24-12-2002 22:28									#31
	Tired of ads?

quote: Originally posted by self biased yeah, Larry Niven is truly a master. he comes up with the neatest aliens. as for poul anderson and jerry pournelle, i forget which, but whoever wrote "the years of the city" that book left me wanting. it never truly arrived as it were. although he's not sci-fi, Clive Barker spins a great yarn as well. check out "the great and secret show." it's a killer.

Frederick Pohl is the correct Author of "The Years of the City".

	24-12-2002 23:01									#32
	Avatar Enlargement: We've got the solution

I'm shocked that no one has mentioned Orson Scott Card yet.

Ender's Game
Speaker for the Dead
Xenocide
Children of the Mind
Ender's Shadow
Shadow of the Hegemon
Shadow Puppets

	25-12-2002 00:31									#33
	Get a bigger avatar today!

reismark I am similarly shocked. However, after Ender's Game, I though the rest of that series really went to Hell in a handbasket.

However, I can recommend Card's:
Hart's Hope
Songmaster
and his Homecoming Quintology--although the structure's a little weird. The 5th book has very little to do with the rest of the quintology, but as a stand-alone, it's some of Card's best writing.

	25-12-2002 03:33									#34
	Support Apolyton, buy Alpha Centauri

Zkribbler: The Bean series (the Shadow books) really got it going again. Shadow of the Hegemon, in particular, is a GREAT read.

	25-12-2002 03:45									#35
	Tired of ads?

How about the Deathstalker series by Simon Green. Mindless Space Opera at it's finest. Also very amusing.

ACK!

	25-12-2002 04:04									#36
	Inflate your Upload Space

For the Libertarian:

The Moon is a Harsh Mistress By Heinlein

Th story of a Libertarian Revolution.

	25-12-2002 04:16									#37
	Enter the AD-FREE zone

Frank Herbert's "The Dosadi Experiment" is a superior psychological sci-fi thriller. Gordie Dickson's "Dorsai", and "Tactics of Mistake" are very good military sci-fi, as is Jerry Pournelle's "A spaceship for the King". Pournelle also teamed with Niven to write "A Mote in Gods Eye" which was a beautiful blending of their two talents. For something with extreme bredth of scope that verges on visionary overload is "The Darkling Wind" by someone named Somtow Scharmukul (or something close to it - he was Russian IIRC).

D

	25-12-2002 05:18									#38
	Inflate your Upload Space

quote: Originally posted by Darsnan Frank Herbert's "The Dosadi Experiment" is a superior psychological sci-fi thriller. Gordie Dickson's "Dorsai", and "Tactics of Mistake" are very good military sci-fi, as is Jerry Pournelle's "A spaceship for the King". Pournelle also teamed with Niven to write "A Mote in Gods Eye" which was a beautiful blending of their two talents. For something with extreme bredth of scope that verges on visionary overload is "The Darkling Wind" by someone named Somtow Scharmukul (or something close to it - he was Russian IIRC). D

That name is Thai.

ACK!

	25-12-2002 05:18									#39
	Support Apolyton, buy Call to Power 2

PKD!

	25-12-2002 05:41									#40
	I think of it more as a comedy in a sci-fi setting - like hitchhiker's guide. Support Apolyton, pre-order Civilization IV

I'd recomend Colony. It's written by Rob Grant, a co-author of the red dwarf series.

Very good book with lots of really great dark humour.

	25-12-2002 13:44									#41
	Suffering from ads?

quote: Originally posted by CyberGnu Molly, have you read Kim Stanley Robinsons other books? I loved Red Mars, was lukewarm to Blue Mars and hated Green Mars... So I'm just curious how The Years of Rice and Salt stock up to that.

Sorry, I would have replied earlier but have been busy making gazpacho and marinading kangaroo. Typical Xmas fare.

