Sci-Fi and Fantasy Recommendations

[ChrisSamsDad]

It's a very easy sci-fi book, not like the ones that say phaser or some annoying thing that needs two pages worth of explanation (which is by far my biggest beef with sci-fi books). But in this book you learn gradually and it's incredibly riveting.

Everyone knows what a phaser is by now, surely? How long has Star Trek been around? Sci-fi, almost by definition has to involve some science, otherwise it'd just be 'fi' and anyone can do that.

[DiykhaniyeIzOsen]

That was just the first thing that popped into my mind to use as an example and yes, they do need science but that science doesn't have to be rediculously tedious for people to understand to have it be sci-fi.

[loopylisa]

I Would highly recommend The Host by stephanie meyer, very good read if you are into sci-fi, based on the idea of "souls" taking over tyhe human body and living as a human but things ger difficult when i human owner of the body does not want to let go!! talk about split personality!!
Highly recommended x x

[bruce brown]

I have a question for Scott. I have a graphic novel called Howard
Lovecraft & The Frozen Kingdom. It is an all ages introduction to the works of H.P. Lovecraft. Would it be possible to get a review of this book for this thread?

[poomlie]

Do his right-wing political views come out in his Sci-fi writing? That was always a bit irritating about Robert Heinlein (Robinn EE Hitler as he was sometimes referred to as)

Orson Scott Card is a practicing Mormon, so chances are he is a right wing kind of guy. Not necessarily, but most likely. I love his writing anyway.

Favorite Sci Fi for me is Childhood's End by Arthur C. Clark, or most things by Arthur. Also liked the Titan, Wizard, Demon series by John Varley, minus the Demon one.

[silver]

I posted this in the General Discussion Forum, and then stumbled onto this thread. Maybe someone here can help. I'm just going to copy and paste, apologies.

Ok, so I have a question concerning a certain style of book. If anyone has read "Gamer Fantastic" by Martin H. Greenburg, this pertains to that. It's a book of short sci-fi stories, and one of them caught my attention. This girl moves back to a city housing a long abandoned family estate. She's struggling to get by, so she starts looking for a job. She saw the wanted sign on a Gamer Store, and went in to apply. This particular store was a little different. One of the things they worked with included Role Playing Games, the old school kind like Dungeons and Dragons. The whole dice era. She didn't know much about it, but just expected to be working a counter. While that was one of her duties, also included was the responsibility to become more familiar with the games. She even had to roll to figure out what kind of character she was, dexterity, intelligence, strength, agility, the whole works. What she didn't realize was that this was actually determing who she was. For example, a co-worker who had been there for a few months longer than she had had rolled a set of stats indicitive of a mage. Later, he surprised her by conjuring a full feast before her eyes, without actually showing anything or giving anything away. He ACTUALLY WAS a wizard. What he rolled when determining his character was reality. She rolled stats that correspond with those of a thief. Anyway, I won't give away the whole story for those that haven't read it before.

My question was, where can I find similar stuff? It was set in a present-day form, but it involved a lot of elements from medieval-themes. The dorky co-worker with the big pimple and glasses that IS a wizard. The strong, muscular inventory delivery man that is actually a warrior. The new employee that has an uncanny ability for theivery. Story lines built up from something similar to this is what I'm interested in. If anyone has any recommendations or knows of a way to find similar story-lines, please feel free to let me know. Thanks a lot.

That reminds me of the Guardians of the Flame series by Joel Rosenberg. Sorry it took so long for an answer I couldn't think of the name so I had to dig through my boxes of books to find it. Anyway here is the back of the first book:

"It began as just another evening of fantasy gaming, with James, Karl, Andrea, and the rest ready to assume their various roles as wizard, cleric, warrior, or thief. But sorceress game master Professor Deighton had something else planned for this unsuspecting group of college students. And the 'game' soon became a matter of life and death as the seven adventurers found themselves transported to an alternate world and into the bodies of the actual characters they had been pretending to be."

