Top products from r/sciencefiction
We found 36 product mentions on r/sciencefiction. We ranked the 274 resulting products by number of redditors who mentioned them. Here are the top 20.
2. How to Write Science Fiction & Fantasy
Sentiment score: 1
Number of reviews: 2
Writer's Digest Books
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4. Date Night on Union Station (EarthCent Ambassador Book 1)
Sentiment score: 2
Number of reviews: 2
Show Reddit reviews5. A Fire Upon The Deep (Zones of Thought series Book 1)
Sentiment score: 0
Number of reviews: 2
Show Reddit reviews6. We Are Legion (We Are Bob) (Bobiverse Book 1)
Sentiment score: 0
Number of reviews: 2
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13. The Reality Dysfunction (Night's Dawn Trilogy, Book 1)
Sentiment score: 0
Number of reviews: 1
Show Reddit reviews14. Shadow & Claw: The First Half of 'The Book of the New Sun'
Sentiment score: 1
Number of reviews: 1
Shadow Claw The First Half of The Book of the New Sun
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Thanks Jagabond, really appreciate that. I’m relatively new to hosting the show, having taken over in June, around episode 209. Shaun Farrell created the show and deserves all the credit. I was a huge fan and when I saw the distance between episodes spreading out, I offered to help provide interviews. Shortly after he offered me the job. I’ve tried to keep it close to the original feel.
That’s not your question though. As for the most important factor, I guess I’d say that while the industry is shifting, you never know if you’ll be successful until you try, and one of the most favorable factors to this industry is the abundance of resources to help you get started. Finishing a book should be your first goal, because that already puts you into the minority.
When you say “shifting industry” I assume you mean the effect of ebooks on pricing, revenues and whether we should self-publish or traditional publish. The good news—depending on how you look at it—is that none of this matters to someone getting started writing, because all you need to worry about is how to tell a good story, and that advice doesn’t change. Are you referring to getting started writing or getting started selling?
For someone getting started writing, a very important factor to be aware of is that you probably have a story worth telling. Writing resources can show you how to start a story. As much as I try, I’m an organic writer, so I don’t use any systems any more except for a notepad and pen and just start asking myself questions about the characters I want to be in the story, what kind of conflict they’ll encounter, how this conflict will cause them to grow or fail. If it’s science fiction, I start researching main technologies to the plot, far enough to make sure the concept is plausible. If it is Fantasy, I essentially just talk to myself about the magic system, how it started, what powers it has, what limitations (costs) using the magic has, etc.
Here are some resources I’ve enjoyed:
The Craft of Writing Science Fiction That Sells by Ben Bova – I loved how well this taught character arc. (Character arc is the emotional progress/failure that your character goes through from start to finish.) In the brainstorming stage, he says to find a character that has to choose between two emotions, such as love vs. hate. He gives a very helpful list of questions to ask yourself that essentially brainstormed my novel for me.
Characters and Viewpoint by Orson Scott Card – great breakdown of the types of story (M.I.C.E.) and I believe has a section on how to ask yourself questions to make the story unique from genre tropes (The One finds The Sword to save The Girl).
How to Write Science Fiction and Fantasy by Orson Scott Card is also very helpful. I like how he says that you don’t have a story until you have at least two separate ideas, maybe three, and then you try to combine them.
Lane Diamond offers paid coaching. He’s the head guy at Evolved Publishing, which puts out some very well written books, no doubt a credit to his editing skills. He also edited the first 5k of my novel, so I know from experience he’s good.
Another couple editors I’ve worked with are C.L. Dyck and Joshua Essoe, if you’re at the stage of finding an editor. This could bring up the topic of when to search for beta readers (readers who read your story after you’ve cleaned it up) and when to hire an editor. My novel had such complicated technology weaving through the plot, that I didn’t know how to clean it up enough to give it to beta readers, so that’s why I hired C.L., and she helped me break down how the technology worked and where it didn’t. I suppose a good beta reader could do that, but I’ve not been fortunate enough to find ones that will stick around (i.e. finish reading and give me feedback).