It's hard to compare 'Years' with any of the Mars sequence, because the starting points are so different. For me, much of the enjoyment of alternate earth stories has been the way the author describes the alternate history, how what was different happened, and why, and what the implications of small or large changes were. With a new world as in the Mars series, everything is up for grabs, and you have no established history to act as a counterpoise, or contrast.
It's not tremendously long (long enough, though) but I think if you enjoy both alternate history and Robinson's work, then get it from the library and see how it goes.

I forgot to mention one of the best ever alternate history works-

Keith Roberts: Pavane

Elizabeth I is assassinated and the Counter Reformation triumphs with Spain and recusant English allies breaking the power of the Northern Protestant states. It's a tremendously vivid, poetic achievement, a vision of a world where science's progress has been slowed, but where Belsen and Auschwitz never occur.

I can also recommend Cecelia Holland's 'Floating Worlds' and Samuel R Delany's 'Triton', and 'Resurrections from the Dustbin of History', by Simon Louvish.

	25-12-2002 14:21									#42
	Help yourself to an AD-FREE life

Tuberski, I love the Deathstalker, but I'm slightly ashamed of it... BTW, I swear to god, if he writes "combined to a whole greater than the sum of the parts" one more time I'm going to track him down and see if the reverse is true....

	25-12-2002 14:23									#43
	Put an end to popups!

Molly, thanks, I think I'll try it out.

Marinate Kangaroo, eh? Can you send some?

	25-12-2002 14:36									#44
	Increase Your PM Length

Mmm, I'd love to, except we just splashed out nearly $ Au 200 on postage for Christmas presents...

I think some tourist shops here sell kangaroo jerky and emu jerky- kangaroo jerky is similar to dried reindeer meat strips.

Kangaroo meat used to be sold in British supermarkets until some uninformed animal rights types took it into their heads that somehow 'roos were an endangered species and demonstrated outside the shops selling it. Idiots.

You can buy it at Safeways in Australia, in sausage, burger and fillet form, and as peppered steak and with cajun spices. I cooked it in paperbark with native spices and rosemary. It made a welcome change from turkey.

Which reminds me- a good Aussie s.f. writer is Greg Egan- I recommend Diaspora and Quarantine and Permutation City- all excellent reads.

Have a good Yuletide, Cyber Gnu.

	25-12-2002 16:19									#45
	Support Apolyton, buy Galactic Civilizations: Deluxe Edition

quote: So I'm just curious how The Years of Rice and Salt stock up to that.

It was a decent book, but it had too much Buddhist theology in it, IMO.

quote: Sorry, I would have replied earlier but have been busy making gazpacho and marinading kangaroo. Typical Xmas fare.

Gotta love that kangaroo. Are emus also typical Aussie Christmas food?

	25-12-2002 16:30									#46
	Full PM-box? Change here!

Anything by Cordwainer Smith.

	25-12-2002 16:42									#47
	Suffering from ads?

My fav's:

Asimov, Foundation (but only the first three, the rest sucked)
Fredric Brown, Martians Go Home
Asimov again: The End Of Eternity (about time-travel)

	25-12-2002 16:53									#48
	Support Apolyton or Terrorists Win

quote: Originally posted by Taz Anything by Cordwainer Smith.

Also,
Alfred Bester - The Demolished Man, The Stars My Destination.
James Blish - The Cities In Flight series

	25-12-2002 20:32									#49
	Suffering from ads?

I'm taking notes. Thanks to everybody and a merry christmas.

	25-12-2002 22:40									#50
	Remove this text

The sci-fi masters seriers you can get at Amazon doesn't have adud book in it and some of the books are masterpieces. I mention this because RedBaron mentioned books in the series.

	25-12-2002 22:56									#51
	Get a bigger avatar today!

David Brin (uplift series, particularly startide rising)
Stanislaw Lem (quite varied in tone, evreything is good but the best ones IMO are Solaris and His Master's Voice. Can be either gloomy or, if not serious, hilarious)
Also Andreas Eschbach (not many books by him, maybe he is not translated in English, but he has been translated from Geman to French).
Usually, look for non-English speaking authors. If they have been translated, they are good.

