp/0525951571/
> albeit not tamper-proof, that you mentioned without being overtly totalitarian.
It is in principle possible to store information in a distributed cryptographic filesystem in a tamper-proof fashion. A precursor to such practical systems is e.g. Tahoe http://tahoe-lafs.org/~warner/tahoe.html
That's part of the title
That was... The Difference Engine by Gibson and Sterling.
Edit: Alright, could be wrong, since you mentioned a short story. "The Difference Engine" is a full-length novel.
What might have been.
OMG I need to choose just one?? Blergh.
uhm - this one - and used would be totally more than okay if I happened to win.
Mosaic 17K by Christopher Drake definitely fits this description. Near future, dystopian SF. It's the author's first novel and, imo a damned good read. I've read it twice so far. Right now it's free through Kindle Unlimited not sure for how long though.
Why are links so hard? Neuromancer @ Amazon
Neuromancer? link
Here is the desktop version of your link
If you have an e-reader, Amazon has some pretty amazing Indie books available for cheap. A Galaxy Unknown is the first in a series following a young female naval officer as she generally kicks ass. Star Force has a group of very near future humans trapped in a war between two groups of machines. Spirit of Empire isn't quite as believable as the others, but it's one of the most gripping space operas I've ever read. Lastly, Theirs is Not to Reason Why is about what happens when you cross a a Drill Sargent with an Oracle and pack it into a female's body. Then send said body out to destroy anything in the way of saving the universe. If you need any more recommendations, I actually have a list saved on my computer. Private message me and I can email it to you.
I really enjoyed these books and have read a lot of similar self published works. A series that is very similar is B.V. Larson's Star Force series.
http://www.amazon.com/Swarm-Star-Force-Series-ebook/dp/B004H8FVEQ/ref=pd_sim_kstore_1
I am a glutton for any type of military scifi and will read through a lot of the self published authors, and some of these authors sell a surprising amount of books. Thomas Deprima is one of these authors as eggrock has pointed out, his series is one of the better selling ones. Although its not selling like it did about a year ago. I do disagree with him on his beliefs that he wrote all his good reviews. There are a lot of people who like his style of writing.
Going back to whether I've read any of his other works, I have not. Although I have debated buying Accelerated, Strontium 90, and Invasion Alaska on a few occasions. I've just never worked up the desire to read them. So I guess we're in the same boat. You can always go to his amazon page and read the reviews.
I recommend 2 series by BV Larson:
First Swarm Book 1 of "Star Force"
Second Steel World Book 1 of the "Undying Mercenaries"
Also The Synchronicity War by Dietmar Wehr
Now for a shameless plug for my favorite Sci-fi book: We Are Legion book 1 of "Bobiverse" There is some ship to ship fighting. But its more Sci-fi comedy.
Public Enemy Zero. Mitchell Roberts discovers that everyone wants him dead, and he doesn't know why. I like it, keeps you on the edge of your seat, and you never know what twist will come up next.
It is a Kindle exclusive, though.
Here are all the local Amazon links I could find:
amazon.com
amazon.co.uk
amazon.ca
amazon.com.au
amazon.in
amazon.com.mx
amazon.de
amazon.it
amazon.es
amazon.com.br
amazon.nl
amazon.co.jp
amazon.fr
Beep bloop. I'm a bot to convert Amazon ebook links to local Amazon sites.
I currently look here: amazon.com, amazon.co.uk, amazon.ca, amazon.com.au, amazon.in, amazon.com.mx, amazon.de, amazon.it, amazon.es, amazon.com.br, amazon.nl, amazon.co.jp, amazon.fr, if you would like your local version of Amazon adding please contact my creator.
I really enjoyed Avogadro Corp (first in a series). It's a compelling and plausible story about an emergent AI, and it takes place in the not-too-distant future.
(disclaimer: I know the author, but I met him after reading the book, and I enjoyed the book before I knew him)
They're light reading and not hard scifi, but the WWW trilogy https://www.amazon.com/dp/B002361NDM/ and Avogadro Corp https://www.amazon.com/Avogadro-Corp-Singularity-Closer-Appears-ebook/dp/B006ACIMQQ are both entertaining and in that niche.
