Books I like

I like Science fiction. And on the whole, I'm not a big fan of Fantasy. So it bugs me that Scifi and Fantasy are grouped together in most bookstores. As for Scifi, it should be spelled with a capital Sci and a lower-case fi, that is, I like HARD Science fiction (not entirely without exceptions, of course). I have not actually begun reading Scifi in alphabetical order by authors, although my ABC of Scifi (Adams, Anderson, Asimov, Banks, Baxter, Bear, Bova, Clarke, Colfer, Czajkowski (Tchaikovsky), and even Cixin, Carl and Andy) might suggest otherwise... I do not like Star Trek.

Here's some stuff I have enjoyed:

• Douglas Adams
  • All five parts of the HHGTG, and the sixth part by Colfer (yes, I liked it too)
  • Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency and The Long Dark Teatime of the Soul
  • Too bad The Salmon of Doubt was never completed
  • Last Chance to See—Less well known, maybe, but a must read, and, believe it or not, on a really serious subject! (No, really!)

• Kevin Anderson
  • Assemblers of Infinity—I recently found my copy which I thought I'd lost, and re-read it. Good stuff, but perhaps a bit... tentative, in my opinion.

• Isaac Asimov
  • The Foundation series, prequels and sequels included
  • Some Robot stories

• Iain M. Banks
  • Consider Phlebas, the first book in his Culture series: I don't quite know what to think of it—the writing is vivid and powerful, but the plot somehow is lacking. It just follows the main character from one swashbuckling adventure to another, the concept of the Culture and its war against the Idirans largely irrelevant. I'll probably read another part of the series some time, Banks seems to deserve a second chance.
  • Player of Games, the second in the series: I'm glad I gave Banks another chance, as this book was much more coherent. The concept (huh, board games???) was imaginative, and Banks makes it work beautifully, but Banks's style still somehow does not really appeal to me. I'll probably read a third part of the series some time nonetheless.
  • Use of Weapons, the third part or the series, is probably loaded with subtle between-the-lines references that I just totally missed. Its structure was too complex, drifting back and forth between the present and memories, and I just couldn't keep up. Sorry, that's it for Banks in my bookshelf, at least for now.

• Stephen Baxter
  • The Manifold series: Time (absolutely brilliant!!), Space (excellent), Origin (somewhat blah) and Phase Space (not bad).
  • Vacuum Diagrams: A bit slow at first, but the latter stories truly shine.
  • Titan: Scary and depressing, but imaginative, realistic, and overall totally fantastic!
  • Voyage: A similar alternate future history as Titan, but maybe more optimistic—also a fantastic read!
  • Ultima: Totally weird in that Baxterish way. Loved it.
  • Proxima: I read it after Ultima, but it worked regardless. Less weird than Ultima, but very real and totally Baxter.
  • The Long Earth and The Long War: I think Pratchett influences the style a whole lot, but the combination works! A whole lot easier reading than undiluted Baxter (which can be quite heavy at times, demanding a long break before starting another Baxter novel). I already went ahead and bought the other books in the series.
  • The Long Mars, The Long Utopia and The Long Cosmos: The other books in the series. Still a fantastic read, becoming increasingly dark and brooding (more Baxterish?) towards the end. Highly recommended.
  • The Massacre of Mankind: Baxter does justice to H. G. Wells. Very good job, sir. Very, very good job!
  • Anti-Ice: Wow, was this by Baxter or by Jules Verne??? Now I understand why the Wells estate authorized Baxter to write that sequel!
  • Looking forward to reading a great many more...

• Greg Bear
  • The Forge of God—This came with a bunch of Bova that I bought from an online auction (and also fits into the ABC category!). Fine reading, and quite weird... But Bear doesn't seem to handle weird quite as well as Baxter, and like The Three-Body Problem by Liu, the end feels somewhat... expedited.

• Ben Bova
  • Decades ago I read part of the Exile series (in fact, Exiled from Earth was the very first Scifi novel I ever read, as a school assignment!), and enjoyed it (if I recall correctly). I recently hunted it down as a compilation volume, and enjoyed every bit of it. The ending, however, seemed a bit... artificial (but I won't say whether it was a forced happy ending, or a dystopian one).
  • The Grand Tour series: Mercury, Venus, Mars and Return to Mars, Jupiter and Leviathans of Jupiter, Saturn, Titan, The Aftermath etc... I still have a few books remaining. Only New Earth has been a bit of a letdown, in comparison to the incredibly high standard he set with the earlier books. This is an undertaking I would only have trusted to The Man (Clarke), but Bova pulls it off admirably. A must read!

• Arthur C. Clarke
  • I don't need to list His books. Get the lot.
  • Yes, Childhood's End totally shines.

• Eoin Colfer—see Douglas Adams

• Adrian Czajkowski (Tchaikovsky)
  • Children of Time—Ewwww, spiders!!!
  • Children of Ruin—What is it with this guy and eight-limbed creatures???
  • Children of Memory—Oh, so weird... How does he keep it so coherently together, though?
  • Very impressed with his work! But I just don't like spiders!!! I'll surely buy Adrian a beer if his books make an arachnologist of me.

• Stanislaw Lem
  • Strange and entertaining. I've also read quite a few others, not just the famous Solaris.

• Cixin Liu
  • The Three-Body Problem—After a slow and awkward beginning (I'm more a fan of future history than past), this book held me in its grip very well. Highly strange all the way through (even reminiscent of Adams's Dirk Gently novels at times), but the final chapter made everything fall logically into place—albeit in a fashion that felt like a hastily written executive summary. Did Liu have a deadline to keep?

• Walter M. Miller, Jr.
  • A Canticle for Leibowitz—Way cool! Way funny! And very... real!

• Grant Naylor
  • Red Dwarf was funny. Somewhat Douglasish, and quite Adamsesque, but not a cheap rip-off in my opinion. Worth reading.

• Kim Stanley Robinson
  • Red Mars—Brilliant!! A must read!!
  • Green Mars, the next book in the series, started out fine but then got so bogged down in planetary political blah that I never finished it.
  • Blue Mars remains to be opened up. Been that way for over a decade (update: two decades). Robinson definitely had something with Red Mars, but Green Mars just put me off it altogether.  :(

• Carl Sagan
  • Contact—Excellent! Way better than the movie! And I'm so happy I read it first, before I saw the movie.

• Andy Weir
  • The Martian—Brilliant!! A must read!! N.B. I read it before I saw the movie. You definitely need to read the book, but don't expect anything extra from the movie. Kind of like Contact in that sense. (Incidentally, this was the first, and probably only book ever, which I read from a phone screen...)
  • Artemis—This book is not nearly as highly regarded as The Martian, and I do agree it's somehow a bit forced at times. But that's just in comparison to The Martian, which was exceptional. The concept of Artemis is fresh and well utilized, and I enjoyed it thoroughly.
  • Project Hail Mary—As different from the earlier two books as the second was from the first. I literally could not put the book down. Really strange at times, but that's what I love about our Universe! And completely believable at all times, which is what I love about Andy's work!
  • Hope to see him publish a REALLY BIG bunch more...

In addition, you definitely need to spend a few minutes of your life reading these three short stories:

• The Nine Billion Names of God by Clarke
• The Star by Clarke
• They're Made out of Meat by Terry Bisson

Now that you know what kind of Scifi I like, how about telling me what I've been missing?