	26-12-2002 02:48									#52
	Support Apolyton

I'll second The Years of Rice and Salt as a good book but beware, it gets surreal when KSR mixes Buddist and Islamic afterlives.

David Brin is excellent too. I also have to put a vote in for Bruce Sterling, one of my favourite authors. Try Holy Fire (introspective look at a fossilising society at the end of the 21st century) or Distraction (political love story set in a broken, chaotic America) or his collections of short stories (Globalhead and A Good Old Fashioned Future). I haven't read Heavy Weather or The Difference Engine but they are on my todo list.

Also, William Gibson, the father of cyberpunk. I had to analyse Neuromancer to pieces for an English course and fell in love with it.

	26-12-2002 05:42									#53
	Avatar Enlargement: We've got the solution

quote: Originally posted by redbaron Also, Alfred Bester - The Demolished Man, The Stars My Destination. James Blish - The Cities In Flight series

I might also suggest Blish's A Case of Conscience. For a real interesting compare and contrast, follow Case with Mary Doria Russells The Sparrow. Both books are about Catholic priests whom undergo crisis' of faith after establishing contact with alien races. Both novels take place in mature interstellar societies, so they are not First Contact stories, btw. The Sparrow contains a pretty big spoiler at the end of it, a spoiler which is revealed in the second sentence of Amazon.com's review of the sequel, Children of God.

My science fiction discussion group is doing Poul Anderson's Boat of a Million Years next month, which isn't a pretty bad read. It postulates that there are some people whom live forever, provided that trauma doesn't get to them (sort of like Highlander) and how they've made it from the earliest Phoenicians to an interstellar civilization. It kind of loses itself in the end, but the first 300-400 pages are pretty gripping, imho.

	26-12-2002 06:13									#54
	Support Apolyton, buy GURPS/ Alpha Centauri

quote: Originally posted by Ramo For starters, try Isaac Asimov's "Foundation" series, Frank Herbert's "Dune" series, and Vernor Vinge's "A Fire Upon the Deep"/"A Deepness in the Sky" series.

Of all the posts given in this thread, this one earns an A+ for quality picks. These three series really give you a glimpse of the development of modern science fiction, especially if you take them in the order published (exactly as Ramo has above). Vernor Vinge can even take credit for inventing cyberpunk, as is argued in the book True Names: And the Opening of the Cyberspace Frontier, which contains Vinges original 1981 story and 11 essays. I've toyed with buying this one, but I think I'll wait until it hits the dump bins for $5.99. I've said earlier that A Deepness in the Sky is, imnsho, the finest single volume space opera of the past 5 years (he says, deftly placing a chronological limit that doesn't have it competing with Iain M. Banks' Excession. )

Good post, Ramo.

	26-12-2002 10:11									#55
	Enter the AD-FREE zone

quote: Originally posted by Ramo It was a decent book, but it had too much Buddhist theology in it, IMO. Gotta love that kangaroo. Are emus also typical Aussie Christmas food?

Only amongst weirdo immigrants like me. Seriously, native Australian foodstuffs (kangaroo, crocodile, wallaby, emu) despite their incredibly healthy nature (no hormones, no antibiotics, free range, organic,) are not items that many native born Australians eat as yet.

In Great Britain one of the best selling new ready made sauces is an Australian import based on Australian rivermint and peaches (if memory serves me correctly).

I could buy things such as Australian Illawarra plum sauce and wattle seeds easier in London than in Melbourne, for a time. I can certainly recommend the spices and herbs of Australia- bush tomato, native lime, macadamia nuts, pepperberry, lemon myrtle- uniquely Australian flavours.

