Recommend some good fantasy/sci-fi books and/or book series

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spudnik
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02 Apr 2008, 8:26 pm

The River World series, Philip Jose Farmer is good, also liked Blood Music by Greg Bear, and Cities in Flight by James Blish



patrick6
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03 Apr 2008, 4:09 am

spudnik wrote:
The River World series, Philip Jose Farmer is good, also liked Blood Music by Greg Bear, and Cities in Flight by James Blish


I actually have the first book from the Riverworld series right now, I haven't started reading it though. I've read Blood Music and liked it quite a bit, but I thought it was good at best. Haven't read, but I've heard of Cities in Flight.



patrick6
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03 Apr 2008, 4:12 am

MartyMoose wrote:
The Hobbit and Lord of the Rings


lol, thanks for the recommendations but wouldn't you say that those are a little too common? I started reading The Lord of The Rings a few years ago but couldn't really get into it. Maybe if I tried reading it again I would enjoy it.



patrick6
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03 Apr 2008, 4:16 am

Enigmatic_Oddity wrote:
I enjoyed Orson Scott Card's Ender's Game saga and Alfred Bester's books. Of the former, I found the side-saga of Ender's game more interesting than the main saga, which gets a little far fetched from the second book onwards. Of the latter, I enjoyed The Demolished Man the most. It's about a guy who commits murder in a world where some people can mind-read and the police who pursue him are all mind-readers too.


I read half of Ender's Game and HATED it. I kept on hoping that the book would get better but it didn't.



Riddick124
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03 Apr 2008, 1:12 pm

Ender's Game, by Orson Scott Card, and all related books by him, are truely amazing works of science fiction.



Anarbaculardrop
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01 Aug 2012, 5:36 pm

I am right now reading H.P. Lovecraft's Science-fiction Horror Novella, the Mountains of Madness. NOT for those who hate long descriptive passages and the genre. I find interesting. I suggest these stories for those who don't want too much of a blow of racism in early 20th century literature:

-The book I am reading now.
-The Cats of Ulthar
-The Outsider
-The Music of Erich Zahn
-The Beast in the Cave

I think there might be more, but that is all I know(or can think of) at the time.


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ReneDescartes
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01 Aug 2012, 5:58 pm

Well, I can recommend most Isaac Asimovs novels and short stories, alongside with G. Orwell's 1984, which is a masterpiece in my opinion. If you get to read that one, be careful with spoilers you could found on the internet as the ending is truly brilliant.



Vyacheslav
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02 Aug 2012, 3:53 am

We by Yevgeny Zamyatin - Old (1921) Russian sci-fi classic dealing with conforming to society.

I also really like Stanislaw Lem, author of Solaris, I especially enjoyed Eden, Return From the Stars, The Invincible, and The Cyberiad (The main characters, Trurl and Klapaucius, are hilarious, IMO)...Fiasco is pretty good too.



Mindsigh
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02 Aug 2012, 8:39 am

L. M. Modesitt's Recluse books are kind of interesting, but if you read too many in a row they start to get formulaic and all run together.
Stephen R. Donaldson had two books, Mirror of Her Dreams and A Man Rides Through, that I've read several times.
I also have read and re-read Tad Williams' Memory, Sorrow and Thorn trilogy and really enjoyed what I've managed to read of his newest ones, "Shadow"-something. (Since my spectrumite son was born, I've had ZERO time to read, so sorry I can't remember the real name of it)



Guppy
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02 Aug 2012, 8:28 pm

As mikebw before, I can really recommend the A Song of Ice and Fire series. Fantastic.



Anarbaculardrop
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03 Aug 2012, 1:30 pm

I am now both reading Vonnegut's "Cat's Cradle" and At the Mountains of Madness. So far, they're good.

Which of these two do you prefer?


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PennyDreadful
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13 Aug 2012, 7:37 pm

Dune is one of my favorite books of any genre. People say it's rather complicated, but I liked that, because when you're reading a book vs. real life, you see all different angles of it so you feel smart when you understand the nuances...XD

Ender's Game, et al. It's weird that the second book in that series, Speaker for the Dead, is so different in tone from Ender's Game, and yet both are excellent and they still feel like part of the same universe. I hear Speaker for the Dead is required reading in some districts; you could very well skip Ender's Game altogether and have no problem with it.

Kirinyaga

Stranger in a Strange Land I think would resonate with a lot of aspies, at least the first half.

Fahrenheit 451. I first read this book in 8th grade, and it was instantly one of my favorites. In 10th grade, it was required reading, but I am SO glad that wasn't my first experience with it, because my teacher really just massacred it. I raised my hand in class to point out the a rather obvious fact about the plot and the teacher told me I was wrong and could I please not disagree with her in front of the class. So much for understanding the point of the book, teacher.

Most of Asimov's stuff. Tbh, I liked Foundation, but I didn't think it was among his best.

The Giver (maybe a little young, but worth a read at any age)



physicsnut42
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13 Aug 2012, 8:02 pm

Hmm...

If you like fantasy:

Gifts by Ursula K. Le Guinn
The Chronicles of Chrestomanci by Dianna Wynne Jones
So You Want to be a Wizard (the first in a series; it in itself was good but the later books weren't very good in my opinion.)
The Girl who Circumnavigated Fairyland Sorta like alice in wonderland.
And of course, alice in wonderland is very good too. Dated, but good. It's free to download as an ebook cause the author's dead.



Jediyoda
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14 Aug 2012, 9:25 pm

Tekwar series written by actor William Shatner who played Captain James T Kirk in Star Trek original series.
Dune series written by Frank Herbert
Doctor Who, Star Wars and Star Trek books.
Red Dwarf series.
I usually read Star Trek, Star Wars and Doctor Who and David Eddings books.



Fogman
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17 Aug 2012, 4:09 pm

Nothing really new here, I will also recommend Phillip Jose Farmer's Riverworld series, as well as the Larry Niven's Ringworld series, and Orson Scott Card's Ender series.

For somewhat fluffier Space Opera type stuff, you might want to check out Alan Dean Foster's stuff.


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Ataraxia_N
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19 Aug 2012, 1:37 am

When I saw this topic I just had to write about a few Epic Fantasy books that I enjoyed reading, especially since I didn't see any recommendations for them.

The Mistborn Trilogy by Brandon Sanderson is, in my opinion, one the best fantasy series ever written. The books have a unique feel to them because of the great characters, the structured magic system and the world in which the story unfolds.

The Wheel of Time series by Robert Jordan is also a great series because it has a truly diverse cast of characters. The slight gender reversal, by having female preference instead of male preference, in this series makes it a fascinating read too.

The Sword of Truth series by Terry Goodkind is a good read if you like thinking about the nature of good and evil.

The Kingkiller Chronicle by Patrick Rothfuss is written in first person, which I've not seen done well in Epic Fantasy before, so I recommend reading that series too if you're into Epic Fantasy.


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