Book picks similar to
Celestial Empire: The Emergence of Chinese Science Fiction by Nathaniel Isaacson
science-fiction
china
sf
shortlist
Sleeping Duty
Laura Montgomery - 2015
While they slept, the starship went through the wrong fold in space and settled for a different world, a wild world. Three centuries after the founding of a colony on the uncharted planet, Gilead awakens to find humanity slipped back to medieval tech and a feudal structure. Worse, the king who wants Gilead awake won’t let Gilead awaken his wife.
On Such a Full Sea
Chang-rae Lee - 2014
Stepping from the realistic and historical territories of his previous work, Lee brings us into a world created from scratch. Against a vividly imagined future America, Lee tells a stunning, surprising, and riveting story that will change the way readers think about the world they live in.In a future, long-declining America, society is strictly stratified by class. Long-abandoned urban neighborhoods have been repurposed as highwalled, self-contained labor colonies. And the members of the labor class - descendants of those brought over en masse many years earlier from environmentally ruined provincial China - find purpose and identity in their work to provide pristine produce and fish to the small, elite, satellite charter villages that ring the labor settlement. In this world lives Fan, a female fish-tank diver, who leaves her home in the B-Mor settlement (once known as Baltimore), when the man she loves mysteriously disappears. Fan's journey to find him takes her out of the safety of B-Mor, through the anarchic Open Counties, where crime is rampant with scant governmental oversight, and to a faraway charter village, in a quest that will soon become legend to those she left behind.
Death Becomes Her / Queen Bitch / Love Lost
Michael Anderle - 2016
(Kneel Or Die - TKG 07 Review) * A serum has been uncovered that was thought had been destroyed in WWII * The UnknownWorld is ready to explode from pent-up frustrations * The most powerful vampire is weary and tired of keeping the peace, and pieces, together * One man hates working with vampires, but he finds someone along the way that makes it worth everything. * A woman is given the opportunity to make a difference, but she gets changed more than she was told. They say a dress can make a woman, but in this case, the dress is Death, and Death Becomes Her very well indeed. Reviewer MistyDawn: "I'm surprised. I thought when I read the first book in this series, that it couldn't get better.... I was wrong. I read almost continuously, and for the past year and a half, I haven't read a series (or even one) book that I've loved as much. With such loyal characters, friendship, and badassery... just don't wait to start reading these. So just, just wow." **Please note, as mentioned in a review, there is flagrantly foul language in these novels. The main character does not have a problem with cussing, just uninspired cussing. Please note: This book is part of a series and MUST be read in order. Series includes: Death Becomes Her - The Kurtherian Gambit 01 Queen Bitch - The Kurtherian Gambit 02 Love Lost - The Kurtherian Gambit 03 Bite This - The Kurtherian Gambit 04 Never Forsaken - The Kurtherian Gambit 05 Under My Heel - The Kurtherian Gambit 06 Kneel or Die - The Kurtherian Gambit 07 WE WILL BUILD - The Kurtherian Gambit 08 - April 2016
Alpha Centauri
Lisa Richman - 2018
In the wake of war, refugees still flee to nearby stars, but there are sinister forces at work in Alpha Centauri who would turn their plight into profit. None of this is apparent to an easygoing, self assured pilot-for-hire named Jason Andrews. Recently arrived from Proxima Centauri to visit his sister, he is sucked into a covert operation by a brother-in-law who is not who he seems. But then again, neither is Jason.... But the enemy they face has grown more powerful than any had expected, and the fate of the star systems' humans and AIs are at stake. Jason must engage in an all-out bid to save a world he's just getting to know, in a war he only just learned about. **
Emergence
Nick M. Lloyd - 2014
On Earth, Jack Bullage survives a horrendous car accident. Reporter Louise Harding has a score to settle with Jack. She investigates all the options, even the most unbelievable ones. How did he get to be so lucky? The Gadium have the answers. They know why Jack is special. It’s just evolution; he’s developing the ability to ‘ride the parallels.’ This could herald Earth's Emergence, a new era, an end to its isolation in the galaxy – but Gadium approval is not assured and Jack may be evolving too fast for their plans. ------ www.nickmlloyd.com ------
Aurora Renegades: The Complete Collection
G.S. Jennsen - 2016
A new world rises--one of unshackled AIs, indestructible starships, ethereal quantum spaces & potent new weapons--& the race is on to determine who will control its future.When faced with its greatest challenge, will humanity rise to triumph or fall to ruin?*SIDESPACEHumanity is saved. But its troubles are just beginning.To achieve their extraordinary triumph over the Metigen armada, humanity put aside its myriad of conflicts & united against a common foe intent on annihilating civilization. In victory, unparalleled peace & prosperity are theirs for the taking--if they can keep hold of them.When the secrets behind the Metigens' defeat escape the shadows, the people who won the war find their lives in danger. Facing anti-synthetic terrorists who want them dead, power-hungry politicians who want them chained, & a rapidly dwindling number of people they can trust, the Prevos--individuals & AIs sharing a single body--must take their fate into their own hands.51 Portals. 