My reading of sci-fi has been circumscribed by my genereal disdain for stories with large, mean scaly aliens. If there are aliens in the story it's better if they don't show their scaly faces, like Arthur C. Clarke's Rendezvous with Rama. If they do show up they need to be believable on some level and if not, the book goes back to the library unread. As a result my recommended reads here are more earth bound, near future, straight science based stories, hopefully with decent characterizations.

Fiction

As mentioned in the "Golden Age" section of this site, the Asimov and Greenberg collections are a great introduction to some of the better early stuff. Out of print but most are available used via Amazon for a few bucks each; Isaac Asimov Presents the Great SF Stories, Volumes 1 to 25.

Greg Bear: Vitals, The Forge of God, Darwin's Radio and Blood Music are my favourites. Well written hard sci-fi of the 1990s and 2000s.

William S. Burroughs: If you're ready for a challenge and aren't squeamish, Burroughs might be your man. A combination of vile, old man and gentleman his stuff is not for the weak of heart. The trilogy Cities of the Red Night, The Place of Dead Roads and The Western Lands is almost a narrative compared to earlier works and might be the place to start. He also wrote a book about his favourite cats, The Cat Inside.

Octavia Butler: Kindred and the two Parable novels are her best. Any of her books are worth reading if you are at all interested in social relations especially around the issues of race and wealth.

Philip K. Dick (1928-1982): Almost anything by Dick is entertaining and thought provoking. The Man in the High Castle or a collection of his short stories are a good place to start.

Nalo Hopkinson: I have not read Nalo's latest but I enjoyed the West Indian flavour in Midnight Robber, a mixture of folk tale and sci-fi and Brown Girl in the Ring, a post apocalypse dystopia set in Toronto.

Marge Piercy: Start with Woman on the Edge of Time or He, She, It first.

Joanna Russ: Her classic novel is The Female Man, though a bit of a challenging read as the narrative is not linear.

Alison Sinclair: A Victoria resident of whose books Cavalcade is a good first choice. It is a story in which a group of people are stranded and must figure out how to get along with an alien technology and each other.

Neal Stephenson: Aside from the already mentioned works, Cryptonomicon is a big, fat, juicy read that falls a little short of what it sets out to achieve but is still a great book. Set in World War II and the present the plot revolves around the German Enigma code, the codebreakers and some good old Nazi gold.

Kurt Vonnegut: Vonnegut's work resides in a nether world between genres but it is almost always humorous, except Player Piano, which is a tale of technology gone wrong. Breakfast of Champions and Slaughterhouse Five are perhaps his best known works.

Peter Watts: Starfish is the first and best of a "four part trilogy" (the third book is divided into two volumes). Watts writes about 'rifters" who have one lung replaced with an artifical gill allowing them to breathe underwater and extract valuable minerals and life forms near deep sea vents for the corpses (corporate executives). It's a hard to put down, inventive book with tense, dark characters and their more-than-slightly-twisted minds.As Watts says in the end note "Actually, you might be surprised at how much of this stuff I didn't make up."

Robert Charles Wilson:Wilson is a very good writer and any of his books are worth reading although I especially enjoyed Darwinia. Other books like Spin, Blind Lake, Bios, Mysterium and Chronoliths are also good. He has "big ideas" and well written characters.

Octavia Butler
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Octavia Estelle Butler died on February 25, 2006 of a fall, possibly caused by a stroke, outside her home in Seattle. She was a brilliant, socially conscious, African-American woman writer in the white, male dominated genre of sci-fi.

I was extremely saddened to learn of her death in conducting research for this project, as I have been reading her books for almost 20 years and I will sorely miss her writing. The loss of her to an accident at only 58 is truly tragic. This link is to an obituary.

In 1995, she won a $295,000 MacArthur Fellowship, known as the "genius grant." In 2000, she received the Nebula Award for her novel "Parable of the Talents." The Nebula award is science fiction's highest prize.

In a 1999 interview, Ms. Butler told a Seattle Times reporter that she had been a tall, socially awkward child in Pasadena, Calif., spending much of her time in the public library and sending manuscripts to publishers when she was only 12 or 13.

