There is somehow an audiobook version of Sandman. I have no idea how that works, but I have heard good things about it.
I listened to it. It’s a full cast. It has sound effects too. I much prefer a straight narration, but the audio production was good.
I don’t think Gaiman is my cup of tea.
Fair. I love his stuff, but he’s pretty far removed from sci-fi, and very far removed from either hard sci-fi or space opera.
2 Likes
If you’re referring to the Sandman audio book, I would still recommend any of his novels instead. At least stardust!
I forgot to mention:
The Mote in God’s Eye; by Jerry Pournelle and Larry Niven. I keep forgetting to look up its 2nd part.
2 Likes
Yes, an excellent suggestion. Pretty much anything by Larry Nevin is good.
pretty hard sci-fi.
I did not think the sequel was quite as good, but still enjoyable.
https://www.amazon.com/Gripping-Hand-Jerry-Pournelle/dp/1476791236
1 Like
Collaborations with Jerry Pournelle, not so much e.g. Footfall. The Mote in God’s Eye IMHO was a bit above mediocre; nowhere near any of the Known Space series.
I’m in the last book of the Cyteen series. I must say I’m really enjoying these. The books are from the eighties, but while the books are rich, I’m wondering how they have ftl and human cloning, but still use microfiche as data storage. Wild imagination juxtaposed to very little imagination. I guess it’s easy to say from the lens of 2021.
1 Like
I recently read seveneves. Whoa that book is intense. I don’t mean suspense, I mean the damn engineering and in-depth discussions on orbital dynamics. It was a bit exhausting, but I do appreciate the detail. It was definitely a good read.
1 Like
Just finished Stephen Baxters destroyer.
Give it a try
1 Like
I’ve only read collabs with Terry Pratchett. I’ll put it on my list.
I’m currently rereading all the Expanse books/novellas getting ready for 12/10.
After that I definitely want to give Seveneves a read. That sounds like my kind of book.
1 Like
This could be interesting.
Charles Stross Singularity Sky and Iron Sunrise (Hugo Award Nominee)
Modern, a bit twisted, British writer take on space opera combined with cyberpunk elements.
I’m an avid reader of his other series (Atrocity Archives)
Love the near future, English locales combined with cyberpunk and advanced math => magic mythos (authors computer science background shows here)
1 Like
I recently ran across Travis J.I. Corcoran’s “Aristillus” books. I was surprised I hadn’t heard of them before since the first one came out around ten years ago. Both start a little slowly, but I ended up having to finish both in a single reading.
The plot (and one of the main characters) is somewhat reminiscent of Heinlein’s “The Moon is a Harsh Mistress” but with far more realistic (and more modern) political interactions and tensions (and that one character’s charactization). His treatment of an antigravity space drive is also interesting.
He just announced that he’s started working on book 3, expecting to publish in late 2024.
There are two prequel short stories. They just fill in some of the background; neither one is worth reading standalone.
Books 1, 3, and 4 were good. Book 2 is unreadable. Most of the short stories were decent. The last four novels were so bad that I barely skimmed them. They were supposed to complete the story arc but I think I’ve read somewhere that he was going to do more anyway.
He has another series as well, something like “The Merchant Princes,” which is unreadable crap. Semi-fantasy “family with special ability to move between timelines” garbage, and then he started shoving his personal politics (hardline America-hating socialist) into it by using a leftist caricature of Dick Cheney as a character (“he’s stupid! and evil! and stupid! did I mention he’s also evil?! and really stupid! oh and also evil! plus stupid!”), nuking the U.S., and making the U.S. out to be a horrible evil stupid bully for actually responding to the nuclear attack by nuking the attackers.
I had some interaction with him on Reddit during one of their AMAs (“ask me anything” threads), and he is even more of an asshole in virtual-person than he is as a writer. I asked him about a couple of things from his website, and he outright lied about what he’d written there – it wasn’t that he was forgetting, or misunderstanding, he was just trying to be self-aggrandizing about how prescient he is about life, the universe, and everything (e.g., Edward Snowden or the use of Bitcoin) and went full arrogant “I’m the great author, how dare you question me.”
Wow, looks like you are a tad obsessed with the guy.
I made a point of not investigating the authors I read.
They are not all titans of political or scientific thought and knowing their shortcomings may just sour their work for me. (enough politics everywhere)
Let their creations defend themselves (as in: entertain me and provoke thought)
Back to topic: Richard Morgan “Broken Angels” is close enough to space opera.
You probably should read Altered Carbon first (don’t just watch TV series)
Which is where Stross’ books failed completely, in large part because he insists on vomiting his fucked-up political delusions all over them.
This turned out to be a good read. Thanks for the recommendation.
1 Like
I just started the third book. All of her writing reads like YA to me, but she has these many nuggets of brilliant writing interspersed. It keeps me hooked. She’s a smart woman.
1 Like
Like this?