looking for SF recs
I'm working on a SF original fiction idea right now (decided to file the serial numbers off my SW fanfic and RPG background), and I'm realizing that when it comes to SF profic, I'm at something of a loss. I've read widely in mystery and fantasy and I've watched a lot of SF TV and movies, but I haven't read many SF novels beyond spinoff novels for my two SF fandoms (Star Wars and Halo). I'm not a big hard SF person, the greater the focus on the tech and the science, the less interested I am.

So I'm interested in:
-what you'd recommend as an introduction to SF for people who don't read a lot of SF, including "hard SF for people who don't like hard SF"
-space opera
-social/cultural SF (the science interests me less than the politics of alien cultures, how being humans on an isolated planetary base influences their society/how they relate to each other, that kind of thing)
-anything with precursor races (especially where they're more of an influence than simply leaving behind cryptic artifacts) and anything with sentient planets

Thanks!

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cjk 2009-10-18 12:25 pm UTC (link)

As to space opera as well as the socio-cultural aspect, I'd very much recommend Lois McMaster Bujold's Vorkosigan Saga. The two Cordelia books and "Memory" are my all-time favourites. It deals with painful culture clash and human relationships on top of hard SciFi that's more background rather than plot point. If you have the time and inclination to get a bit retro and/or metaphysical, look up Stanisław Lem's books, especially "Solaris" (speaking of sentient planets) and the "Star Diaries" for biting satire. And, being Russian, I couldn't not recommend the Strugatsky brothers' books, though they might be a problem to read in translation. If you can/want to get hold of these books, I'd recommend "Roadside Picnic" about how humanity deals with trash a "superior" race left behind on Earth, and "Space Mowgli" about a human child being raised by aliens a human mind literally cannot comprehend, and what happens when he's found by other humans. They also have this entire universe ("Noon" universe), made up of many books, that starts with this happy-apple-pie Communist SciFi future, and devolves (emotion-wise, not quality-wise) into a rather uncertain and bleak future for mankind that's finding leftovers by other races that it can't comprehend, has to face new übermensch mutations it can't deal with socially, and has to fight human stupidity at every step. If your are in the mood for warm fuzzies (the entire book is just sweet, sweet fluff) there's Clifford Simak's "Goblin Reservation", which seamlessly combines Shakespeare, goblins, superior alien races and a romance with added sabletooth tiger cub who steals steaks. Simak also wrote "Way Station" which is a SciFi classic about human prejudice, stupidity, hard choices and love, incorporating hard SciFi and aliens as some of the more important plot elements; it's all centered around a rather ordinary guy in Wisconsin, only he's a near-immortal Civil War veteran who mans the only Earth gateway to alien worlds. Oh, and yet again speaking of sentient planets, there is, of course, Harry Harrison's "Deathworld", which is technically a series, but I prefer to disregard the latter books in it. It's typical hard SciFi but with many very interesting social elements. (Reply to this)(Thread)

(no subject) - eleutheria, 2009-10-18 01:31 pm UTC

(no subject) - cjk, 2009-10-18 01:53 pm UTC

(no subject) - b_jellybean, 2009-10-18 04:34 pm UTC

(no subject) - ari_, 2009-10-19 06:12 am UTC

(no subject) - cjk, 2009-10-19 04:05 pm UTC

(no subject) - undomielregina, 2009-10-20 12:27 am UTC

(no subject) - varethane, 2009-10-21 04:01 am UTC

(no subject) - ickle_snowflake, 2009-10-19 05:29 pm UTC

(no subject) - cjk, 2009-10-19 07:31 pm UTC

(no subject) - ickle_snowflake, 2009-10-19 07:36 pm UTC

(no subject) - scifantasy, 2009-10-18 03:49 pm UTC

btw - cjk, 2009-10-18 09:47 pm UTC

Re: btw - ayezur, 2009-10-19 02:05 pm UTC

Re: btw - cjk, 2009-10-19 04:02 pm UTC

Re: btw - ayezur, 2009-10-19 04:21 pm UTC

sqbr 2009-10-18 12:43 pm UTC (link)

