(Part 2) Top products from r/scifi

While not my favorite ever I really enjoyed the Otherland series (only four volumes but each book is fairly large).

It's entertaining cyberpunk and features some interesting looks at the future. Very enjoyable read.

Another (shorter) series that is good for a quick read and a lighter introduction to scifi is The Risen Empire. Split into two parts (although together they would have made an only slightly-large novel) it's along the border of Hard Scifi and "pulp scifi". I'd consider it as an okay introduction to hard scifi.

Which leads me to the third and forth series, Alastair Reynold's Revelation Space. Reynold's is hard scifi, meaning that there are points where he spends twice as much time describing the technical details when character advancement would be very much welcome. However, this also means he takes into account things like relativistic travel and how boring space battles would be to spectators. Awesome books though.

Last but not least is the Mars Trilogy by Kim Stanley Robinson. It's hard scifi that doesn't lose sight of character development. Also, out of all the books I've mentioned I'd have to call it the most "realistic" as the technological point at which it starts could conceivably be reached in the next decade or so.

All enjoyable reads, all enjoyable scifi. After (or during) these don't forget to check out classics like Asimov, Clarke, Heinlein, Banks, etc. Especially Asimov's Foundation books or the short(ish) story Nightfall, although the original short story can easily be considered better than the expanded version linked (so you might want to stop reading when you reach the end of the original).

Gregory Benford might be to your liking, Eater hits a lot of those old hard SF buttons in particular. The Hyperion Cantos may also do the trick. C.S. Friedman's In Conquest Born and This Alien Shore are favorites that have that classic sci-fi feeling.

I would also give Stephenson another shot.. it's really good stuff, but yeah Snow Crash is a little over-the-top (very much so for the first chapter or two, but it does settle down a good bit). I mean, the main character is named Hiro Protagonist... there's obviously going to be a certain level of tongue-in-cheek, self-aware ridiculousness going on, but it's quite amazing how well he foresaw much of the modern computing world. Cryptonomicon is awesome and is one of those rare books that somehow feels like science fiction even though there's nothing out of the ordinary in it. Anathem and Zodiac are also quite good and more traditional in tone and style.

A few other options (and these might have been mentioned in previous comments):

Clarke's Rama series (although the first two of the four, in my opinion, are the best).

Niven's Ringworld series -- Note: there is a great variety in the quality of these books-- some are great, some are not. The first one, Ringworld, is superb and definitely an anchor of the "Big Dumb Object" type of books. Protector is also great!

Peter Hamilton's Pandora's Star -- followed by Judas Unchained and the Void Trilogy ! Great world-building!

Greg Bear's Eon series

By the same author of Red Mars, pickup Icehenge -- a shorter read but definitely full of Kim Stanley Robinson's world-building depth.

Yea the lore they are building\built in the halo universe is awesome. If you have finished the books try looking for the spartan ops season 1 on youtube. Runs for almost an hour and is a pretty fun watch.

Also The Lost Fleet is a nice easy read.

• Orson Scott Card's "Ender's Game"
  
• Neal Stephenson's "Snow Crash"
  
• Joe Haldeman's "Forever War"
  
• Arthur C. Clarke's "Rendezvous with Rama"
  
• Vernor Vinge's "A Fire Upon The Deep"
  
• Kurt Vonnegut's "The Sirens of Titan"
  
• Philip K. Dick's "Do Android Dream of Electric Sheep" (inspiration for the Blade Runner movie)
  
• Dan Simmons' "Hyperion"
  
  Every single one of these books has something different to offer you from the genre of scifi. Those three at the top are great entries into the genre. As what I perceive to be "deeper cuts", allow me to suggest my four favorite scifi novels:
  
  
• Isaac Asimov's "Foundation"
  
• William Gibson's "Neuromancer"
  
• Paolo Bacigalupi's "The Windup Girl"
  
• Alfred Bester's "The Stars My Destination"
  
  Cheers!

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.

Iain M Banks most recent Culture novel is called Surface Detail. His Culture novels are great.

China Mieville consistently wins awards for his "new weird" books; most notably the Bas Lag novels. His The City and the City is a kinda mind-bending crime novel, but his most recent is Kraken.

The Wind Up Girl has garnered quite a few positive reviews.

