The Top Sci-Fi Authors and their best book series

John Scalzi’s Old Man’s War series is pretty good, although I was left a little flat by the fourth one.

Oh yeah? Well Dune is stupid and fat!

One recent series that I really enjoyed is SM Stirling’s Emberverse series, starting with Dies The Fire. It’s a sort of post-apocalyptic story about a mysterious, sudden worldwide Change that causes all energy technologies to stop working (gasoline, electricity, steam) and the resulting mass deaths and breakdown of society. The prose is a little rough in places and there’s some nerd wish-fulfillment that I found grating, but the plot is fun, and the story moves along at a brisk pace. Good stuff.

I have a deep affection for Zahn because I picked up the COBRA books when I was a younger teen and they really captured my imagination. I’ll give pretty much anything he writes a fair try, and The Icarus Hunt is pretty darn fun.

I like the concept, but the whole idea of LARPers will rule the world is too much to swallow.

I find Stirling’s Lords of Creation (Sky People, In the Halls of the Crimson Kings) to be more enjoyable pulp sci-fi: the golden age style is a lot of fun.

On the topic of fun sci-fi, Scott Westerfield’s Succession (Risen Empire, Killing of Worlds) is some of the best space opera I’ve read in a long time.

For more pure sci-fi, Vinge, Brin, Stross, and May are my favorites.

I wasn’t a big fan of the COBRA books, but I read them after I read most of his other stuff. I thought the Conquerors trilogy was also very good.

SCA aren’t LARPers. They’re more akin to the people that do Civil War reenactments.

I stand corrected.

That said: isn’t civil war reenactment literally live action role playing? It’s not scripted is it (so as to fall more squarely into acting)?

I’ll second (or third!) the recommendation for Dan Simmons Hyperion (and the following 3 books).

I also really enjoyed George R.R. Martin’s Tuf Voyaging, which is a collection of short stories he wrote about a space trader who came into possession of a ancient “SeedShip” which has the power to genetically splice and dice and effectively create new life.

Dying of the Light is his full length novel about a rogue planet that for a brief time hosted a collection of city-states built by several space-faring races but which is finally passing away from the solar system which gave it brief life.

His Dreamsongs collections contain a number of excellent sci-fi short stories. Sandkings stands out to me as being a fantastic read, but I found a number of other stories I probably would have never come across otherwise that were really well done. Although he’s probably mostly known at this point for his epic fantasy work, Martin was a science fiction writer prior to doing Game of Thrones.

Yeah, I wouldn’t actually hold the COBRA books up as an example of great sci-fi, they just hooked me as a young teen. I still enjoy the Conquerors trilogy, though.

Ben Bova’s Mars trilogy is his best work though declining in quality with each one, having been published so many years apart. It has the distinction of each book being published by a different publisher.

Robert J. Sawyer, a Canadian sci-fi author wrote a really good trilogy (he wrote FlashForward) about a Neanderthal parallel world, called the Neanderthal Parallax. What I really like about this one is how nicely plotted out it is across all 3 books. That’s significant as I’ve read many trilogies, some of which have petered out by the 2nd or 3rd books, with the authors not knowing how to finish things up. One of my favourite stories ever.

A lot of good stuff here that I now wanna read. Thanks guys!

[QUOTE]* I nominate Frank Herbert and “Dune”. I’m hoping the things you all come up with will give me the amazing ride Frank Herbert’s given me.

[QUOTE]

I concur.

The only downside to Frank Herbert is that once you read all his books, you are done.

The Conquerors trilogy is pretty good, but I’m not too keen on the rest of his stuff. But then, I think SF is most interesting when it’s based around at least one cool idea. So it’s probably no surprise my favourite author in the genre is Larry Niven.

Okay, okay! You convinced me!

Stupid Icarus thing isn’t available on Kindle, though. I’ll have to get the paperback, then see if I can DL a scan.

You all really came through on these threads. I am very excited about the stuff I’m lining up now. Hopefully I can convince my wife we don’t need tv for yet another 6 months.

Another!

Mike Resnick. Specifically Santiago and Return of Santiago.

When I write, I have three authors in mind that I refer to. One of them is Jim Butcher, for his turns of phrase, his work with his characters, and his pacing. One of them is Timothy Zahn, and how excellent he is at not letting the setting and gimmick overwhelm the rest of the book. The third is Mike Resnick, for his ability to convey emotions and characters in as few words as possible. He’s kind of the anti-Robert Jordan in that way.

High quality SF series of at least three books:

Isaac Asimov: Foundation Trilogy (not later sequels)
Poul Anderson: Van Rijn/Polysotechnic series, Flandry series
Iain Banks: Culture series
Gordon R. Dickson: Dorsai series
William Gibson: Neuromancer, Count Zero, and Mona Lisa Overdrive
Frank Herbert: Consentiency series
Alexei Panshin: Villiers series
Doc Smith: Skylark series, Lensman series
Jack Vance: Lots, including Demon Prince, Cadwal, Alastor, etc.
Joan D. Vinge: Psion series, Winter Queen series
Walter Jon Williams: Hardwired series, Majistral series
Robert Anton Wilson: Illuminati series
Gene Wolfe: Lots, including New Sun series

I think all of these are better than Herbert’s Dune series. Dune was a great book, the trilogy, not so much, the whole series, well… I won’t mock your tastes. Anyhow, as noted above, I think Herbert’s Consentiency Universe books are much better as a series.

Wasn’t sure if fantasy was allowed, so I didn’t include any fantasy authors. Of course most fantasies are in series.

You captured some of the high and low points, but I’m going to agree with stepsongrapes that these weren’t my favorite books by him. Is it his most popular series though? I don’t even know really.

I prefer his Conqueror trilogy, but have fond memories of “Heir to the Empire”. Wish Lucas would have filmed that, instead of the prequel trilogy.