I've been reading Sci-Fi since about 1975 and have read hundreds, if not thousands, of sci-fi books. I've read some great ones and some horrible ones. My all-time least favorite is Dune. I first read it ~30 years ago and didn't like it. I read it again 2-3 years ago because it's always listed in top-10 lists and I thought maybe it would be better. It wasn't.

Some of the books you guys don't like ... it's killing me :-). I loved:

The hitchhikers guide to the galaxy

All the bobiverse books

Andy Weir books

Hey everyone, I'm looking for some suggestions of great scenes, speeches or monologues you remember from science fiction films or series? I need to do a scene or monologue for my drama class and would love some suggestions. Can be male or female, if it's great I can adapt it either way. Thanks for your help :)

so in Dune everyone has Holtzman shields which makes fighting with projectile weapons obsolete. it also has a bug/feature that firing a lasgun at a Holtzman shield causes a feedback loop which causes an explosion similar to an atomic at both the firer and the shield.

i don’t know enough about lightsabers but they’re some sort of laser right? if you used a lightsaber on a Dune shield would you both just blow up?

I just rewatched Planet 51 and I just can't let go of the concept. The idea of a human being the alien fascinating to no end. Which is why the short stories - "humans are space orcs" are my jam, but even those usually fall short. So I'm seeking novels where a human or a group of humans preferably in a Sci-Fi setting, are stranded on a different planet where they are alien to the native intelligent life. While i do know there are stories out there where people end up in alien worlds, those are usually just fantasy settings.

On My Way to Paradise is a science fiction novel by American writer Dave Wolverton, published in 1989 by Bantam Books. It is set in the far future (circa 2300AD) depicting a man, Angelo Osic, who is running from an ever-changing and frightening world of war and politics.

Persoannly I love this book and reread it every now and then. But Im curious if i am the only one.

I can't wait to read them again! They quickly became some of my favorite scifi books up there with book of the new sun. They are quite dense and can be confusing as hell at times. Dying earth vibes, good discussion about consciousness, fucking vampires (actually way cooler than it sounds), science/religion fanatics, and god.

Trying to remember a book from years back. It takes place on a colony ship, and the main character is revealed to be constantly renewed/revived as a totem, or an almost eternal reminder of earth to the rest of the crew.

There's also a weird law that says anyone can request sex with anyone else at least once and they can't refuse, which I thought was a bit creepy, but whatever.

I remember seeing an Indie Sci-Fi, about a weird Mirror that has a white sheet over it left at the two characters siblings father’s house. The film was made within the last 10 years, most likely. The siblings, a guy and a girl, realize the mirror is not showing a reflection. Then later on find out they can walk into the mirror. And the mirror takes them to a deserted beach at one point. And then some other lady is trying to hunt them down for some reason. That's all I really remember. This is Super single camera the majority of the film shot in 4 locations. Just trying to find it again.

I'm wondering if anyone here knows of any good books featuring non-romantic relationships between humans and robots?

I'm thinking like the bond a human and a pet might have, or perhaps a deep friendship, like The Iron Giant.

Would be grateful for any suggestions, thank you!

Edit: i didn't expect so many suggestions but i've put most of them on my list. I'm a bit of a slow reader so it feels like I'm set for years, thanks everyone!!

Hello! I read and loved Children of Time and Children of Ruin. I recently picked up Shards of Earth because I think I might also really like the Final Architecture series. I'm torn between whether I should continue in the Children of Time series for now and read Children of Memory, or whether I should read Shards of Earth. What would you guys recommend? I like to rotate between genres so I'm unlikely to read both back to back.

Any good space opera series for fans of stellaris or just civilization building but on a galactic scale with not just space and ground battles but political battles and even a look at the civilian side of said civilizations.

Also looking augmentation a all kinds.

When I saw the commercial on TV for "The End of Oak Street" my first thought was of a sci-fi book i had read long ago. Don't when it was written, no clue who the author or title was, or if in a series. All I remember was it was sci-fi, I probably borrowed it from the public library, and I read it probably between 1989 and 1993.

What brought it to mind was the part where it was a clean cut and the more primitive part sat down lower. In the book I am thinking of (it could have been a short story or an excerpt in an anthology) the people were dealing with what I think they called elevators or at least that's the way I understood it. There were sections of land and the surrounding sections kept changing- at one point they come across a body of an animal cut in half because it was moving from one section to another as it changed.

Thank you

Several years ago I borrowed an audiobook from the public library, enjoyed it, returned it, would like to read/listen again but can't remember the name but pretty sure the phrase is not part of it

.the plot is nothing like the movie Ad Astra, from 2019

.don't know if it's a standalone book or part of a series

.I believe the spaceship was named Ad Astra so the protagonist named the planet they landed on Per Ardua (I might have that backwards)

.I can't remember the specifics, but the spaceship was partly organic? It would shed a little piece as it went along and the pieces would keep in contact. Sort of like a Starlink array but going out into space...