Since the top /r/scifi post right now is about Alastair Reynolds, maybe you can try his books. I think his books are one of the best in the Space Opera genre, and written very well.

You can start with his most popular series, Revelation Space, but his other books are stellar (ha) as well, like House of Suns, or Century Rain.

Ah man, I had this book growing up and loved it. So many small details, and enough to make you imagine what existed past the edges of the painting. Always enjoyed the Coruscant and Alderaan sections. One of my favorites from the book

Just going to mention that the Aliens VS Predator novel was amazing, and so were the graphic novel follow ups, pretty cool. Forget that horrible movie you saw. The original was the shit.

Do you mean this book series https://www.amazon.com/Prey-Aliens-Vs-Predator-Book/dp/0553565559? I remember it being pretty awesome.

Just finished The Myriad on the recommendation of r/scifi and while it was good i wish it had more fleet combat. I guess i have just been spoiled by Honor Harrington.
The next book i am gonna read is The Dauntless and we will see how it goes

Eon by Greg Bear

Maybe Neverness by David Zindell. Though the "mysterious artifact" in it isn't exactly an artifact. Still, it's a crime that this novel has been out of print for over a decade.

Frederik Pohl's Heechee series, beginning with Gateway. Pulpy, but enjoyable.

Ringworld of course, but I'm sure you've already heard of that one.

edit: Whoops. You mentioned Pohl already.

Yep, it was that series. I came here to post this.
I remember picking up the first one for $1, terrible cover
http://www.amazon.com/Call-Arms-Damned-Alan-Foster/dp/0345375742
It's a fun and interesting read that was quite thought provoking. Didn't care much for the sequels though as it just seemed to turn into a space opera after the first book.

The Ender sequels (Speaker for the Dead, Xenocide, Children of the Mind) and The Mote in God's Eye all have a lot of soft science. This is probably true for a lot of stories involving first contact.

Edit - Snow Crash deals a lot with linguistics as well.

If you don't mind things set in our geography but with fantasy worlds added on there's:

The City and The City by China Mieville. I really didn't like it but lots of people do.

Not to give much away but towards your fantasy point [spoiler](/s"The story is set in a city that overlaps with another. There aren't other races etc though.")

Alternatively his Perdido Street Station has those of other species in something like our modern times.

Also I'm surprised to have not seen American Gods in here.

I have the Illustrated Star Wars Universe book that is full of his paintings and it is excellent. I love his art, it's got a sense of atmosphere that similar art often lacks.

https://www.amazon.com/Illustrated-Star-Wars-Universe/dp/0553374842

The Pak Protector species in Larry Niven's novel Protector and the later Ringworld novels.
The Pak care for nothing except ensuring that their bloodline will survive.

C.S. Friedman's In Conquest Born-
She's normally a Fantasy writer, so I'm guessing the style will appeal to you, and the book is awesome.
http://www.amazon.com/Conquest-Born-Daw-Book-Collectors/dp/0756400430

Reading A Canticle for Leibowitz by Walter M. Miller (selected in r/SF Book Club).

I'll definitely be picking up 'A Game of Thrones' next; I want to read it before the TV series comes out so I don't go in with too many preconceptions (trying to stay away from all the screenshots and clips flying around is very difficult).

It's "Signal to Noise", by Eric S. Nylund.

And it's one of my favorite books of all time: http://www.amazon.com/Signal-Noise-Eric-S-Nylund/dp/0380792923

... and did you know there's a sequel?

"A Signal Shattered":

http://www.amazon.com/Signal-Shattered-Eric-S-Nylund/dp/038079294X/

Hull Zero Three by Greg Bear

Revelation Space by Alastair Reynolds - this is a /r/scifi favourite but in this case, at least for this book, it's a very similar setting to the original Alien

A Signal Shattered by Eric Nylund. Humanity has been wiped out by the Earth losing its rotation. Only some dozen survive, using the alien attacker's teleportation device to run across the solar system. It's actually the second in a trilogy I believe, but it's the only I've read and I highly recommend it.

http://www.amazon.com/Signal-Shattered-Eric-S-Nylund/dp/038079294X

C.S.Friedman's [In Conquest Born] (http://www.amazon.com/dp/0756400430). The societies (one male lead, one female lead) are interesting.

