Sci fi book recommendations please

I couldn’t put down ‘The Martian’ which I bought last time I was at an airport, having not been drawn to sci fi books before. It’s an example of ‘ real science Sci fi ‘ according to reviews within. Anybody got any other good examples of this genre to recommend please?
Iain M Banks seems to be very popular in sci fi but I’m not sure that’s what I’m really after?

I believe the Mars Trilogy is widely held to be top of the ‘realistic’ sci-fi stakes. A very good read.

Edit: I didn’t realise The Martians was the book of short stories from the same author. Should have read my own link.

Consider Phlebas by Iain Banks is a good one to start with (obviously).

The Forever War by Joe Haldeman is also very good.

No Jim, my book is different to the one you’re talking about, the Mars trilogy looks exactly the kind of thing I’m after, cheers.

Larry Niven wrote a series set in his ‘known space’

The Stars My Destination by Alfred Bester (originally known as Tiger Tiger in the UK).

I’ll check them out, keep ’em coming folks.

As well as Tiger, Tiger/SMD, Alfred Bester also wrote The Demolished Man, both books are regarded as the precursors of the Cyberpunk style of writing. William Gibson is one of the best-known writers in that sub-genre, I would recommend his short-story collection, Burning Chrome, because it introduces the world his stories inhabit, as well as a certain character. Johnny Mnemonic introduces The Sprawl Trilogy; Neuromancer/CountZero/Mona Lisa Overdrive, which the movie Bladerunner is remarkably like.
He also co-writes with Bruce Sterling, who is also known for his gritty urban type of SF.
Gibson’s ‘Bridge Trilogy’; Virtual Light/Idoru/All Tomorrow’s Parties, is a bit more Noir-ish, and has a cycle courier as a lead character, and then there’s his Hubert Bigend* series; Pattern Recognition/Spook Country/Zero History, which are much more present day, with instantly recognisable technology, like drones, operated via iPhone, before such tech was really known about.
*Pronounced ‘Beyjaund’

Cheers for the very comprehensive reply cz, I’ve done some more digging myself and found my niche: ‘hard science fiction’, as in ‘hard science’ fiction, NOT ‘hard’ science fiction (oo err missus). The stuff towards the end of your post sounds more my cup of tea. I’m not into aliens and alternative universes, but each to their own. Cheers all

Mars trilogy can be pretty hard work but it’s bloody amazing, it’s not so much a novel as a future history. I always say the same thing, it feels like Kim Stanley Robinson lived through it.

Alastair Reynolds writes some excellent stuff. House of Suns is particularly interesting because unlike most hard sf he makes it work without having to imagine a FTL drive.

Right, going to get myself Red Mars!

Back the Future novelisations…

nah im just replying here so i can pick the list off the above posts when i’ve got time to search/wishlist amazon.

sorry

I’ve done some more digging myself and found my niche: ‘hard science fiction’, as in ‘hard science’ fiction,

Try Greg Egan, proper hard scifi.

Northwind – Member

Mars trilogy can be pretty hard work but it’s bloody amazing, it’s not so much a novel as a future history. I always say the same thing, it feels like Kim Stanley Robinson lived through it.
Have you read anything else by KSR, and how do you think it stacks up? I found the Mars books weird – I didn’t like them, which is by the by, but they read like the work of a completely different writer. KSR’s early stuff is heavy sheeeit – stuff like the planet on the table is absolute top drawer, stellar writing, really ambitious. The likes of Gene Wolfe (no less), were saying this guy is the future of SF.
The Mars books are defo ambitious in some respects – his passion and knowledge comes through for sure, but it’s like he dictated them to a journalist who had no clue on even the basics of writing a novel.

The “Wool” trilogy by Hugh Howey I can’t recommend highly enough.

Coyote – have you read book 4? I’ve read the original trilogy but book 4 seems to have very mixed reviews.

gobuchul – Member
Consider Phlebas by Iain Banks is a good one to start with (obviously).

The Forever War by Joe Haldeman is also very good.

good user name/post combo

I’d say Player of Games is better to start with in Iain M Banks

The wool series was quite good, enjoyed that. Not read 4 though.

Anyway, if I was recommending sci-fi books I’d go for the following list. (Hopefully in order)

Snow Crash (quite possibly my favourite book of all time, simply brilliant and without doubt the best 1st chapter that has ever been written)
Neuromancer (This and Snow Crash were clear inspirations for the Matrix trilogy)
The Dune series (1,2 and 3 are awesome)
Enders Game (ignore the rubbish film)
RingWorld
I, Robot

That’ll keep you busy for a while.

@Garry Lager, I think I’ve read all the short stories from planet on the table, can’t remember them all from the titles tbh but I loved lucky strike/sensitive dependence on initial conditions…

Still haven’t read a couple of the early novels but I didn’t feel a big jump in style from teh californias and icehenge to mars… Really wasn’t a fan of Galileo’s Dream though and Shaman was a bit odd… I think one of the things I really liked about Mars is the jumps in style and delivery- Coyote and Nirgal’s bits read totally differently to Sax’s and Anne’s, frinstance, the book runs to the character’s beat. Doesn’t always work mind. I’ve read them all a few times and if Sax’s wanders in the desert get me in the right mood, it’s probably my favourite bit of writing full stop.

I’d say Player of Games is better to start with in Iain M Banks

Oh hell no.

That was my first and I wish I’d gone for something else, Excession maybe (although Consider is constantly referenced as a baseline) or Use of Weapons depending on what mood you’re in. Player of Games is great but it’s not his most accessible work. In fact, my favourite is probably Excession, ITG certainly make it the most amusing.

