What Are The Darkest Science Fiction Novels and Stories You Ever Read ?

[Cicero]

Which Novels , novellas and short stories ?

 

[dannymcg]

"I have no mouth and I must scream" by Harlan

 

[Cicero]

"I have no mouth and I must scream" by Harlan

With the villainous computer Nimdok . That is easily one the darkest cruelest stories Ellison ever wrote.

 

[dannymcg]

With the villainous computer Nimdok . That is easily one the darkest cruelest stories Ellison ever wrote.

Confused!
I thought the computer was AM and Nimdok was one of the five victims it tormented

 

[Cicero]

Confused!
I thought the computer was AM and Nimdok was one of the five victims it tormented

Your absolutely , it was AM I read this story about 30 years ago., another faulty memory moment for me.

 

[dannymcg]

As a dark SF book series I think most likely The Gap Cycle by Stephen Donaldson

The Gap Cycle - Wikipedia

en.m.wikipedia.org

 

[mylinar]

Evolution by Stephen Baxter. No point to anything we do.

 

[Raf]

S.A. Tholin's "Primaterre" trilogy is pretty dark. But, to be fair, while I liked the first novel? The 2nd novel was not working for me and I DNF'd the rest of the series.

 

[suciul]

The Acts of Caine by MW Stover (which is sf at least as setup though has a lot of fantasy-nal stuff too) is darker (imho) than the Gap series which is no slouch either, but Earth Made of Glass by J Barnes (with its double portrayal of a failing marriage and self-destroying planetary cultures) and Ancient Light (with, well wouldn't want to spoil its unbelievable ending) by Mary Gentle take the top for me

 

[Hobbit]

Mary Gentle's a good shout, suciul: I was thinking ASH A Secret History, which has SF elements to it, but Golden Witchblade/Ancient Light is a good call. I really got the impression the author didn't want to write any more in this series!

 

[KatG]

Blindsight by Peter Watts is a pretty dark and hard SF novel. LeGuin's "The Ones Who Walk Away From Omalas" is not one that I could re-read right now without depression. The Windup Girl by Paolo Bacigalupi is a very bleak post-apocalypse novel.

I have not gotten around to reading it yet, but Nevil Shute's On the Beach is considered one of the darkest ones.

 

[Cicero]

The Killing Star by Charles Pelligrino and George Zebroski has a very dark story premise . It's a great read.

 

[Ropie]

The Sparrow by Mary Doria Russel gets pretty horrible, as do Jack Glass, By Light Alone, and The Thing Itself by Adam Roberts, all of them for the same reason (sexual violence).

For pure dark atmosphere, I would have to say the first story in Hyperion by Dan Simmons is very hard to beat.

 

[Stanley Steamboy]

Neal Stephenson's Fall was about the most dispiriting thing I can recall reading.

And I've read all of Peter Watts and Stephen "R is for Rape" Donaldson's Gap.

 

[dannymcg]

One that I found really dark and depressing was The Road by Cormac McCarthy

 

[Cicero]

No blade of Grass by John Christopher
The Possessed by Arthur C Clarke
All The Way Back by Michael Shaara

Three very bleak reads

 

[Ropie]

No blade of Grass by John Christopher

Bleak in outlook and troubling at times, but for me the tone of the book is kind of lively and exciting, so I couldn't call it 'dark'. I might be biased though, he's one of my favourite writers!

 

[Cicero]

Bleak in outlook and troubling at times, but for me the tone of the book is kind of lively and exciting, so I couldn't call it 'dark'. I might be biased though, he's one of my favourite writers!

I couldn't put this book down once I started it . Ive also read The Tripods Trilogy by him . He's terrific .

That last story on my List All the Way Back By Michael Shaara is a favorite of mine quite good, I wish he'd written a follow up to it , This author started out in Science fiction but stopped and went to other things . He's known for the Civil War novels as Gods and Generals and The Killer Angels . He did write one science fiction novel later in his career The Herald in 1981 which ive not read .

Earth Abides by George R Steward. It's an end of civilization story and a great book and it hard to put down once you start reading it. He wrote several books and this was his only science fiction novel.

 

[Ropie]

I couldn't put this book down once I started it . Ive also read The Tripods Trilogy by him . He's terrific .

I need to read the Tripods trilogy - I have only read one Tripods story, a later book outside of the original trilogy. Empty World is also a lot of fun but intended for a younger audience.

Earth Abides is another absolute classic, and hard to put down as you say. Also not really dark at all - it's quite the opposite in fact.

I'll have to check out that Michael Shaara story you mentioned.

 

[Cicero]

I need to read the Tripods trilogy - I have only read one Tripods story, a later book outside of the original trilogy. Empty World is also a lot of fun but intended for a younger audience.

Earth Abides is another absolute classic, and hard to put down as you say. Also not really dark at all - it's quite the opposite in fact.

I'll have to check out that Michael Shaara story you mentioned.

I found the Michel Shaara story in the two volume anthology Galactic Empires edited by Brian Aldiss . It has classic stories by Poul Anderson Cordwainer Smith, R A Lafferty and others .