Free resources:
The Snowflake Method by Randy Ingermanson – I’ve started this, but never finished. I’m just not an outliner. Plot evolves out of each progressing scene as I write them. He has a lot of writing tips on his site beyond just the Snowflake.
StoryFix by Larry Brooks – never used this, but hear great things about it.
And of course, podcasts. I love hearing authors tell us their story of how they got started and found success. Their advice never gets old, and often I hear just what I need. For example, I have an upcoming interview with Ronald Malfi, where he says: "The characters and their problems come first. If you've got really good characters and really good problems with those characters from the get-go then the stories build themselves around them."
Did by “getting started,” you mean being at a point where you have a story ready to sell? I’ll answer that when I get back in a few hours, if that was your question.
I recommend Dune, as it's similar to ASOIAF as far as political machinations go to some degree, also epic story lines.
You might also like Hyperion by Dan Simmons, I read the first two books, they're kind of freaky.
I also liked Eon by Greg Bear, which is interesting as it shows a look at a future where a big asteroid appears above earth and it has an object on it that the joint Russian/U.S spaceforce goes to investigate, if you're interested in futuristic politics as evidenced by your love for the Bean series, then I'd say this one is for you. Although it's not quite similar to that in the blatancy of its political machinations, it does show an interesting look at this culture and that is in the background.
He also did a couple of good books like Darwins Radio and Darwins Children. I actually started out with Darwin's Children even though it's a sequel. I really liked it. Think Escape to witch mountain.
Earth by David Brin : Experiments with a black hole on the earth's surface goes horribly wrong, near future society where privacy has become a thing of the past
If you're looking for a good post-apocalyptic romp I'd suggest Parable of the Sower by Octavia E. Butler. She also did a great series called the Patternist series. This covers several generations. She also did something widely praised called the Kindred though I have yet to read it. Also Lilith's Brood was cool.
You might also like the Stardoc novels. It's a little bit smaller scale in terms of focus but follow large events.
Also one of my favorite all time books is Mainline. It's about an assassin who can slip through parralel time streams to make a hit. It's pretty awesome.
Ok good luck!
And read Lost World Jurassic Park.
Hey Everyone!
I just finished and released my second novel in the Origo series called "Ghost". In celebration I am making "Ghost" FREE on the Amazon Kindle store for a limited time. It is part two of the Origo series. If you search for the book on Amazon, the easiest way to find it is to type in "Ghost Tucker French". It is a continuation of "Haven". For those of you who did not read "Haven", the premise of the first book was that Earth was unable to support itself and was slowly dying. Pollution and overpopulation has run rampant for decades and have caused irreparable damage to the planet. The first book focused on a select group of humans, who take it upon themselves to venture into space and look for a new home for the Human race.
"Ghost" picks up where "Haven" left off. Lieutenant Nicholas Snow and his squad are on Origo and are desperately looking for a way off the planet. Follow them through their journey as they face new obstacles on the foreign planet.
I hope those of you who do download "Ghost" enjoy the story as much as I did when I was writing it.
One thing that I do ask is that you please leave an honest review of the book on the Amazon page when you finish reading it. I would be extremely grateful! Even if you don't have time to read the book now, I still encourage you to download it and save it for later! Thank you all, and I hope you enjoy the book!