Pretty much all of the above: The Vorkosigan Series by Lois McMaster Bujold "A Fire Upon the Deep" by Vernor Vinge Social/cultural sf and interesting aliens: "Lillith's Brood"/"The Xenogenesis Saga" by Octavia Butler (it got published under two names) "The Sparrow" by Mary Doria Russel (I HATED the characters in this book, but most people like it and the alien culture is really well drawn) "The Dispossessed" by Ursula K Leguin (and lots of her other stuff) Sentient planet: "Solaris" by Stanislaw Lem. Precursor races: Both flawed, but "Protector" by Larry Niven and "Strata" by Terry Pratchet had interesting bits. (Reply to this)(Thread)

(no subject) - eleutheria, 2009-10-18 01:34 pm UTC

(no subject) - miraba, 2009-10-18 01:53 pm UTC

(no subject) - sqbr, 2009-10-19 08:58 am UTC

(no subject) - cjk, 2009-10-18 01:55 pm UTC

(no subject) - mister_terrific, 2009-10-19 07:17 pm UTC

(no subject) - sqbr, 2009-10-23 05:21 am UTC

(no subject) - mister_terrific, 2009-10-23 12:12 pm UTC

(no subject) - sqbr, 2009-10-26 08:05 am UTC

moriath 2009-10-18 01:52 pm UTC (link)

John Scalzi's "Zoe's War". It's technically the last in a series, but the story is apparently written to be parallel to the story of the first novel, "Old Man's War" so it works as a stand alone (I haven't read any of the other books in the series. I keep meaning to and then I get distracted by something else!). I don't like hard SF, but it definitely had a lot of aspects of what I consider to be hard SF and I still liked it. And it's got some great alien politics going on (there are several alien races, but none of them like each other, or the humans, because there's a finite number of planets to colonize and everyone wants to have the planets for themselves). (Reply to this)(Thread)

(no subject) - beccastareyes, 2009-10-18 02:29 pm UTC

(no subject) - dez_chan, 2009-10-18 04:26 pm UTC

brennalarose 2009-10-18 02:04 pm UTC (link)

For most of it, I dunno, although video game wise, I remember Sid Meier's Alpha Centauri deals heavily with planetary sentience. I know that there was a short story and a trilogy of pretty bleak novels, but the game and it's books were never very popular, so finding them at the library maybe nigh impossible. It's been ages since I've read them, but the Stardance trilogy by Spider and Jeanne Robinson deals with humanity learning to communicate with aliens through dance. Granted, I suspect my mother gave me the "Good Parts" version, but I recommend damn near everything they've touched, as I read other works by Spider later and loved them. (Reply to this)

deconcentrate 2009-10-18 02:20 pm UTC (link)

CJ Cherryh's Alliance/Merchanter/Union stories, in particular CYTEEN (this is hard, hard SF but you'll be so engrossed with the characters you won't actually notice) and and 40,000 IN GEHENNA (humanity colonizes a planet; the planet takes offense to this, says "NO U"). Pretty much all her Alliance/Merchanter/Union stuff qualifies under the sociocultural aspect of what you want - one of Cherryh's greatest strengths is an anthropological obsession with cataloguing changes in human behavior in reaction to environmental stress, how it changes what people do and say and think. Many of them also qualify under the "space opera" tag, too, particularly stuff like HEAVY TIME and HELLBURNER, but the only actual spacer novel set within the Alliance/Merchanter/Union 'verse I've managed to get through so far was RIMRUNNERS which is one of the few space opera books I've ever read to feel legitimately claustrophobic in its intensity. Another one you might want to look into - and I know I'm gonna get some odd looks for this one from people who don't know about it - is the novelization of the original MOBILE SUIT GUNDAM series by Yoshiyuki Tomino with translation by Frederick Schodt, which just recently came back into print from Stone Bridge Press. The GUNDAM novelization is one of the finest works of SF I have ever read, right up there with the greats of SF literature, and hits nearly every button on this list - the only one it misses is the "precursor races" option, but that's because it stays fairly tightly focused around Earth and its surroundings and it's not the sort of novel to speculate about Earth being colonized by aliens. (And the English translation is a damn fucking good one, too, natural and fluid.) (Reply to this)(Thread)

