The Sci-Fi Book Thread

One of the great benefits of Jihodji's challenging argument from authority (in a thread that shall remain unnamed, lest you be bored to tears by philisophical and logic nitpicking) is that it had me revisit some interesting SF books, namely some of the Culture books by the late Iain M. Banks

if you're unfamiliar with the Man, he's one of the greatest SF authors of the decade... no, century. If you see a M. qualifier, he considered that book as SF, without it, it was supposed to be "literary", but the distinction is really hard to make in quite a few cases. (M. books are unabashedly SF, non-M. books are... well, weird).

Anyway, in the context of the Thread That Shall Be Not Named, the most relevant book is Surface Detail, which is one of the Culture "series" books (Banks alternated Culture and non-Culture books within its "M." SF offerings). This one examines in detail the nature of Hell in a materialistic and godless universe. It is quite challenging, morally speaking, and absolutely gorgeous, SF-speaking.

I hearthily recommend it, as well as every single "M." book from Banks, and a lot of non-M. books. The world has been poorer since cancer took Banks from us.

wilkxus said:

Sounds terribly interesting. Is Surface Detail the best starting point to jump into his works in your opinion?

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Probably not. If only because one of the minor twist is when you realize one of the characters is a recurring one from previous books.

All of the books from Banks are completely stand-alone, but the Culture ones occasionally reference events from other books in the same universe. Most people think that Consider Phlebas, the first book of the series, is required reading because it sets the backstory of that universe. The Player of Games (2nd book of series) is also considered an easy read.

then, almost any book of the series, except for the last two (Surface Detail and Hydrogen Sonata). You can get Surface Detail after reading Use of Weapons (3rd in publication order), and you should really skip Hydrogen Sonata until you've read most of the books. Hydrogen Sonata was written when Banks had cancer, and he knew it was his last.

Banks alternated non-SF books and SF books, and within SF books Culture ones and non-Culture ones. The others are... sometimes weird.

Also, what thread/posts are you referring to btw? Just curious, I can do my own skimming if its boring, but a link would be nice =)

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The Atheist/Theist thread in General. Beware, heavy dissonance between trying to apply formal logic and stumbling upon heaps of missed assumptions on both sides; for most of the discussion Jihodji and I keep talking past each other's head. And bore the rest of the readers to tears.

slippery said:

I really need some new SciFi, preferably in stuff similar to Peter Hamilton, or just good interesting Space Opera type stuff.

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If you want the best in modern Space Opera authors, then you get, in my order of recommandation:

- Banks, obviously (see above)
- Alastair Reynolds. Anything from him.
- Neal Asher, same.
- James S.A. Corey (aka Ty Frank & Daniel Abraham)
- Peter Hamilton (I include him there so you can have an idea of how I personally rank the rest, relative to him)
- Stephen Baxter
- Paul Mc Auley

There's other authors, but they tend to write all over the place; the ones above are pure/primary Space Operatic stuff.

Oh, and funny bit: Except for Frank/Abraham, every one else is british. No ones does Space Opera better than the brits these days.

khalid said:

These authors don't just write spac operas, but some really good space operas are:

The Praxis series by Walter Jon Williams

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He is apparently (finally) writing a sequel. Hope we get more Sula...