Science Fiction

[Zirconia]

^^^^^^
Up to 5 was all audio books for me then went back to print. I stopped the driving when I would use them. Read 6 in print and now have 7 on order. Started to use kindle and apple books a lot now but Skippy only like Amazon I think.

[strudel]

Read Flowers for Algernon today. Brilliant but saddening.

Seems to be on offer on Kindle today(only?) For 99p

[grumbledoak]

strudel said:

Read Flowers for Algernon today. Brilliant but saddening.

Seems to be on offer on Kindle today(only?) For 99p

Thank you, bought for later!

[Tankrizzo]

Got into Luke Smitherd this year who's a low-radar British author. Writes quite quirky sci-fi lite stuff covering quite a range of subjects.

Started with 'The Stone Man' which is a decent read. Huge stone figure suddenly appears one day in a busy shopping area in Coventry, nobody can figure out where it's come from or why it's there. Then it starts to walk in a straight line, pretty much pulverising anything it comes across, and the authorities are desperately trying to figure out how to stop it and where it's going.

https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B00AHJIJF2/ref=cm_sw_r...

[JonChalk]

Tankrizzo said:

Started with 'The Stone Man' which is a decent read. Huge stone figure suddenly appears one day in a busy shopping area in Coventry, nobody can figure out where it's come from or why it's there. Then it starts to walk in a straight line, pretty much pulverising anything it comes across, and the authorities are desperately trying to figure out how to stop it and where it's going.

Excellent story.

I've not been so impressed with his other stuff, but it's been a year or so since I looked, so will give him another go.

[RizzoTheRat]

Currently reading "This is how you lose the time war", not what I was expecting but loving it. Most of it is told via letters between two agents on opposing sides.

[funkyrobot]

Finished Peter F Hamilton's The Abyss Beyond Stars the other day.

Disappointing. So much so that I can't bring myself to purchase the sequel.

The first 70 odd pages were ok. However, it went rapidly downhill after that.

[captain_cynic]

funkyrobot said:

Finished Peter F Hamilton's The Abyss Beyond Stars the other day.

Disappointing. So much so that I can't bring myself to purchase the sequel.

The first 70 odd pages were ok. However, it went rapidly downhill after that.

Yep, it felt like he had just done a dodgy copy/paste from the Void trilogy. The whole thing seemed phoned in.

The sequel is better but still not as good as the Void trilogy.

Great North Road is a great standalone novel from PF Hamilton if you've never read it. The blurb always put me off buying it but it's one of his better novels.

[Sway]

I love PFH - but that's because of the Night's Dawn Trilogy.

Which I'm just starting via audible. Not listened to them before, and I'm enjoying the difference.

[The_Doc]

Thread hijack

I like hard Sci fi and space opera

What's your best 5 hard SF, because I need inspiration for my next read?

I have obviously read:
all Iain M. Banks
Alastair Reynolds Inhibitor trilogy and Pushing Ice
Most SF you find on a "best SF" list eg Neuromancer/ForeverWar/Dune/etc

an undiscovered IainMB novel please....

Sidenote: everytime I watch a SpaceX launch, I delight at the autonomous vessels Just Read the Instructions, Of Course I Still Love You and A Shortfall of Gravitas: Man I miss him!
How long until Musk names one Grey Area or Ethics Gradient?

Edited by The_Doc on Tuesday 31st December 18:11

[Narcisus]

funkyrobot said:

Finished Peter F Hamilton's The Abyss Beyond Stars the other day.

Disappointing. So much so that I can't bring myself to purchase the sequel.

The first 70 odd pages were ok. However, it went rapidly downhill after that.

I thought it was great I'm currently half way through the 2nd Salvation book. That's great as well :-)

[Zirconia]

Sway said:

I love PFH - but that's because of the Night's Dawn Trilogy.

Which I'm just starting via audible. Not listened to them before, and I'm enjoying the difference.

I find the narrator makes a huge difference. Dune is terrible, but John Lee has a superb voice for these. R C Bray for skippy fits well etc.

[JonChalk]

Narcisus said:

I thought it was great I'm currently half way through the 2nd Salvation book. That's great as well :-)

Got it for Christmas - just started it - really looking forward to the next few days :-)

[br d]

What would people recommend first, Nights Dawn or Void trilogy?

I've read the Greg Mandels and Pandora star and Judas Unchained.

[Sway]

br d said:

What would people recommend first, Nights Dawn or Void trilogy?

I've read the Greg Mandels and Pandora star and Judas Unchained.

They're completely different universes.

Pandora Star and Judas Unchained are both same universe as Void.

Night's Dawn is very different from his other work...

[Clockwork Cupcake]

For some reason, James P. Hogan's "Giants" series came up in an article somewhere. I remember reading the first 3 books back in the day - back in the 1990's when I would haunt my local second hand bookshop and buy old sci-fi paperbacks.

Anyway, turns out there were 2 further books published in the series. I might have to look out for them.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Giants_(series)

Edit: Although, having read that Wiki page, I'm not sure if I will bother.

Edited by Clockwork Cupcake on Wednesday 1st January 14:47

[br d]

Sway said:

br d said:

What would people recommend first, Nights Dawn or Void trilogy?

I've read the Greg Mandels and Pandora star and Judas Unchained.

They're completely different universes.

Pandora Star and Judas Unchained are both same universe as Void.

Night's Dawn is very different from his other work...

So the Void trilogy is set after Judas Unchained?

[Sway]

br d said:

Sway said:

br d said:

What would people recommend first, Nights Dawn or Void trilogy?

I've read the Greg Mandels and Pandora star and Judas Unchained.

They're completely different universes.

Pandora Star and Judas Unchained are both same universe as Void.

Night's Dawn is very different from his other work...

So the Void trilogy is set after Judas Unchained?

If my failing memory serves me correctly - yes, by quite a bit! Although many of the same characters.

[grumbledoak]

br d said:

What would people recommend first, Nights Dawn or Void trilogy?

I've read the Greg Mandels and Pandora star and Judas Unchained.

In some ways you've read the best of them.

The Void trilogy is set in the Commonwealth universe. It's two intertwined stories - I liked one more than the other, you may differ - but all the old tropes and some of the old characters come back to haunt it, and not in a good way - having lived so long they are Deus Ex in this "new" story.

Nights Dawn starts well, it's distinct and original. It rambles though - almost whole novels worth of distracting sub stories - and he clearly doesn't know how to finish what he started. It's good despite this. I would recommend these over Void.

[tertius]

grumbledoak said:

br d said:

What would people recommend first, Nights Dawn or Void trilogy?

I've read the Greg Mandels and Pandora star and Judas Unchained.

In some ways you've read the best of them.

The Void trilogy is set in the Commonwealth universe. It's two intertwined stories - I liked one more than the other, you may differ - but all the old tropes and some of the old characters come back to haunt it, and not in a good way - having lived so long they are Deus Ex in this "new" story.

Nights Dawn starts well, it's distinct and original. It rambles though - almost whole novels worth of distracting sub stories - and he clearly doesn't know how to finish what he started. It's good despite this. I would recommend these over Void.

I know the Nights Dawn trilogy is well liked on here but I found it visceral and so unpleasant I couldn’t read it and gave up on it after a few hundred pages.