[xaraan]

For some good Fantasy books try:

The Name of the Wind by Patrick Rothfuss (the first book of a trilogy, and the only one out so far. One of the best fantasy books I've read in a long time though)

The First Law Trilogy by Joe Abercrombie (the characters are a bit generic in their types, but he does a great job with them relation and story wise)

George RR Martin's "A Song of Fire and Ice" series, 1st book is "A Game of Thrones" (another series still waiting for it's next book, but a very very good one. Four books deep so far, but if you like fantasy I would definitely read these)

Robert Jordan's Wheel of Time series is pretty good. It's gets a bit boring seven books in, feels like he is dragging it out. But now Brandon Sanderson is finishing it for him now that he passed; so it will probably pick up a bit. That series is a commitment though lol.

Brent Weeks "The Night Angel" trilogy was a fun read. Feels a bit like he was inspired by the Assassin's Creed video game initially (and by the cover art), but I really enjoyed the characters.

The Harry Potter series, if you haven't already read it; is great.


For Urban Fantasy:

I've seen tons of people talk about the Anita Blake series, but I haven't got into it myself.

Personally I love the Harry Dresden Files by Jim Butcher. Told in that first person narrative and set in the modern world where magic and supernatural really exist like most of the other urban fantasy. They have been extremely fun to read and pretty engrossing to me.

Monster Hunter International by Larry Correia is kinda like that same urban fantasy I suppose. It's told in 1st person again, set in the modern world; where monsters still exist and the main character works for a company that hunts them. It's only a single book, but it was a pretty fun read, kinda like a popcorn action movie; but still a good story to it.


For Sci-Fi:

I haven't read a ton of Sci-Fi. I've seen others talk about Ender's Game and that series, which is good.

[Bowlie]

For some good Fantasy books try:

The Name of the Wind by Patrick Rothfuss (the first book of a trilogy, and the only one out so far. One of the best fantasy books I've read in a long time though)

The First Law Trilogy by Joe Abercrombie (the characters are a bit generic in their types, but he does a great job with them relation and story wise)

George RR Martin's "A Song of Fire and Ice" series, 1st book is "A Game of Thrones" (another series still waiting for it's next book, but a very very good one. Four books deep so far, but if you like fantasy I would definitely read these)

Robert Jordan's Wheel of Time series is pretty good. It's gets a bit boring seven books in, feels like he is dragging it out. But now Brandon Sanderson is finishing it for him now that he passed; so it will probably pick up a bit. That series is a commitment though lol.

Brent Weeks "The Night Angel" trilogy was a fun read. Feels a bit like he was inspired by the Assassin's Creed video game initially (and by the cover art), but I really enjoyed the characters.

The Harry Potter series, if you haven't already read it; is great.


For Urban Fantasy:

I've seen tons of people talk about the Anita Blake series, but I haven't got into it myself.

Personally I love the Harry Dresden Files by Jim Butcher. Told in that first person narrative and set in the modern world where magic and supernatural really exist like most of the other urban fantasy. They have been extremely fun to read and pretty engrossing to me.

Monster Hunter International by Larry Correia is kinda like that same urban fantasy I suppose. It's told in 1st person again, set in the modern world; where monsters still exist and the main character works for a company that hunts them. It's only a single book, but it was a pretty fun read, kinda like a popcorn action movie; but still a good story to it.


For Sci-Fi:

I haven't read a ton of Sci-Fi. I've seen others talk about Ender's Game and that series, which is good.

I read one Anita Blake book and couldn't get into it. I also heard as the series goes on, there is more and more sex. I've read most of the Merry Gentry series that Hamilton writes, but I'm getting really tired of all the sex in that too. I'm not against a little sex in books, but geez....she goes a little overboard. Every time I read one I can't help but think she's pervy and hope that her parents don't read her books.

[xaraan]

I read one Anita Blake book and couldn't get into it. I also heard as the series goes on, there is more and more sex. I've read most of the Merry Gentry series that Hamilton writes, but I'm getting really tired of all the sex in that too. I'm not against a little sex in books, but geez....she goes a little overboard. Every time I read one I can't help but think she's pervy and hope that her parents don't read her books.