After checking this link
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uY7u0_UxC0w
it seems as if Mr Musk have been reading
http://www.amazon.com/Avogadro-Corp-Singularity-Closer-Appears-ebook/dp/B006ACIMQQ
I read a book a while back called Avogadro Corp, which is about
Googlea fictionalized tech company creating a project that inadvertently becomes self-aware. For what it's worth, I think it's very close to what you're looking for.I have a four book series about the emergence of artificial intelligence that Wired called "chilling and compelling." It starts with Avogadro Corp: http://www.amazon.com/Avogadro-Corp-Singularity-Closer-Appears-ebook/dp/B006ACIMQQ/
The series spans forty years, and is ideal for people interested in the singularity, the progress of technology and its impact on people and civilization, and is especially well liked by software developers and others in tech, since the protagonists of most of the novels are programmers.
I just finished reading the first book in The Singularity series. Not the greatest book ever, but it's something you might not have heard of which is definitely worthy of attention. It has the added benefit of being fairly short and fast paced.
See: Avagadro Corp.
I would use the kindle fire for watching movies and reading pdf for work/school. And the book I'd choose is this one
I suggest you read Cyberstorm. I devoured it during a snowstorm last winter and wallowed in delicious panic with every page.
If you haven't read it yet try out
http://www.amazon.com/CyberStorm-English-Edition-Matthew-Mather-ebook/dp/B00BT4QRHG/
By the same author. I haven't read Darknet yet but CyberStorm was great.
My friend suggested this to me! Looks exciting!
Thanks for the contest!
Ebook
Haha, I actually read a great book that was self published! CyberStorm http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00BT4QRHG
Here's a non-referral link for ethics' sake
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00BT4QRHG/
Check out David Simpson's Post-Human Series
Peter Watts - Blindsight - kinda a harder form of sci fi, great detail about some hard sci fi style like post-scarcity methods, genetic and psychological tweaking, and wow the aliens in this one are really alien Book is available online for free because the author is just that cool.
M. J. Locke - Up Against It - Easier, a young adult sort of sci fi. Ice as a valuable commodity, hackable nanobug poop, and a great AI narrative. Also, one of the main characters has a very very Ripley feel about her, I think you'll like that.
David Simpson - The Post-human series - Just get the whole thing, the books are speedreaders for me. Kinda pulpy, but follows the whole of humanity's awakening to the multiverse and trans-human technology. Does and amazing job of ethics in the age of moddable bodies and backup brains. I'm not spoiling anything for you, but this might be the easiest read of this list. Was free for a while on amazon, now it's only $3
P.J. Haarsma - Virus on Orbis 1 - if you like that young adult feel this and the entire Softwire series should hold you over nicely. Clone babies on a interstellar seed ship, and one of them has a rare superpower, though he doesn't know it. Another AI-centric story, but more abstract with the imagery.
Also, my favorite short story - Alfred Bester- The Stars My Destination - humans have always been able to teleport, but what secrets does Gully Foyle, a proven deadbrain burnout, hold that could revolutionize the discovery again? A pretty great retelling of The Count of Monte Cristo. should be public domain by now...
The Post Human Series by David Simpson might fit the bill https://www.amazon.com/Post-Human-Omnibus-1-4-David-Simpson-ebook/dp/B00H0D5NTI
Gibson's new book The Peripheral is amazing. It's set in both the future and the future's future which is no longer the future's future once contact is made with the future's future's past. The two futures are connected by a murder mystery with interweaving plots in both times.
The Peripheral by Gibson.
Queen of Angels by Greg Bear sounds like it's what you're looking for.
Cory Doctorow wrote a book about that recently, "Walkaway"
'17
800 3.75 https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/40604388-walkaway
200 3.8 https://www.amazon.com/Walkaway-Novel-Cory-Doctorow-ebook/dp/B01FQQ47OC
> set in early days of a better world. /u/finfinfin /u/Ungreat
A lot of Cory Doctorow’s stuff deals with these themes. Check out Walkaway
just finished the bitterbynde trilogy, lovely high fantasy novel based on the folklore of the british isles.
currently in the middle of cory doctorow's new novel, walkaway, which is shaping up nicely
Could you please fix the link?
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https://www.amazon.com/Synthetic-AI-Apocalypse-Steven-Kratz-ebook/dp/B07J1Z5VFM/ref=sr_1_1?s=digital-text&ie=UTF8&qid=1540072265&sr=1-1&keywords=synthetic
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The current link leads to an Amazon search.
FYI, there is a semi-sequel that just came out a few days ago: http://www.amazon.com/The-Rapture-Nerds-singularity-posthumanity/dp/0765329107 It was a joint effort between Stross and Cory Doctorow (who bears a strange resemblance to Macx)
Cyber Storm: http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00BT4QRHG/ref=kinw_myk_ro_title
Reading it now, very scary.
7 bucks.