I started on Consider Phlebeas, I still reckon it’s the best introduction to the Culture. Maybe not the best of the series mind. But also, Banks doesn’t really meet the OP’s call does he? Not hard SF at all, he throws a bit of science at you but it’s really just sufficiently advanced magic.

Book 4? Is there a book 4?

There is Sand but that’s a standalone novel.

@Samuri – Just read the bumph on Snow Crash. It does look rather good. Next on the list.

Isn’t Sand set in the same world just a bit later on?

Proxima by Stephen Baxter should fit the bill?

I’m midway through Dune at the moment and am enjoying that a lot. I also second the recommendations for Wool.

The Martian is next on my list and, after that, I may finally get around to Leviathan Wakes that has been on my ‘to read’ list for a while.

+1 for Snow Crash, and The Diamond Age (same author) Outstanding.

I may follow some of these up. I read loads of sci fi when I was a kid, classic space opera thru all Asimov, Clark, Heinlein etc to Ballard, but none in the past 20-30 years apart from Iain M Banks which I love and reread.

Anyway, another vote for the Iain Banks’ ‘mainstream’ literature, much of which is pretty close to sci fi/fantasy (Walking on Glass, the Bridge, Transitions.)

(I vaguely recall reading him saying it was pretty random the way his middle initial made it into his sci fi name, and that it was never deliberate to differentiate.)

Another suggestion, not genre sci fi though it wanders the edge with fantasy and pushes a lot of the same buttons, is David Mitchell, who’s quite happy to go off into dystopian futures etc with, with a feeling that anything is possible…

Finally, if you’ve not read early (or middle or late come to that) Kurt Vonnegut, lots of that is sci fi, kinda (sirens of titan).

I guess I must like my sci fi in a literary plain brown paper wrapper…

Bookmarked.

I’d say Player of Games is better to start with in Iain M Banks
Oh hell no.

That was my first and I wish I’d gone for something else, Excession maybe (although Consider is constantly referenced as a baseline) or Use of Weapons depending on what mood you’re in. Player of Games is great but it’s not his most accessible work. In fact, my favourite is probably Excession, ITG certainly make it the most amusing.
Absolutely agree with squirrelking here, I’ve got Player… and I’ve only read it through once, tried several more times, but the lead character is just so unbearably, unremittingly awful that I just can’t carry on.
Most of Banks’s characters are flawed, some quite dreadfully so, but there is always something there that allows a degree of sympathy, but not in Player…
Snowcrash is one I should have thought of earlier, great book, very inventive, lots of humour. The Diamond Age
Is also very tech orientated, but darker in tone, and less humour.
Good book, though, very readable.

Larry Niven and Jerry Pournelle togethr wrote ‘Lucifer’s Hammer’. That’s Niven the mathematician and Pournelle the NASA engineer, consequently the book is very real and credible, from the time of the space shuttle.

OP here, good to see more discussion. I decided against Red Mars and have gone for The Quiet War by Paul McAuley. I’ve also got the audio book of Consider Phoebe for the driver to and from work. This is turning into an excellent reference thread for future* purchases.

*see what I did there?

It’s been while since I read them, but the Foundation Trilogy books by Asimov absolutely gripped me when I was younger. I also loved “Rendezvous with Rama” by Arthur C Clarke.

I don’t know how well either of these will have aged.

For a different perspective (more of a dystopian future fiction than straight science fiction), how about “Oryx and Crake” by Margaret Attwood? Sweet and depressing by turns, it’s also terrifyingly believable.

Great thread. Bookmarked!

Hannu Rajaniemi’s Thief triology is a ripping yarn:

First book is the Quantum Thief, then The Fractal Angel and lastly the Casual Angel.

High concept hard sci fi with elements of mystery and whodunit.

Ilium and Olympos by Dan Simmonds are an inventive reworking of the Iliad and Greek mythology, combined with Shakespeare along the way.

Early Charlie Stross is good – Singularity sky, Glasshouse, Accelerando, Saturn’s children – but writes too much now, low quality control.

Richard Morgan’s stuff is hardboiled sci-fi.

Black man – 40 something supersoldiers on the loose in post United States.

Market forces – Death race crossed with the Dogs of war

Altered carbon – ultraviolent PI tries to track down who murdered his employer, who has been resurrected from back up missing 10 ours. . .

Someone mentioned Alastair Reynolds, I’m just finishing Abolsution Gap which is the third in the Revelation Soace trilogy, really good books with a basis in proper science. To me they read a bit like Iain Banks but more in depth with how the tech works. Still haven’t quite got my head around conjoined drives yet though.

I’ve read most of the Culture books and I do like Player of Games but I wouldn’t say it’s the best. Consider Phlebas is, fittingly, the best introduction to it all though.

Couple of classics I’ve read recently, well worth checking out

Tau Zero – Poul Anderson

and

Solaris – Stanislaw Lem

In fact I think I picked up Tau Zero as result of a recommendation in a previous thread on here.

Not sure if it’s Sci-fi but I am currently enjoying “The Passage” by Justin Cronin. I guess it falls more into the “post-apocalyptic” pile.

I have “Gateway” by Frederik Pohl lined up next: That seems t get good review.

Mentioning Dan Simmons Olympia reminded me – his earlier Hyperion quadrilogy is excellent. Really inventive.

Tau Zero – Poul Anderson

Something of a minor classic, often overlooked. Good book, haven’t read it in a while, always got something going on the phone/pad, (400+ books), although I’m currently reading Claire North’s new hardcover Touch, which is truly excellent, although not hard/tech SF.