Book picks similar to
The Wine of Violence by James K. Morrow
science-fiction
fiction
sf
scifi
Bring the Jubilee
Ward Moore - 1953
Trapped in 1877, a historian writes an account of an alternative history of America in which the South won the Civil War. Living in this alternative timeline, he was determined to change events at Gettysburg.When he's offered the chance to return to that fateful turning point his actions change history as he knows it, leaving him in an all too familiar past.
Axiomatic
Greg Egan - 1990
Contents:The Infinite Assassin (1991)The Hundred Light-Year Diary (1992)Eugene (1990)The Caress (1990)Blood Sisters (1991)Axiomatic (1990)The Safe-Deposit Box (1990)Seeing (1995)A Kidnapping (1995)Learning to Be Me (1990)The Moat (1991)The Walk (1992)The Cutie (1989)Into Darkness (1992)Appropriate Love (1991)The Moral Virologist (1990)Closer (1992)Unstable Orbits in the Space of Lies (1992)
Fool's Run
Patricia A. McKillip - 1987
She was sentenced to the Underworld prison. Now, a new age band, led by a psychic pianist and a masked woman called the Queen of Hearts, arrives at the prison to perform. And Terra's vision is moving closer, changing all their lives forever.
The Ultimate Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
Douglas Adams - 1996
"The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy"Seconds before the Earth is demolished for a galactic freeway, Arthur Dent is saved by Ford Prefect, a researcher for the revised Guide. Together they stick out their thumbs to the stars and begin a wild journey through time and space."The Restaurant at the End of the Universe"Facing annihilation at the hands of warmongers is a curious time to crave tea. It could only happen to the cosmically displaced Arthur Dent and his comrades as they hurtle across the galaxy in a desperate search for a place to eat."Life, the Universe and Everything"The unhappy inhabitants of planet Krikkit are sick of looking at the night sky- so they plan to destroy it. The universe, that is. Now only five individuals can avert Armageddon: mild-mannered Arthur Dent and his stalwart crew."So Long, and Thanks for All the Fish"Back on Earth, Arthur Dent is ready to believe that the past eight years were all just a figment of his stressed-out imagination. But a gift-wrapped fishbowl with a cryptic inscription conspires to thrust him back to reality. So to speak."Mostly Harmless"Just when Arthur Dent makes the terrible mistake of starting to enjoy life, all hell breaks loose. Can he save the Earth from total obliteration? Can he save the Guide from a hostile alien takeover? Can he save his daughter from herself?Also includes the short story "Young Zaphod Plays It Safe".
Android at Arms
Andre Norton - 1971
Awaking from a mind-frozen state, Andas Kastor must discover if he is the rightful human Emperor of Inyanga or an evil android double.
Elysium
Jennifer Marie Brissett - 2014
The program's data, however, has been corrupted. As the novel's characters struggle to survive apocalypse, they are sustained and challenged by the demands of love in a shattered world both haunted and dangerous.
Dark Eden
Chris Beckett - 2012
Beyond the Forest lie the mountains of the Snowy Dark and a cold so bitter and a night so profound that no man has ever crossed it. The Oldest among the Family recount legends of a world where light came from the sky, where men and women made boats that could cross the stars. These ships brought us here, the Oldest say—and the Family must only wait for the travelers to return. But young John Redlantern will break the laws of Eden, shatter the Family and change history. He will abandon the old ways, venture into the Dark…and discover the truth about their world.Already remarkably acclaimed in the UK, Dark Eden is science fiction as literature; part parable, part powerful coming-of-age story, set in a truly original alien world of dark, sinister beauty--rendered in prose that is at once strikingly simple and stunningly inventive.
Three Days to Never
Tim Powers - 2006
. . until now. This extraordinary new novel from one of the most brilliant talents in contemporary fiction is a standout literary thriller in which one man stumbles upon the discovery Einstein himself tried to keep hidden.When twelve-year-old Daphne Marrity takes a videotape labeled Pee-wee's Big Adventure from her grandmother's house, neither she nor her college-professor father, Frank Marrity, has any idea that the theft has drawn the attention of both the Israeli Secret Service and an ancient European cabal of occultists—or that within hours they'll be visited by her long-lost grandfather, who is also desperate to get that tape.And when Daphne's teddy bear is stolen, a blind assassin nearly kills Frank, and a phantom begins to speak to her from a switched-off television set, Daphne and her father find themselves caught in the middle of a murderous power struggle that originated long ago in Israel and Germany but now crashes through Los Angeles and out to the Mojave Desert. To survive, they must quickly learn the rules of a dangerous magical chess game and use all their cleverness and courage—as well as their love and loyalty to each other—to escape a fate more profound than death.A pulse-pounding epic adventure that blurs the lines between espionage and the supernatural; good and evil; past, present and future, Three Days to Never is an exhilarating masterwork of speculative suspense from the always remarkable imagination of the incomparable Tim Powers.
Tuf Voyaging
George R.R. Martin - 1986
So how is it that, in competition with the worst villains the universe has to offer, he's become the proud owner of the last seedship of Earth's legendary Ecological Engineering Corps? Never mind, just be thankful that the most powerful weapon in human space is in good hands-hands which now control cellular material for thousands of outlandish creatures. With his unique equipment, Tuf is set to tackle the problems human settlers have created in colonizing far-flung worlds: hosts of hostile monsters, a population hooked on procreation, a dictator who unleashes plagues to get his own way...and in every case the only thing that stands between the colonists and disaster is Tuf's ingenuity - and his reputation as an honest dealer in a universe of rogues...Tuf Voyaging features interior illustrations by Janet Aulisio. Included in it will be her original eight illustrations, along with 28 newly commissioned ones.