Blindsight by Peter Watts

http://www.amazon.com/Blindsight-Peter-Watts/dp/0765319640/ref=sr_1_cc_1?s=aps&ie=UTF8&qid=1407747083&sr=1-1-catcorr&keywords=Blindsight+by+Peter+Watts

Awesome first-contact story, a small crew in deep space, all heavily-modded with augmentations, captained by a DNA-reconstructed vampire...making contact with an alien species that's even more bizarre.

Jack McDevitt did something like this in Moonfall.

Absolutely. And worth the price to have a durable, re-readable hardcover copy on the shelf. This book turned me on to neuropsychology.

How many SF books come with a bibliography?

"A Signal Shattered" is pretty awesome, too. It starts off in the wake of the Earth's destruction and spirals into clone-of-the-protagonist-army-teleporting-around-the-galaxy strangeness.

http://www.amazon.com/Signal-Shattered-Eric-S-Nylund/dp/038079294X

This is the best movie AvP candidate IMO. AvP: Prey

Sort of sets the stage for the war series

A Canticle for Leibowitz, by Walter M. Miller, Jr. One of my favourite books. Amazon link

http://www.amazon.com/Snow-Crash-Bantam-Spectra-Book/dp/0553380958

It's coming out in October.

It could be based on the book.
https://www.amazon.com/Moonfall-Jack-McDevitt/dp/0061051128/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1466808941&sr=1-1&keywords=moonfall

Wish Granted.

The Vang by Christopher Rowley
http://www.amazon.com/Vang-Military-Christopher-B-Rowley/dp/0345331761

I believe you should read Steel Beach by John Varley

Moonfall by Jack McDevitt.

John Varley's Steel beach is a story of humanity's development on the Moon after being kicked off Earth by mysterious, and then absent, alien civilization called the Alphans.

> It's a logical deduction

Also, the events of Protector have already happened. Protector happens before Ringworld, but was published after Ringworld. Some spoilers within.

Sorry, the book is called "the vang"

http://www.amazon.com/The-Vang-Military-Form/dp/0345331761

"Neverness" by David Zindell.. He then wrote a follow-up trilogy of books called "A Requiem for Homo Sapiens" which consists of "The Broken God", "The Wild", and "War In Heaven"..
My favorite sci-fi universe/story of all time..

The Damned trilogy by Alan Dean Foster, starting with A Call to Arms.

I really enjoyed Diaspora because it was such a different sort of story. It also may me terrified of gamma ray bursters. Forget asteroids, that's what will get us!

Who remembers Heavy Weather? How about Steel Beach?

Oh, wait. Not of this decade. I get lost sometimes.

Sci-Fi Starters:

Starship Troopers by Heinlein

Stranger in a Strange Land by Heinlein

Ender's Game by Orson Scott Card

Ender's Shadow by Orson Scott Card

The Foundation series by Asimov: Foundation -> Foundation and Empire -> Second Foundation

The Robot series by Asimov: I, Robot...

Vernor Vinge needs to publicly apologize for making the Children of the Sky.

It was one of the worst books i've ever read. You know a book is bad when the characters have dialogue like "I think i'm finally sure, i'm sure than Nevil is evil"

I think he's done as a sci fi author. His greatest contributions will always be A Deepness in the Sky and A Fire Upon the Deep.

The Lost Fleet, by Jack Campbell. The main character is about as apolitical as it gets.

>Captain John “Black Jack” Geary’s legendary exploits are known to every schoolchild. Revered for his heroic “last stand” in the early days of the war, he was presumed dead. But a century later, Geary miraculously returns from survival hibernation and reluctantly takes command of the Alliance Fleet as it faces annihilation by the Syndic.

http://www.amazon.com/A-Call-Arms-The-Damned/dp/0345375742/ref=pd_cp_b_0

In this series, Humans are very, very good at combat. Many species minds shutdown when forced to kill others. Many evolved on worlds less hostile than Earths. That combined with an innate human ability to resist telepathic control....

http://www.amazon.com/Canticle-Leibowitz-Walter-Miller-Jr/dp/0060892994/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1248001865&sr=8-1#reader

With a first page that reads as badly as Canticle does, you would regret it almost instantly.

OP: most redditors have frighteningly bad taste in books (and music, and often art). Not all, but anything with more than half a dozen upvotes will be something to avoid.