(no subject) - lady_ganesh, 2009-10-18 04:10 pm UTC

(no subject) - deconcentrate, 2009-10-18 04:29 pm UTC

lovecoconuts 2009-10-18 02:26 pm UTC (link)

Social/Cultural SF - try Isaac Asimov's Foundation series. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foundation_Series Frank Herbert's Dune series also comes in mind as well as Orson Scott Card's Ender series. These series focus more on social/cultural/the psyche/politics, etc. rather than on technology. Especially the Foundation series which was inspired by Gibbon's Fall of the Roman Empire. If you do plan to start on any of the series above, I will recommend that you first read: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foundation_%28novel%29 (for the Foundation series) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dune_%28novel%29 (Dune series) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ender%27s_game Recommending starting off with those books because those are the original starting novels for those series, not the sequels or prequels, which at times, feel as though its expected that the reader has read the first novel which made the series popular in the first place. Also, I don't know about Isaac Asimov and Frank Herbert's rep in the FW community, but OSC seems to have a bad rep around here. Oh, and since you love mysteries - then I must recommend Isaac Asimov's Robot series. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Isaac_Asimov%27s_Robot_Series They're like detective stories in a sci-fi setting with robots, and I will just warn you that you'll probably become a fan of R. Daneel Olivaw, who is generally considered as Isaac Asimov's most popular character. (Reply to this)(Thread)

(no subject) - alya1989262, 2009-10-18 05:23 pm UTC

(no subject) - lyrangalia, 2009-10-19 09:44 pm UTC

	ravenscanary 2009-10-18 02:32 pm UTC (link)
	Charles Stross has some very enjoyable hard scifi. Accelerando, Glasshouse, Singularity Sky and Iron Sunrise are good. The first two are stand-alone, the second two are a series. (I think I prefer the latter two, personally, might want to start there.) Since I don't like much hard scifi but his, I'd think they'd be a good "hard scifi for people who don't like hard scifi" intro. (Reply to this)

beccastareyes 2009-10-18 02:36 pm UTC (link)

Elizabeth Moon does nice military SF -- I personally prefer her Vatta's War series (which is about a merchant captain who ends up fighting pirates after they attack her family's business and home) to her other books, but the Serrano ones also have a lovely look at the politics of aging -- basically, there is a medical treatment that stops aging. You might also find Red Mars by Kim Stanley Robinson interesting in the 'humans on isolated planetary base' angle. It's the start of a epic* trilogy about the first Mars colony. It's pretty hard SF, but a lot of the characters aren't scientists (so don't infodump that much), and the author at least tries with relationships. It's a bit problematic in some respects, but worth a look. * In the sense of being a brick with thousands of characters. (Reply to this)

	Third try the charm - I really shouldn't post before coffee gorogoro 2009-10-18 02:37 pm UTC (link)
	(Third try the charm - I really shouldn't post before coffee.) Seconding the Cherryh recs. Also Cherryh's "Chanur" series, if you can find the books, are a bit lighter on the hard SF and very heavy on the alien politics. (Reply to this)

	the__ivorytower 2009-10-18 03:41 pm UTC (link)
	*shy* I'm in love with the Confederation Series by Tanya Huff. I believe it falls under several of the categories you mention, though "precursor" is more like "elder". ...hesitantly, also, StarCraft? Particularly the new trilogy, you actually get to hear a lot more about the Xelnaga. (Reply to this)

	scifantasy 2009-10-18 03:53 pm UTC (link)
	This is a recommendation I haven't actually read, but talking of precursor races, David Brin's "Uplift" series is probably worth a look. This one's a video game, but it seriously skirts the line, and it has some precursor fun and games (including the race called the Precursors)--Star Control 2, better known these days as the freely downloadable The Ur-Quan Masters. (Reply to this)(Thread)

(no subject) - ianthefira, 2009-10-18 06:24 pm UTC

sineala 2009-10-18 04:04 pm UTC (link)