The Sheriff of Yrnameer
Michael Rubens - 2009
His sidekick just stole his girlfriend. The galaxy's most hideous and feared bounty hunter wants to lay eggs in his brain. And the luxury space yacht Cole just hijacked turns out of be filled with interstellar do-gooders, one especially loathsome stowaway, and a cargo of freeze-dried orphans.Reluctantly compelled to deliver these defenseless, fluidless children to safety, Cole gathers a misfit crew for a desperate journey to the far reaches of the galaxy. Their destination: the mysterious world of Yrnameer, the very last of the your-name-heres—planets without corporate sponsors. But little does Cole know that this legendary utopia is home to a murderous band of outlaws bent on destroying the planet's tiny, peaceful community.Follow Cole's adventures through a delightfully absurd science-fiction universe, where the artificial intelligence is stupid, dust motes carry branding messages, and middle-management zombies have overrun a corporate training satellite. In the spirit of Douglas Adams and Terry Pratchett, The Sheriff of Yrnameer is sci-fi comedy at its best—mordant, raucously funny, and a thrilling page-turner.
The Quiet Invasion
Sarah Zettel - 2000
Helen Failia is nearing middle age but has lost none of her fighting spirit. The founder of Earth’s first fully functioning colony on Venus, she will do anything to ensure that the home she’s built and nurtured not only survives, but thrives. Despite her constant work, funding for the colony is running out, and she’s dreading telling the ten thousand colonists they must move to Earth, a world some of them have never even seen. When one of her probes returns with the unprecedented proof of an ancient alien artifact on the surface of Venus she cannot believe her luck. This is the first evidence that humanity is not alone, and the discovery will surely secure the research colony’s future.As Helen and her team investigate the strange new find, they learn that humanity is not the only species with its eye on the planet. A dying race of spacefaring aliens needs a new home, and Venus is perfect for the people and their massive, living cities. But these newcomers consider the human presence on Venus a very small problem, one that can be swept aside if it dares get in the way.
A Fire Upon the Deep
Vernor Vinge - 1992
A Fire upon the Deep is the big, breakout book that fulfills the promise of Vinge's career to date: a gripping tale of galactic war told on a cosmic scale.Thousands of years hence, many races inhabit a universe where a mind's potential is determined by its location in space, from superintelligent entities in the Transcend, to the limited minds of the Unthinking Depths, where only simple creatures and technology can function. Nobody knows what strange force partitioned space into these "regions of thought," but when the warring Straumli realm use an ancient Transcendent artifact as a weapon, they unwittingly unleash an awesome power that destroys thousands of worlds and enslaves all natural and artificial intelligence.Fleeing the threat, a family of scientists, including two children, are taken captive by the Tines, an alien race with a harsh medieval culture, and used as pawns in a ruthless power struggle. A rescue mission, not entirely composed of humans, must rescue the children-and a secret that may save the rest of interstellar civilization.
Binti: The Complete Trilogy
Nnedi Okorafor - 2019
Despite her family's concerns, Binti's talent for mathematics and her aptitude with astrolabes make her a prime candidate to undertake this interstellar journey.But everything changes when the jellyfish-like Medusae attack Binti's spaceship, leaving her the only survivor. Now, Binti must fend for herself, alone on a ship full of the beings who murdered her crew, with five days until she reaches her destination.There is more to the history of the Medusae--and their war with the Khoush--than first meets the eye. If Binti is to survive this voyage and save the inhabitants of the unsuspecting planet that houses Oomza Uni, it will take all of her knowledge and talents to broker the peace.Collected now for the first time in omnibus form, follow Binti's story in this groundbreaking sci-fi trilogy.
Invasion of the Body Snatchers
Jack Finney - 1955
Miles Bennell discovered an insidious, horrifying plot. Silently, subtly, almost imperceptibly, alien life-forms were taking over the bodies and minds of his neighbors, his friends, his family, the woman he loved—the world as he knew it. First published in 1955, this classic thriller of the ultimate alien invasion and the triumph of the human spirit over an invisible enemy inspired three major motion pictures.
Flatland: A Romance of Many Dimensions
Edwin A. Abbott - 1884
The work of English clergyman, educator and Shakespearean scholar Edwin A. Abbott (1838-1926), it describes the journeys of A. Square [sic – ed.], a mathematician and resident of the two-dimensional Flatland, where women-thin, straight lines-are the lowliest of shapes, and where men may have any number of sides, depending on their social status.Through strange occurrences that bring him into contact with a host of geometric forms, Square has adventures in Spaceland (three dimensions), Lineland (one dimension) and Pointland (no dimensions) and ultimately entertains thoughts of visiting a land of four dimensions—a revolutionary idea for which he is returned to his two-dimensional world. Charmingly illustrated by the author, Flatland is not only fascinating reading, it is still a first-rate fictional introduction to the concept of the multiple dimensions of space. "Instructive, entertaining, and stimulating to the imagination." — Mathematics Teacher.