One book reading: what SF would you recommend?

[AKL]

Hi SFFWORLD,

Still being on lock-down,
and the urge to read more
has turned into a voracious appetite.

What is the SF Author/Book that you would say leads the genre?
If you had to choose one author and then one of his books,
that each time you read it
you find it timeless...

What would that be?

 

[Av Demeisen]

Hi SFFWORLD,

Still being on lock-down,
and the urge to read more
has turned into a voracious appetite.

What is the SF Author/Book that you would say leads the genre?
If you had to choose one author and then one of his books,
that each time you read it
you find it timeless...

What would that be?

Leading the genre should not be about sales or popularity. For me Ada Palmer is currently the greatest SF writer. Start with Too Like The Lightning and Seven Surrenders.

 

[Hobbit]

Welcome to SFFWorld, AKL. I've separated this out into a new thread rather than have it in the "Reading..." thread.

Still being on lock-down,
and the urge to read more
has turned into a voracious appetite.

What is the SF Author/Book that you would say leads the genre?

I know that it is not quite the same, but have you looked at the SF in this article?

 

[AKL]

Welcome to SFFWorld, AKL. I've separated this out into a new thread rather than have it in the "Reading..." thread.


I know that it is not quite the same, but have you looked at the SF in this article?

Thank you for sharing this article
it has many suggestions and much info to dig into.

I was looking for personal preferences though.
Like, what have you enjoyed the most?
What is your SF author and story of reference.

 

[Hobbit]

I was looking for personal preferences though.
Like, what have you enjoyed the most?
What is your SF author and story of reference.

Hi AKL!

The problem for me is that I can never narrow it down to just one. The last I tried, I got it to 50 (and then 55).
For me, books are so much about when you read them and the mood you are in when reading. Some are read for enjoyment, some are read for atmosphere, others are read to make you think...

So it is difficult to cut it to just one. It's like that element of the radio programme where they say "You're on a desert island. You can have just one book." I couldn't do it. But others might!

 

[AKL]

Hi AKL!

The problem for me is that I can never narrow it down to just one. The last I tried, I got it to 50 (and then 55).
For me, books are so much about when you read them and the mood you are in when reading. Some are read for enjoyment, some are read for atmosphere, others are read to make you think...

So it is difficult to cut it to just one. It's like that element of the radio programme where they say "You're on a desert island. You can have just one book." I couldn't do it. But others might!

Damn thats a lot of books to read in what is left of May.
That is the beauty though.
Among many good things its difficult to choose only one

 

[Hobbit]

Damn thats a lot of books to read in what is left of May.

That would be a challenge!

But it looks like we may have time at the moment. Pick one & try it? The Big books for lockdown might be easiest to pick one from - there are individual books as well as series there to choose from.

That is the beauty though.
Among many good things its difficult to choose only one

I've always said that one of the great things about this is that the genres are wide and varied, which is why I'm usually amused when someone says "Don't you get bored reading the same stuff"?

Always enough to vary it.

 

[krisbslick]

#1 - Peter F. Hamilton for me. Pandora's Star got me into the science fiction community at large.
This is part one of two - each clock in at 1,000 pages in paperback. But if that's too daunting and you want to get a feel for Hamilton, try Fallen Dragon first. (check out Mark's review here)

Also, depending on your tastes - these are some of my personal favorites. I usually recommend to people who have a mild interest or want to dip their toe in SF (in no particular order):

Ender’s Game by Orson Scott Card - one of the top rated SF novels of all time
Old Man's War by John Scalzi - Space Opera 101
Ready Player One by Ernest Cline - fun page turner

All of these get great reviews from my friends (non SF readers) when I recommend them and all can be read as stand alones, even though some have sequels if you want to pursue further.

 

[Charlie]

Well, that's a tall order especially given we know nothing of your personal preferences. But I will take a shot at it. My selection for the one SF author who has never failed to entertain and enlighten, whose books I have reread many times and will continue to read; the author who has contributed to the most SF sub-genres:

...drum roll please...

**** H. G. Wells ****

Charlie

 

[Hobbit]

...drum roll please...

**** H. G. Wells ****

Ah, but which book, Charlie?