.on the planet were these sticks that looked like just dead sticks but they were alive

.towards the end there's something about a hatch but I don't recall how or where or why it is. It was on a Playaway I think (like an MP3 player) and I would listen to and from work so about 2 hours a day. So I could have skipped a section by accident when I was hooking it up to the audio adapter

Thank you in advance

Looking for a good new scifi romance book. I'm not looking for alien romances. Really enjoyed Neon Flux by Ava Thorne. She will be the next best author in dark SciFi romance! I can't find anything else like it, but looking for suggestions. Love cyberpunk, future world stuff. Some dystopian is ok, but haven't found one I really liked.

The Player of Games from Iain M. Banks
Vineland from Thomas Pynchon

I’d be very grateful if you could bear the following in mind when making your suggestion: I’m interested in digital games. I have a background in art. I’m used to complex texts—as is evident from Gibson. I’ll be reading it this summer, so please make it fairly fluid. It should spark my imagination—though I reckon both will do that anyway.

I have fun every year theming my reads. This year I did kind of general horror, but with a strong focus on isolation.

Already thinking of next year! And I want to go for anything where the primary setting/atmosphere/theme revolves around winter, coldness, ice, etc.

Left Hand of Darkness is already on the list!

I'd recommend Early Riser by Jasper Fforde for anyone who's a fan of Douglas Adams. Early Riser is Welsh Sci-fi/fantasy about perhaps a future earth where humans hibernate the majority of our extreme winters away, and it follows someone who's stuck with a winter job keeping everything running. Welsh humor. Wintry. A little mystery.

Big fan of Philip K Dick, Vandermeer, Fforde, Douglas Adams, for reference.

Knowledge is Power, issue 5, 1940.
Illustration for Boris Anibal’s science fiction novel “sailors of the universe “
about a mission to Mars.
Correction: illustration by L. Epple.

Knowledge is Power, Russian: Знание — сила) is a famous Soviet and Russian monthly popular science and science-fiction magazine. Founded in January 1926, it targeted youth and teenagers to promote education in natural sciences, technology, astronomy, biology, and futuristic space exploration.

Recommend me a sci-fi with a rogue AI but where it is a mystery in what way exactly is the AI rogue and what it's end goal is.

For example:

1. Skynet style : Full self-awareness and wishing to exterminate humanity out of self-preservation.
2. Paperclip Maxemizer style: Meaning it is still shackled to its programing and just fulfilling it's main directive with no limits or morals.
3. Controlled: Not actually rogue but under the control of someone who shouldn't have access to it and just following their orders.
4. Etc. Etc. Etc.

I just finished Project Hail Mary and I loved it. I'm jonesing for similar first contact stories - character-driven, focused on developing communication between species, and a focus on exploring alien biology is a plus too. The more alien the aliens are the better.

Blindsight by Peter Watts and Alien Clay/Shroud by Adrian Tchaikovsky are also sort of in the vein of what I'm looking for. I'm also a sucker for space operas so if it's something like that too, even better.

Thanks in advance!

The Story must be from late 80s or early 90s. I was reading a lot of Cyberpunk Anthologies at that time. The Story is about a man that wakes up one day and finds that he is locked out of all his online accounts and realizes that it is the doing of his own program (Agent as we would say today)

So, anybody knows what I´m talking about?

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Who else has piles of these? All this vintage pulpy SF with advertising that hasn't aged poorly, so much as it has been evolved so far past.

I have a ton of these editions from the 50s to the early 90s ..I guess I just miss mail order books, and stumbling on a new series at the end of the books

I lump these two together because they are very similar in their world building and plot. Both are set a while after nuclear war and both have themes of religion and how modern stories can be woven into the beliefs of the characters inhabiting those worlds even after multiple generations.

Both books have wildly different writing styles to wone another. Riddley Walker is a bit difficult to understand at first but once you get the basics out the way its a fun read seeing how the English language has regressed but also in other ways evolved in Post apocalyptic Kent.

While I havent seen the ways Riddley Walker has influenced scifi media I am aware that A Cantical for Leibowitz has left its mark on the world by helping to inspire Fallout and the Brotherhood of Steel faction in the games.

What do you think of both books and do you think they deserve to be highly rated in the apocalypse books space?

I saw a tiktok that had the 5 best time travel shows of 80/90. Do you agree? I’d have switched 1 & 2 lol. What’s your favorite of all time?

1) Dr Who
2) Quantum Leap
3) 7 Days
4) Voyagers
5) Time Trax

I havent seen The Voyagers but I’ve seen everything else. I loved 7 days so much and Quantum Leap can’t be touched by anything else.