Sci fi/dystopian fiction recommendations

[Heavenscent86]

So as the title says can anyone recommend me some really good Sci fi or dystopian books to read?

Patrick Ness- The Knife of Letting Go (1st of 3)

It's meant to be for young adults in the same way as the Pullman books are. Set in a dystopia world where there are no women and the men left can read each other's (and animals') mind.
Warning though- parts of it will make you sob. Seriously.
But beautifully written and three books which is a bonus.

Tad Williams- the Otherland series.

Set in the near future where the Internet has turned virtual reality and children are mysteriously falling into a coma after surfing forbidden parts of the net.
Turns into an epic multi-characters multi-worlds amazingly evocative with some seriously moving moments.

Otherwise the Wool trilogy is not bad. It's about human living in bunkers and only allowed out to 'clean' the windows- which kills them as no-one can survive outside.
A bit slow going but quite intriguing.

Anne McCaffrey. Ship Who Sang, Crystal singer series. Dragons of Pern (origin book makes it sci-fi). Anything by Herbert or Asimov. Stranger in a Strange Land (I wonder if you will grok that?).

I just finished The Knife Of Never Letting Go and found it too weak for even DD (10) who is tearing through Hunger Games and Gone series atm. Honestly, I can't imagine anyone shedding a tear over its pathetically thin plot, ludicrous premise, and dumb protagonist.

Marking place

Definitely Station Eleven and Oryx& Crake. I still miss the characters.
I would second Carhullan Army as well. I read it a long time ago and it has stayed with me.
I loved Girlfriend in Coma by Douglas Coupland when younger, but recently reread it and was less keen.

Children of Men - PD James

Has anyone mentioned Sheri S Tepper yet? Specifically Grass, Raising the Stones and Sideshow, which are loosely a trilogy? Interesting feminist-oriented science fiction. I don't get on with all her stuff, but I love those three.

Have you read A Brief History of the Dead by Kevin Brockmeier?

It's set after almost everyone in the world has died, and just one woman is left alive. She is a scientist in Antarctica and has managed to avoid the thing that killed everyone else.

It's also set in a place called The City, where the dead live for as long as someone left on earth can remember them.

I'm not making it sound very good, but I liked it when I read it. And it manages to combine the ends of two places, life on earth and life in The City, as people die, arrive, and disappear as the people who remembered the first to die follow them.

I'll second the suggestions for The Passage trilogy and the Wool trilogy, and if nobody else has said it I'll add The Three and Day Four by Sarah Lotz. It's another trilogy but no release fro the third book yet as far as I know.

I just finished Station Eleven and while it was beautifully written and cleverly plotted there were just so many massive implausibilities for me. Why no electricity for twenty years when the world is full of solar panels and wind turbines? I can buy that there might be travelling symphonies far more easily than that there won't be travelling electricians...

Wool - the first is terrific, the second not quite as good and the third doesn't cut it.

The Man Who Fell To Earth by Walter Tevis, about an alien who comes to earth to find a way of saving his dying planet; quite a depressing read, but I thought it was brilliant. Vintage sci-fi, written in the 1960s.

Also second Riddley Walker & Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep.

Haven't read them since I was a teenager but I adored Spares and Only Forward by Michael Marshall Smith, which have a strong vein of surreal humour. Spares was going to be made into a film at one point but was ripped off by The Island, which should give you an idea of the subject matter. Very disturbing in parts.

YY to Station Eleven, The Chaos Walking trilogy, Orxy and Crake, Ready Player One and Lexicon. All fab.

This has been an expensive thread for me, I bought The Death of Grass and loved it (thought it would be a fab book club read as has lots of interesting themes, particularly relevant to current developments) and I have raced through the first two Red Rising books, half way through the third.

Have just bought Brilliance and The Anubis Gates to line up as next reads :-)

Oh, I and I was going to add that I am in the minority but didn't like the Wool trilogy. The first one was ok, but I gave up half way through the second as it was annoying and dull (and I don't stop reading books very often).

I didn't like Wool, either. None of it made much sense. The life as described in the silo is impossible, and not just because of they apparently (and miraculously) manage to find everything they need by digging downwards ). Fluffy sci-fi like Station Eleven.

theforce - I read & enjoyed The Man Who Fell To Earth - a long time ago! It was made into a film where the alien was played by none other than David Bowie. He was brilliant

Oops forgot to say that I read Spares, too. I looked up my review on the 50-Book thread from last year, and I've called it "dark, interesting, and rather strange. A cross between Philip K Dick and William Gibson, sort of a twisted Blade Runner"

It was good but I have no idea what the hell the author was saying in the last 20% of so of the book. What on Earth was all that about?

Kim Stanley Robinson '2312'

also liked his Galileo's Dream
dithering about buying 'Aurora' read the sample but couldn't decide whether to get the book

Peter F Hamilton - Void trilogy and Pandora's Star...

SM Stirling, Dies the Fire and sequels - Earth, near future, electricity etc fails.

The Peshawar Lancers is also a sideways post disaster book I enjoyed.

Hi I ended up buying The First Fifteen Lives of Harry August which unfortunately I didn't enjoy. I found it dragged a little and didn't grip me. I also bought TIme and Time Again which was much better. I did very much enjoy that one and will try more of Ben Eltons books. Now to go back through this thread and pick something else to read.

The 5th wave
Brave new world
1984

Not sure if it has been mentioned but I Just finished California and it was fab.

Im in the middle of Red Rising, and finding it excellent. Maybe a tad 'teenish' but not so much.

Put down Wool and have no desire to pick it up again.

Yes to Mark Lawrence. It does count I think.

The Passage was ok, but have no need to read further books in the series.

Some good idea here and will take a browse later on my Kindle.

I have just read Ready player one on the basis of this thread. I need a new book now. And to find a way to transfer it to dds kindle if possible.

Anciliary Justice by Ann Leckie is one of the best Sci-fi books I have read.

One of the things I like about it is that it isn't a dystopia that is likely to become real (I worry about real life politics enough as it is), but a purely fictional one that therefore can be enjoyed without any "Fridge Horror", so to speak.

If you fancy a bit of a challenge anything by C J Cherryh. The challenge is finding them. Waterstones don't have her on their distribution list at all!

She does a range of middle European myth based book - Russalka (The Russia Series) The Paladin, as well as a space universe or wars - Alliance/Union lots of interwoven books

Then there is The Faded Sun trilogy - which I have owned for decades and still go back to. Makes me cry for all sorts of reasons/species.

Even her fantasy novels are dystopian, Chronicles of Morgaine is so well written you can taste the fear.

Then the Fortress series, is that wizard good, bad or just plain mad?

And others www.cherryh.com/www/univer.htm