"I consider Octavia to be the most important science-fiction writer since Mary Shelley," said Steven Barnes, an African-American science-fiction writer.
http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/localnews/2002831388_butlerobit27m.html

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	Further Reading Fiction and Octavia Butler My reading of sci-fi has been circumscribed by my genereal disdain for stories with large, mean scaly aliens. If there are aliens in the story it's better if they don't show their scaly faces, like Arthur C. Clarke's Rendezvous with Rama. If they do show up they need to be believable on some level and if not, the book goes back to the library unread. As a result my recommended reads here are more earth bound, near future, straight science based stories, hopefully with decent characterizations. Fiction As mentioned in the "Golden Age" section of this site, the Asimov and Greenberg collections are a great introduction to some of the better early stuff. Out of print but most are available used via Amazon for a few bucks each; Isaac Asimov Presents the Great SF Stories, Volumes 1 to 25. Greg Bear: Vitals, The Forge of God, Darwin's Radio and Blood Music are my favourites. Well written hard sci-fi of the 1990s and 2000s. William S. Burroughs: If you're ready for a challenge and aren't squeamish, Burroughs might be your man. A combination of vile, old man and gentleman his stuff is not for the weak of heart. The trilogy Cities of the Red Night, The Place of Dead Roads and The Western Lands is almost a narrative compared to earlier works and might be the place to start. He also wrote a book about his favourite cats, The Cat Inside. Octavia Butler: Kindred and the two Parable novels are her best. Any of her books are worth reading if you are at all interested in social relations especially around the issues of race and wealth. Philip K. Dick (1928-1982): Almost anything by Dick is entertaining and thought provoking. The Man in the High Castle or a collection of his short stories are a good place to start. Nalo Hopkinson: I have not read Nalo's latest but I enjoyed the West Indian flavour in Midnight Robber, a mixture of folk tale and sci-fi and Brown Girl in the Ring, a post apocalypse dystopia set in Toronto. Marge Piercy: Start with Woman on the Edge of Time or He, She, It first. Joanna Russ: Her classic novel is The Female Man, though a bit of a challenging read as the narrative is not linear. Alison Sinclair: A Victoria resident of whose books Cavalcade is a good first choice. It is a story in which a group of people are stranded and must figure out how to get along with an alien technology and each other. Neal Stephenson: Aside from the already mentioned works, Cryptonomicon is a big, fat, juicy read that falls a little short of what it sets out to achieve but is still a great book. Set in World War II and the present the plot revolves around the German Enigma code, the codebreakers and some good old Nazi gold. Kurt Vonnegut: Vonnegut's work resides in a nether world between genres but it is almost always humorous, except Player Piano, which is a tale of technology gone wrong. Breakfast of Champions and Slaughterhouse Five are perhaps his best known works. Peter Watts: Starfish is the first and best of a "four part trilogy" (the third book is divided into two volumes). Watts writes about 'rifters" who have one lung replaced with an artifical gill allowing them to breathe underwater and extract valuable minerals and life forms near deep sea vents for the corpses (corporate executives). It's a hard to put down, inventive book with tense, dark characters and their more-than-slightly-twisted minds.As Watts says in the end note "Actually, you might be surprised at how much of this stuff I didn't make up." Robert Charles Wilson:Wilson is a very good writer and any of his books are worth reading although I especially enjoyed Darwinia. Other books like Spin, Blind Lake, Bios, Mysterium and Chronoliths are also good. He has "big ideas" and well written characters. Octavia Butler to top of page Octavia Estelle Butler died on February 25, 2006 of a fall, possibly caused by a stroke, outside her home in Seattle. She was a brilliant, socially conscious, African-American woman writer in the white, male dominated genre of sci-fi. I was extremely saddened to learn of her death in conducting research for this project, as I have been reading her books for almost 20 years and I will sorely miss her writing. The loss of her to an accident at only 58 is truly tragic. This link is to an obituary. In 1995, she won a $295,000 MacArthur Fellowship, known as the "genius grant." In 2000, she received the Nebula Award for her novel "Parable of the Talents." The Nebula award is science fiction's highest prize. In a 1999 interview, Ms. Butler told a Seattle Times reporter that she had been a tall, socially awkward child in Pasadena, Calif., spending much of her time in the public library and sending manuscripts to publishers when she was only 12 or 13. "I consider Octavia to be the most important science-fiction writer since Mary Shelley," said Steven Barnes, an African-American science-fiction writer. http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/localnews/2002831388_butlerobit27m.html to top of page

Further Reading