Hard SF for people who don't like hard SF: Kim Stanley Robinson's Mars trilogy. (As a bonus, fits your request about humans on isolated bases.) I'd also rec Nancy Kress' Beggars in Spain trilogy, which IIRC is pretty hard. And if you read Dune, it's really okay to read the first couple books and stop, because no one ever needs to read God-Emperor of Dune. I mean this. How about alternate history? If yes, go read Philip K. Dick's The Man in the High Castle right now. How about not-crazy Heinlein? Starship Troopers, The Moon is a Harsh Mistress... Space opera is really pretty much covered if you've got Lensman and Vorkosigan. Oh! You should try David Weber's Honor Harrington series -- it is pretty much exactly Horatio Hornblower as a girl in space, and is full of missiles and trade agreements and planetary revolutions and stuff. Kind of cheesy, but fun! (As a bonus, you can read most of them for free; Baen puts them in freely-downloadable CD-ROMs.) Social/cultural: Yes to Le Guin; of her work I would very strongly rec The Left Hand of Darkness, because it's really really really good. Also, I think I am the only person I know who liked Always Coming Home, but I liked it a lot. I know I have more recs, but I can't think of them right now. (Reply to this)(Thread)

(no subject) - rosehiptea, 2009-10-18 04:18 pm UTC

(no subject) - demonbean, 2009-10-18 08:14 pm UTC

(no subject) - jat_sapphire, 2009-10-19 01:08 am UTC

	lady_ganesh 2009-10-18 04:17 pm UTC (link)
	Aside from those books not already mentioned, Margaret Atwood's The Handmaid's Tale and Oryx and Crake-- and the new book set in the same universe-- are sci-fi without the sf label, and might work well in the 'sf for people who don't like sf' category. (Reply to this)

	rosehiptea 2009-10-18 04:24 pm UTC (link)
	I have an abiding affection for James White's Sector General series about a space hospital for alien races. They're not exactly perfect writing to be honest but the races he created just really interest me. They generally tend to be non-depressing books, which is a nice change now and then. (Reply to this)

kamiki_seto 2009-10-18 04:30 pm UTC (link)

Warning: I like the older SF classics, so my recommendations will go in that direction. A hard SF mystery that is very readable - Asimov's "The Caves of Steel". Also his "I Robot" ....very readable. "I Robot" is a short story collection. I consider Asimov's robot stuff some of his best, and it set the stage for so much that later became standard in SF - characters like Data. For isolated colonists, Ray Bradbury's "The Martian Chronicles". It's another short story collection, but it's chronological and the theme is Mars being settled from Earth and what happens. Some of the concepts sound a bit old-fashioned to more modern readers, but emotionally he's spot-on...his Mars storys are some of his best work. His Mars stories in other collections are worth hunting down, too. ("Dark They Were, And Golden-Eyed" is a very interesting story about assimilation...) (Reply to this)(Thread)

(no subject) - vzg, 2009-10-18 07:19 pm UTC

(no subject) - miraba, 2009-10-19 03:42 am UTC

	braisinhussy 2009-10-18 05:03 pm UTC (link)
	I'm not sure it's a good introduction, but it's my favorite short story in the history of ever: The Last Question by Isaac Asimov. (Reply to this)

	wankaholic 2009-10-18 05:10 pm UTC (link)
	Ursula LeGuin. Her Hainish cycle, specifically, along with The Left Hand of Darkness and someone already mentioned The Telling. Most of what she deals with is, umm, stuff that's on your list. :P Annnd, Joan D. Vinge, if you can find a copy of The Snow Queen. My boyfriend had me read it this summer, and it's fairly good. (Reply to this)(Thread)

(no subject) - wankaholic, 2009-10-18 05:10 pm UTC

spacelogic 2009-10-18 05:35 pm UTC (link)

I second Le Guin and, uh, the Ur-Quan Masters, whole-heartedly. I'd also toss in, in terms of precursors and enjoyable "hard" sci-fi, Frederik Pohl -- I started with Gateway and the series built off of it, which deal with a mysterious precursor race having left behind technology that humans are trying to use, but don't fully understand. The Other End of Time and sequels might also be worth checking out. If you want a taste of Pohl's writing style, he's got an excellent blog that gives a taste of it (though his books are typically darker.) (Reply to this)

hyaenid 2009-10-18 05:37 pm UTC (link)