For me it would be either War of the Worlds or the Time Machine. (I have read others.) Usually I would say War of the Worlds, but it is so well known these days, if only for the variations created by the TV, music & film versions.

So- probably Time Machine - for its wide ranging scope. Again, it has been done in film & audio, but none of them to my knowledge are like the book.


Sitting on the fence a little, though - these are well over 100 years old. Is there nothing newer with the same scope, style, sense of vision?

Over to you...

 

[Windshadow]

An Author that over more than half a century that never made me feel that I wanted my money back for one of his books... I expect I could put 50 names here without bending that selection criterion, but here are a few to be getting on with. In no particular order and sticking with authors with a lot of published works.
Harry Harrison
Poul Anderson
Arthur C. Clarke
Jack Vance
H.Beam Piper
Robert A. Heinlein up to about The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress so before the mid-1960s...some of his later stuff I do find disappointing though I never wanted my money back)
Larry Niven is another writer that has faded for me in his old age along with his sometimes partner
Jerry Pournelle try their The Mote in God’s Eye or Oath of Fealty for your one book

 

[Diosces]

Daemon by Daniel Suarez, and if you have spare May time left, sequel Freedom--best sequel I've read.

 

[Westy]

Hard to do one book - for me the Hyperion Cantos (first two books are really one book), or Dune.

 

[dannymcg]

The Mote in God's eye

 

[krisbslick]

@AKL - What book did you end up going with?

 

[Stanley Steamboy]

My preference would be for something that is complex, realistic, reasonably page turning, makes great use of language and will keep you thinking well after you put it down.

Dune. There's a reason for its decades of popularity.
The Player of Games by Iain Banks. Documents two very different societies while describing a physical and mental adventure. Has a dark humor to it.
Marrow by Robert Reed. An engrossing world and future people that just gets more surprising and interesting as the tale goes on.

All three have subsequent/related novels, but are fine stand-alone works.

The problem I have with some suggestions is that the books are good, or fun, or iconic, but they really aren't all that deep, don't leverage the speculative side of SF or don't function as literature that well - so they miss the mark as exemplars. If you're going to read just one book, you might as well read something that is more than a military adventure that just happens to be set in space. Read something that requires SF concepts to even allow the plot to function. Read something that you'll still be thinking about when you go to bed.

There are other books I was tempted to suggest, but they might be less universal in their appeal or require the reader to go too far down the rabbit hole to get the most out of them: The Peripheral, The Diamond Age, A Fire Upon the Deep, Blindsight, Souls in the Great Machine.

 

[Vince W]

Dune would be my first and foremost recommendation, but I would also add Nova by Samuel Delany, The Centauri Device by M. John Harrison, and Contact by Carl Sagan.

 

[AKL]

@AKL - What book did you end up going with?

Waiting to see if the multiple inputs from the SFers will converge to a singular solution.
I guess when it comes to matters such as this it's more of a personal taste thought.

In the meanwhile I pulled
the last gunslinger from my stock
and now breathing the hot air coming from the vast desert
at the end of Tull.

 

[krisbslick]

Waiting to see if the multiple inputs from the SFers will converge to a singular solution.

I think that's pretty much all the responses you're going to get - at least from #theRegulars.

I guess when it comes to matters such as this it's more of a personal taste thought.

Definitely personal taste differs widely here, but we're all science fiction lovers!

 

[pogopossum]

I agree with Hobbit. For me narrowing to just one is a fool's game. It's like asking what is your favorite food.
I like Windshadows list. Including Heinlein, up to a certain point.
I read him and also everyone publishing in Galaxy (& much of Astounding) as a teenager. My brother had a complete collection of the first & my dad a subscription to the second.
Came from a family of nerdy engineers.

On my own discovered Roger Zelazny. If forced to pick a single title (as I had to signing up for this forum) I would pick Lord of Light.

Others who I would add to the Wndshdw list would be John Varley, Ursula LeGuin, Charles Stross, Joe Haldeman, much of Vernor Vinge, John Brunner, and Cliff Simak.

I realize that this is an old guy's list. For some reason I only discovered John Scalzi last year and powered through all of his stuff. Like many here, I could go on - and on -

edit. Should have included fantasy. Terry Pratchett and Jim Butcher. Titles? All except perhaps the first two by each of them.