51 Universes.Intent on learning the purpose behind the Metigens' elaborate multiverse network, Alex Solovy, Caleb Marano & Valkyrie embark on a gripping journey through the network's portals, each one leading to a universe not their own. In a mosaic of spaces inhabited by fantastical aliens & worlds both beautiful & deadly, they will be forced to question everything they thought they knew, including the nature of life itself.*DISSONANCEKnow this: you need not be afraid. They own the fear. They fear us because they believe we are powerful, and they are correct to do so.The technology behind Project Noetica is on the loose. Prevos are spreading across the galaxy. Now two opposing but inexorably related forces threaten to plunge the galaxy into chaos. The Order of the True Sentients believes Prevos are monsters who endanger humanity,& it intends to destroy them by any means necessary. Underworld despot Olivia Montegreu, now a radically enhanced Prevo, is its doomsday warnings made flesh.As society splinters from within & the Earth Alliance falls to reactionaries, a formidable new player emerges on the galactic stage, one not afraid to do whatever it takes to protect all sentient life--human, Artificial and Prevo.The Metigen surged forward to engulf her in light. I see you, Alexis Solovy.Killers & saviors. Deceivers & protectors. Destroyers & creators. Could the Metigens truly be all these things? The search for answers leads Alex and Caleb to the most shocking revelation of all--the true face of the enemy.*ABYSMIn the quest to be the masters of their own fate, will humanity rise to become liberators or follow the path of their ancestors into darkness?Alex Solovy & Caleb Marano risked everything to learn the hidden purpose behind the Metigens' multiverse portal network, but nothing prepared them for the answer. Humans are a genetic recreation of the Anaden, the dictators & overlords of the master universe. Aurora is a recreation of their origins created by the Metigens in a desperate gambit to understand their enemy & find a way to defeat them.Aurora's future hangs in the balance as the Earth Alliance goes to war with itself over the right of synthetics and Prevos--human/AI hybrids--to exist. Terrorists sow chaos in a wave of bombings and assassinations. The next evolution of the human species will not be so easily defeated, but they must move quickly to win the day, because the true enemy is closing in faster than anyone realizes.
Cyberpunk City Book One: The Machine Killer
D.L. Young - 2020
He couldn't be more wrong.Forced by a powerful executive to steal a priceless dataset, Maddox uncovers the shocking truth of a secret war between AIs, raging inside the digital universe known as virtual space. Plunged headlong into the deadly conflict, he’ll have to use every trick he’s ever learned—and a few he’s never tried before—if he wants to survive.Sprawling megacities, rogue AIs, black market tech, modded mercenaries, and a pulse-pounding story filled with unexpected twists. If you love gritty, hardcore cyberpunk, you won’t want to miss this series!
Victory's Wake
Daniel Gibbs - 2021
The war is over. Or is it?In the wake of the bitter galactic conflict, a cauldron of desperate refugees is rife with rival cartels and flooded with drugs and weapons. In this pocket of lawlessness, old enemies are fighting a new war by proxy. Captain Jackson Adams of the Coalition Defense Force is tasked with gathering a ragtag crew for a black ops mission—infiltrate the cartels and discover the enemy’s ultimate scheme. But what they uncover is more horrifying than anyone ever anticipated.
Short Story Collections by Stanislaw Lem: The Cyberiad, Tales of Pirx the Pilot, the Star Diaries
Books LLC - 2010
Source: Wikipedia. Pages: 20. Not illustrated. Free updates online. Purchase includes a free trial membership in the publisher's book club where you can select from more than a million books without charge. Excerpt: The Cyberiad (Polish: ) is a series of short stories by Stanisaw Lem. The Polish version was first published in 1967, with an English translation appearing in 1974. The main protagonists of the series are Trurl and Klapaucius, the "constructors." The vast majority of characters are either robots, or intelligent machines. The stories focus on problems of the individual and society, as well as on the vain search for human happiness through technological means. Two of these stories were included in the book The Mind's I. Trurl and Klapaucius are brilliant (robotic) engineers, called "constructors" (because they can construct practically anything at will), capable of almost God-like exploits. For instance, on one occasion Trurl creates an entity capable of extracting accurate information from the random motion of gas particles, which he calls a "Demon of the Second Kind." He describes the "Demon of the First Kind" as a Maxwell's demon. On another, the two constructors re-arrange stars near their home planet in order to advertise. The duo are best friends and rivals. When they are not busy constructing revolutionary mechanisms at home, they travel the universe, aiding those in need. Although the characters are firmly established as good and righteous, they take no shame in accepting handsome rewards for their services. If rewards were promised and not delivered, the constructors may even severely punish those who deceived them. The universe of The Cyberiad is pseudo-Medieval. There are kingdoms, knights, princesses, and even dragons in abundance. Robots are usually anthropomorphic, to the point of being divided into sexes. Love and marriage are possibl...More: http: //booksllc.net/?id=59380