Someone upthread mentioned not-crazy Heinlein, so I'm going to expand on that a bit. Heinlein wrote lots of crazy time-travelling space sex, but his YA fiction is pretty solid -- they focus closely on one or two characters at the most, and IMO handle infodumps and Heinlein's political commentary pretty well. I think probably the best three are Have Spacesuit -- Will Travel, Farmer in the Sky, and Red Planet. I'd probably start with Farmer in the Sky, which is more like a pioneer novel than anything else. And yes, Starship Troopers is pretty great. I totally disagree with big chunks of it, but I love it to pieces. You might try picking up a short story collection, too -- I'd recommend Isaac Asimov's Science Fiction Treasury, which is massive (as in, 800 pages), available for cheap on Amazon, and quite good. IIRC there are a couple of good stories that are about society and culture. (Reply to this)(Thread)

(no subject) - sineala, 2009-10-18 08:49 pm UTC

(no subject) - bobafeis, 2009-10-19 03:43 am UTC

(no subject) - jat_sapphire, 2009-10-19 01:11 am UTC

(no subject) - hyaenid, 2009-10-19 02:19 am UTC

(no subject) - jat_sapphire, 2009-10-19 03:57 am UTC

	hyaenid 2009-10-18 05:38 pm UTC (link)
	ALSO (I can't believe I forgot her): try Octavia Butler for cultural and social SF. (Reply to this)

	littleshebear 2009-10-18 05:40 pm UTC (link)
	David Brin's Uplift series have some interesting aliens in it, a little bit about precursor races and some nice discussion on how more advanced species effect the less advanced. (Reply to this)

solle 2009-10-18 07:18 pm UTC (link)

I'd recommend Robert A. Heinlein - The Moon Is A Harsh Mistress. Was my first proper grownup sci-fi novel and one of my favourite books I've ever read. I can't think of a single thing I dislike about it. It's about the social/political revolution of a moon colony powered by a sentient computer. Definitely Heinlein's best novel, and a really good introduction to sci-fi. Tropes page for the book: http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/TheMoonIsAHarshMistress (Reply to this)

mmanurere 2009-10-18 07:59 pm UTC (link)

I usually recommend (as, it seems, does half of JF) Ursula K. Le Guin as a good intro, especially to the more socially-based SF. The Dispossessed, The Left Hand of Darkness, and maybe The Lathe of Heaven. My favorite is probably Samuel R. Delany, though depending on what you're looking for you might want to stick to known quantities -- Trouble on Triton, Stars in My Pocket Like Grains of Sand, and the Empire Star/Babel-17 combo. Octavia Butler is also must-read; the Lilith's Brood series definitely, while some of her other books are pre-outer-space near-future SF (like The Parable of the Sower, which is still rather terrifying in its plausibility). (Reply to this)

	staroverthebay 2009-10-18 08:28 pm UTC (link)
	Personally, I think, the best book you can read isn't actually a SCI-FI book itself... it's a How To book on how to write it. How to Write Science Fiction & Fantasy by Orson Scott Card. I have that, and I love it. (Reply to this)

undomielregina 2009-10-18 08:51 pm UTC (link)

I'm going to go ahead and recommend Hyperion by Dan Simmons. It's a huge thick book and the first in a quartet of equally thick books (which sort of function as two duos) and ends on a cliffhanger, so, you know, you should be aware of that. I'm not going to link it because I tend to think that this is one of those series where spoilers are criminal. Basically, the Hegemony (human civilization) has been at war with a group called the Ousters for hundreds of years. A small border world called Hyperion is under attack by them in the present, but the government believes that making something called the Shrike pilgrimage (the Shrike is a giant metal monster that's on Hyperion) is their best chance of survival. It picks seven people to go on this pilgrimage, and the majority of the novel is them telling their stories in a Canterbury Tales homage. This is much cooler than it sounds. It does have a lot of hard SF elements in the tech and military, and some really interesting societal bits (every member of the pilgrimage is from a radically different background/world), although the series is focused on humans. One of the really cool (scientifically accurate!) concepts is that the form of faster-than-light travel they use incurs a "time-debt," so that time as those traveling is much shorter than time as it passes for everyone else. (Reply to this)(Thread)

(no subject) - sithwitch13, 2009-10-18 11:54 pm UTC

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