Yea, I heard the same as well. She has a lot of fans that loved the first several Anita Blake books, but really haven't liked the last few because of the shift toward sex. I have the first two on my shelf, but haven't read them yet. My gf hasn't tried them to give me her thoughts, but she has read some Dark Hunter series by Sherylon Kenyon that she loves (I don't know if it has some sexual stuff in it or not)

[awash1]

For some good Fantasy books try:

The Name of the Wind by Patrick Rothfuss (the first book of a trilogy, and the only one out so far. One of the best fantasy books I've read in a long time though)

Agreed. That is a really good book. For urban fantasy I like Illona Andrews, the first of her series is called Magic Bites and it's like sci-fi urban fantasy mix. Good stuff. I am also fond of Jim Butcher's Dresden Files. Jim Butcher also writes a really good fantasy series to ... The Furies of Calderon. Rachel Caine's Weather Warden series is also good stuff. And I absolutely must support my local girl so give Patricia Briggs' Mercy series a go too.

[Lynda Coker]

When reading the back cover of this book, it described the story as reading like a modern-day '1984' and 'Fahrenheit 451'. I have to tell you that this set me on edge a little, as both those books are old favorites of mine. So to say I was geared to be a tough critic, is putting it mildly.

The story is about Words. We use them daily, take them for granted, and abuse them without thought. Veracity plunges its readers into a time when Words are a controlled substance, and some words, the Red Listed ones, are denied altogether. The kind of governmental change that brings this eradication of the basic freedom of speech is horrifying. The 'Pandemic', as described, is so possible it raised the hairs on my arms like they were little soldiers standing at attention. Scary, thought-provoking, thoroughly entertaining, are all descriptions that fit this book.

If there were a down side for me, it was the way the story was formatted into flashbacks and forwards. This may not be a factor for most readers, but it robbed me of some of the enjoyment, as I had to several times pull myself out of the story in order to readjust myself in the proper time frame.

[bluegirl123876]

I like Scott Westerfeld

If you like science fiction then look for the Midnighters Series

1.The Secret Hour
2.Touching Darkness
3.Blue Noon

These are the names of the books

[pendragonisgood]

I am pretty sure that the Pendragon series falls under the genre of fantasy. I read the whole series
1. merchant of death
2. lost city of farr
3. the never war
4. the reality bug
5. Black water
6. rivers of zadda
7. quillian games
8. pilgrams of rayne
9. raven rise
10. the soldiers of halla
Its about a boy named bobby pendragon and his "uncle" Press tilton. The night of a huge basketball game bobby makes out with the girl of his dreams. But Press comes to tell him people need his help. So together they travel the territories of halla all that there ever was and will be. Trying to save it from being taken over by Saint Dane. The travelers bobby, press, osa, loor, alder, saint dane, nevva winter, eli winter, spader, gunny, kasha, siry, aja, and patrick mac. Its up to the travelers and booby's friends mark dimond and courtney chetwynde.

[fkeru]

well i havnt read all the posts so i dont know if anyone has recommended this at all but Terry Pratchett's discworld novels have got to be the best fantasy books after Harry Potter. They are imaginative, satirical and very funny and if thats your kind of book then you will absolutely love them

[Kathe]

If you are looking for intelligent, philosophical sci-fi, I highly recommend Gene Wolfe's The Fifth Head of Cerberus and The Book of The New Sun series. Also Flowers For Algernon by Daniel Keyes, which can be appreciated by anyone, not just sci-fi fans.

If you enjoy a good fantasy series, with excellent character development, you can't go wrong with Robin Hobb's three trilogies: The Farseer Trilogy, The Live Ship Trader Trilogy, and The Tawny Man Trilogy. And yes, they should be read in that order.

If you are looking for romantic, fairy-tale like fantasy, there is none better than Patricia McKillip. Try Winter Rose or The Forgotten Beasts of Eld.

If you are looking for urban fantasy that is highly literate, poetic, and thought-provoking an excellent read would be Little, Big by John Crowley.