You can follow me on twitter @tuckerfrench117 or on facebook
You can also follow me on my blog
This sounds awesome man! Going to grab it after work today, I recently published my first novel too, the combo of mythology and science fiction massively intrigues me too, love that you're writing in this area! I'm really intrigued by the convergence of esoteric / occult narratives with science fiction, would love to exchange notes on the writing and publication process with you:
CYCLE: A People's History
Dr. Max Tegmark, cosmologist and physics professor at MIT
Dr. Jane Goodall, Primatologist
Dr. Sean Carroll, Theoretical physicist at the California Institute of Technology
Dr. Temple Grandin, Animal scientist
Dr. Seth Shostak, Senior astronomer and director at the Center for SETI Research
Dr. Chris Stringer, Anthropologist at the Natural History Museum in London
Dr. Jack Horner, Paleontologist at Montana State University
Dr. Adam Riess, astrophysicist at Johns Hopkins University
Dr. Steven Strogatz, professor of mathematics at Cornell University
Dr. Ainissa Ramirez, materials scientist
Dr. Mario Livio, astrophysicist at the Space Telescope Science Institute
Olympia LePoint, rocket scientist
Dr. Danielle Lee, biologist
Dr. Michael Shermer, historian of science
Neil deGrasse Tyson, astrophysicist
Try EM Foner's Union Station series. Great fun and good reads.
Date Night On Union Station. I got it off amazon. It's free and a good read. There is a race of sentient computers in it that have their fingers in trade and stuff like that. I guess there are 4 books total.
LINK
I loved Flowers for Algernon. A true classic.
Thirteen (US)/Black Man (UK) is a great novel by Richard Morgan with a pretty insane antagonist that should fit what you're looking for.
http://www.amazon.com/Thirteen-Richard-K-Morgan/dp/0345480899/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1395172304&sr=8-1&keywords=Thirteen+morgan
Pat Cadigan has a book called Patterns that are some excellent short stories
Tetrastatum- Dr. Richard & Tim Smith SciFi Time Travel free eBook Kindle 10/27-10/31. www.tetrastatum.com Tetrastatum
https://www.amazon.com/Scientific-Romance-Novel-Ronald-Wright/dp/0312199996
Seems like there's one left
The Bob, not exactly what you asked for, but worth the read
A Fire Upon the Deep is on special at Amazon today.
https://www.amazon.com/Fire-Upon-Deep-Zones-Thought-ebook/dp/B000FBJAGO
Blueprints of the Afterlife has caused the person who turned me on to it, myself, and my wife, to be completely freaked out about our current reality but to believe it's the most important contemporary book of our time. Just saying.
http://www.amazon.com/Blueprints-Afterlife-Ryan-Boudinot/dp/0802170919
I know he is not popular in some circles, but I have found How to Write Science Fiction and Fantasy by Orson Scott Card to be extremely helpful not only with practical advice, but with avoiding common tropes, or putting my own spin on them.
This series might not be exactly what you're looking for, but it just came to mind...
The Bobiverse series
It's about a guy who is killed in an accident, and later has his brain used (in the far future) to man an AI probe to explore the universe. Bob begins to replicate himself, and many Bobs are born.
At one point one of the bobs discovers an indigenous race on a far planet and become EXTREMELY invested in their future. It's only one of the several aspects to the main story, but it was my favorite part.
​
It's a very entertaining series, lots of comedy and philosophical dilemmas.
https://www.amazon.com/Tetrastatum-Travel-Thriller-Dr-Richard-ebook/dp/B07SGFWSNT/
Link for the lazy.
Peter Hamilton - The Night's Dawn Trilogy
Book 1
Blueheart by Allison Sinclair is about a colony on a water world that is reaching a crisis point between the first settlers who were genetically altered to make living on a aquatic world easier, and the settlers who came after the colony was established and were never altered. There's a lot of tension between the two groups that could spark civil war.
It's got politics and economics, and is still pretty topical for some of its themes.
Gimme a fucking break.
FOUR entries for Hugh Howey? And three of them are about the same (meta)series?
What a joke.
Obvious omissions include:
The Dog Stars
The Passage
Through Darkest America
I Am Legend
And more...
Gateway by Frederik Pohl.
The Player of Games by Iain Banks.
Startide Rising by David Brin.
Downbelow Station by CJ Cherryh.
A Fire upon the Deep by Vernor Vinge.
http://www.amazon.com/Blueprints-Afterlife-Ryan-Boudinot/dp/0802170919
Read this 4 years ago, still going WTF today