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[Ken]

I mentioned in another thread that I have a long business trip coming up shortly.  It's always good to bring a few books along for things like that, and I have a small number of them saved away for the occasion.  Still, it wouldn't hurt to stock up a bit more, and I'm curious what each of you would consider to be truly essential sci-fi reading.  To that end, if you had to recommend only one science fiction novel or series (think desert island reading), what would you pick?  And for a second recommendation, what was the best book (in any genre) that you've read recently (within the last few years)?

[Lillith Blackheart]

The Ender Series.

[Mizhara]

Sci-fi Essentials? Dune series. Or the Hive and the Tower series. MCaffreys Freedom series are good too.

As for best book I've read recently... hrm... maybe the Mercy Thompson books by Patricia Briggs?

[Saede Riordan]

the Mortal Engines quartet is an excellent, excellent series, and I will recommend it to anyone who likes eve, as it features an equally awesome, equally dark and cruel universe.

Dresden Files were also very good.

[Aria Jenneth]

Charles Stross, Accelerando, for speculative fiction with just enough utter bizarreness to seem true to life (uploaded, spacefaring lobsters FTW).

Also, by the same author, Singularity Sky, for the most bad-ass party, er, Festival, in science fiction. I think the author kind of cooled on the setting; he's a hard sci-fi sort, and I suspect he decided it was too unlikely to ever actually happen.

[Vieve]

If your tastes run more toward the thick chewy flavors of fantasy, check out China Miéville's New Crobuzon series.   I haven't read Iron Council yet, but I enjoyed Perdido Street Station and The Scar a great deal.

[Saede Riordan]

Charles Stross, Accelerando, for speculative fiction with just enough utter bizarreness to seem true to life (uploaded, spacefaring lobsters FTW).

Also, by the same author, Singularity Sky, for the most bad-ass party, er, Festival, in science fiction. I think the author kind of cooled on the setting; he's a hard sci-fi sort, and I suspect he decided it was too unlikely to ever actually happen.

you read his recent stuff Aria? His new one, Halting State, was weird, good, and seems like a fairly possible place for the internet to be in 7 years when the book is set, also, and there is a sequel to it coming out called Rule 34. The fact that is called that is just...its....I can't even...

[Kaleigh Doyle]

For me, some of my favorites have been a blend of science fiction and politics, so The Moon is a Harsh Mistress and Starship Troopers, and having read every Dune book imaginable, I still say the first book is the only one really worth reading. Ian Banks stuff I just couldn't get into personally. >_<

[Lillith Blackheart]

having read every Dune book imaginable, I still say the first book is the only one really worth reading.

I would like to second this notion.

[Saede Riordan]

having read every Dune book imaginable, I still say the first book is the only one really worth reading.

I would like to second this notion.

the prequals were good, it just got weirder, harder to understand, and less true to the universe with every book after God-Emperor

[Cain Jacobi]

Hey Ken
I finished reading the Jump 225 trilogy by David Louis Edelman. Great trilogy for people who like sci-fi stuff. Also Iain M. Banks Culture novels are also great sci-fi books.



Cain Jacobi

[Lillith Blackheart]

In case it was forgotten I would like to reiterate the Ender's Series by Orson Scott Card. Although you only really need the first three. Once you hit Children of the Mind it goes a little nuts.

In order:

Ender's Game.
Speaker for the Dead.
Xenophobia.
(Then the other two that are a little nuts).


The Ender's Shadow series (about Bean!) is also pretty good, but I've only read the first one (Ender's Shadow) in that series.

[Casiella]

Also, depending on your tastes, you might find some classic Heinlein to your liking. Starship Troopers (the original novel, not the 1990s movie), Revolt in 2100, and maybe even Stranger in a Strange Land.

Have you left out Arthur C. Clarke? IMO he mastered the SF short story, but Childhood's End qualifies as essential (in addition to the more popular 2001: A Space Odyssey and 2010: Odyssey Two).

Echoing what Aria said about Charles Stross; if you like that, you might also like Cory Doctorow, some of Nancy Kress's work. Probably John Scalzi and Ian MacDonald fit right into that as well. In some ways, Philip K. Dick foreshadowed a lot of this, and I keep discovering new depths to his work, to my fortunate surprise.

For the original question, though: if you have a deficient education in SF and need a series to get started, Asimov's Foundation series certainly qualifies in the same breath as Dune.

[Ken]

Thanks for the great recommendations from all of you.  I did some searching to see what fits with my personal tastes.  The reading list is shaping up as follows:

Asimov's Foundation series (a true favorite for re-reading; also, I've never read past Second Foundation but plan to now with Prelude to Foundation, Foundation and Earth, and Forward the Foundation)
The Moon Is A Harsh Mistress (another of my favorite novels, will be re-reading)
Julian Comstock by Robert Charles Wilson (halfway through this at the moment)
WWW: Wake by Robert J. Sawyer
Palimsest by Catherynne Valente
A Canticle for Leibowitz by Walter M. Miller, Jr.
Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand (still have never read it)
The Windup Girl  by Paolo Bacigalupi
The Risen Empire and The Killing of Worlds by Scott Westerfield (I've read the first several years ago, going back to have both in one sitting)
Accelerando by Charles Stross
Perdido Street Station by China Mieville
Infoquake by David Lewis Edelman (now that sounds like EVE)
Consider Phlebas by Iain M. Banks
A History of Venice by John Julius Norwich (non-fiction, but that would make an interesting title for an alt history/sci-fi book...)

As for other Heinlein stuff, I've only read Starship Troopers, so I might have to pick up Stranger.  Kind of wary of him, having had a friend recount all the strange/incestuous sexual oddities in some of Heinlein's later work.  I re-read Dune in a completely different desert not two months ago.  I've never gone past the original novel in that series and I'm a little hesitant to make the leap.  Read Ender's Game twice, but never gone past it either.

Casiella, what of Philip K. Dick's would you recommend?

Edit: Forgot to include Anathem by Neal Stephenson and Wastelands in the list.

[Silver Night]

I've found myself wanting to re-reread Snow Crash, recently. Think it is usually (along with Neuromancer) given some of the credit for establishing the whole 'Cyberpunk' thing.

For a series to keep me occupied on a desert island, I would probably go into fantasy instead and pick the 'Malazan Book of the Fallen' - If you don't mind the occasional digressions into pages of philosophical stuff, the rendering and depth of the setting really impresses me. It's also very - maybe excessively - complex as far as multiple interwoven plots. Reading that series is one of the things that inspired me to look at Eve and think of all the possibilities as far as culture and history that it would be neat to explore. Also it's like 10k pages long, atm, so there would be plenty to read on that desert island  


For a book that I found the most striking recently, Perdido Street Station, as I think others have said, and the book after set in the same world, The Scar. Iron Council was also good, Though I think I liked the first two maybe a little more.

Altered Carbon (and the other Takeshi Kovacs novels) for an entertaining read and an Eve-like feel (kinda have to read it to see what I mean). Also The Windup Girl, which I was impressed enough with after reading a bit at the bookstore, I bought it in hardcover. (I'm usually much too cheap to do that.)

Other Sci-Fi authors I've enjoyed (some of whom have already been mentioned): Iain Banks, Alastair Reynolds, Charles Stross, William Gibson, John Scalzi, Peter Hamilton, Ian McDonald

These are all more recent, rather than the older big names, ofc (Many of which have also already been mentioned. Asimov, Clarke, etc.)