Anyway, more book recommendations:

Michael Moorcock: Gloriana

An alternate world empire Britannia, with Native American Dukes, John Dee and other characters. A phantasmagorical read. Also, his Cornelius Quartet, and his Oswald Bastable, Warlord of the Air, trilogy.

Philip K D!ck's Clans of the Alphane Moon, Martian Time-Slip and The Crack in Space.

M John Harrison's The Pastel City and In Viriconium.

John Brunner's Stand on Zanzibar

Norman Spinrad's Bug Jack Barron

J.G. Ballard's The Drowned World, Vermilion Sands and The Atrocity Exhibition

Samuel R Delany's Triton and Nova

George Turner The Sea and Summer

Kate Wilhelm Let The Fire Fall

Paul J McAuley's Pasquale's Angel and Fairyland

Robert Silverberg's Good News From the Vatican

Roger Zelazny's A Rose for Ecclesiastes, Isle of the Dead and Lord of Light

Simon Ings's Hot Head and Hotwire

Bruce Sterling's Islands in the Net

China Mieville's Perdido Station.

	26-12-2002 10:35									#56
	Increase Your PM Length

quote: Originally posted by reismark I'm shocked that no one has mentioned Orson Scott Card yet. Ender's Game Speaker for the Dead Xenocide Children of the Mind Ender's Shadow Shadow of the Hegemon Shadow Puppets

I got my friend ender's shadow and shadow of the hegemon for christmas. He was overjoyed.

How does shadow puppet fit into the ender series? is it a sequel to children of the mind?

	26-12-2002 21:29									#57
	Support Apolyton buy from Amazon

recomendation... hmm.. Canticle for Leibowitz was good. Felt like Fallout, the game.

quote: My science fiction discussion group is doing Poul Anderson's Boat of a Million Years next month, which isn't a pretty bad read. It postulates that there are some people whom live forever, provided that trauma doesn't get to them (sort of like Highlander) and how they've made it from the earliest Phoenicians to an interstellar civilization. It kind of loses itself in the end, but the first 300-400 pages are pretty gripping, imho.

do you have a web page or something?

	26-12-2002 22:00									#58
	Remove this text

Harry Harrison - Stainless Steel Rat series

	26-12-2002 22:14									#59
	Support Apolyton, buy Civilization: The Boardgame

quote: Originally posted by LDiCesare David Brin (uplift series, particularly startide rising) Stanislaw Lem (quite varied in tone, evreything is good but the best ones IMO are Solaris and His Master's Voice. Can be either gloomy or, if not serious, hilarious) Also Andreas Eschbach (not many books by him, maybe he is not translated in English, but he has been translated from Geman to French). Usually, look for non-English speaking authors. If they have been translated, they are good.

I must wholeheartedly agree (though I have not read Eschbach)..

I love Lem, and you can find most of his works translated: The futurological Congress is very good, and Tales of Pirx the Pilot are also very good. The first is relatively short, the second a series of short stories. Eden is a great story of first contact. Solaris is sort of muddled. Good but very deep. ... in a bathtub (I don't remmeber if the first word is diary, or transcripts) is a very weird tale of espionage, counter-espionage, counter-counter espionage, and counter-counter (you get the point). He has one bok, with 'doctor' in the title which deals with an asylum in Poland during the Nazi occupation (By the way, Lem is polish) that is good but depressing. Lem is famous for having being inducted into the American association of Sci-Fi writers (even if he was part of the Eastern Block) but then causing a furor when he wrote that most American sci-fi, with a few exceptions, was utter crap.

	27-12-2002 03:11									#60
	Support Apolyton

quote: Originally posted by CyberGnu Tuberski, I love the Deathstalker, but I'm slightly ashamed of it... BTW, I swear to god, if he writes "combined to a whole greater than the sum of the parts" one more time I'm going to track him down and see if the reverse is true....

Very true, but anybody who writes this:

"she looks as confused as blind lesbian in a fishmarket."

can't be all bad....



ACK!