Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

The Realism of Our Times: Kim Stanley Robinson on how science fiction works

publicbooks.org

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

31–40 of 88 posts

Re: The Realism of Our Times: Kim Stanley Robinson on how science fiction works

#31

Post by BLKNSLVR »

renke1 wrote: post #23
everyone wrote: post #4

Can ye recommend any novels / authors that are as hard sci-fi as KSR or Arthur C Clarke?

* Seveneves (I haven't read much else from Neal Stephenson, but I've heard good things) * Children of Time / Children of Ruin (both really good) * Remembrance of Earth's Past (even the fan fiction one is good) * A lot of stuff from Alastair Reynolds (House of Suns being my favorite) * Classics like Tau Zero, The Forever War etc. * A Deepness in the Sky / A Fire Upon the Deep Although not all of these are strictly con…

+1 for Seveneves. I found it so engrossing that just thinking about it now I can picture the shapes of that chain in zero-G, and the unexpectedly long-lasting hellscape consequences of the very early reveal. The CB radio...

Re: The Realism of Our Times: Kim Stanley Robinson on how science fiction works

#32

Post by arethuza »

jpm_sd wrote: post #28

Really loved the Mars trilogy when I was a teenager. The clunky character development and invented politics haven't aged super well, but the stories are still interesting. I also enjoyed The Memory of Whiteness and The Years of Rice and Salt. More recently I tried reading Aurora (2015), but the book is a downer and a slog. Not recommended. Didn't finish it. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aurora_(novel)

Isn't the narrative of Aurora slightly odd (at least at first) because of who the narrator is and how the narrator develops over time?

I really liked it.

Re: The Realism of Our Times: Kim Stanley Robinson on how science fiction works

#33

Post by hyperpallium2 »

everyone wrote: post #4

Can ye recommend any novels / authors that are as hard sci-fi as KSR or Arthur C Clarke?

Larry Niven. His older stuff: Ringworld. and all his short-story collections, especially Neutron Star.

He also did a scifi take on magic, in The Magic Goes Away.

I see Vinor Vinge's AFUTD and ADITS as the closest thing to Niven.

Re: The Realism of Our Times: Kim Stanley Robinson on how science fiction works

#34

Post by arethuza »

PicassoCTs wrote: post #27
adrianN wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I enjoyed Permutation City by Greg Egan and the Zones of Thought books by Vernor Vinge.

Vernor Vinge is so good, shame he dropped it in Rainbows End.

I think Rainbows End is excellent. However, I was disappointed with The Children of the Sky.

Re: The Realism of Our Times: Kim Stanley Robinson on how science fiction works

#35

Post by arethuza »

Herodotus38 wrote: post #6
everyone wrote: post #4

Can ye recommend any novels / authors that are as hard sci-fi as KSR or Arthur C Clarke?

Peter Watts has a good biology background so his books are pretty accurate when it comes to sci-fi advances with biology. Definitely better than most authors who usually focus more on physics/engineering. I liked “Blindsight” and “The Freeze-Frame Revolution” I would also appreciate any recommendations for hard sci-fi authors with a biology focus, I’m sure there are many more I don’t know.

Ken MacLeod has a zoology degree - which is presumably where names like "The Stone Canal" came from...

I like most of his novels, particularly "Learning the World" - which I guess is a reverse first contact novel.

Re: The Realism of Our Times: Kim Stanley Robinson on how science fiction works

#37

Post by JadeNB »

BLKNSLVR wrote: post #17
everyone wrote: post #4

Can ye recommend any novels / authors that are as hard sci-fi as KSR or Arthur C Clarke?

Quarantine by Greg Egan: https://www.gregegan.net/QUARANTINE/Quarantine.html Upon re-reading your question, I don't think this recommendation exactly fits, but, damn, it's a good book anyway and Neal Stephenson doesn't do things by halves: Interface by Neal Stephenson (under a pseudonym and in conjunction with another author also using a pseudonym). This book only becomes more relevant with each presidential campaign…

Greg Egan in general is a solid recommendation for diamond-hard sci-fi; I actually think Quarantine is one of the weakest in this respect, though it's a fantastic book. Who else would think to write a series of books (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greg_Egan#Orthogonal_trilogy) about what would happen if you flipped a sign in the Lorentzian metric?

Re: The Realism of Our Times: Kim Stanley Robinson on how science fiction works

#38

Post by BLKNSLVR »

Seeing this on HN, reading the article and the comments, really reminds me of how much I respect KSR.

His 2312 brought me back to reading hard sci-fi after too long not really reading much fiction at all for a long time. The ideas presented in it reminded me of a sense of wonder at the scope of future possibilities that had previously been lost under an ever increasing pile of marital, parental, and financial responsibility.

The problem I have now is, he somehow seems to write 'em faster 'n' I can read 'em (the responsibility pile still exists and is as demanding as ever)

Anyway, thanks KSR.

(Mostly off topic, but I'm currently reading Patrick O'Brien's Master and Commander, the first in a series of 20 nautical-historic fiction novels, and it's incredibly tough going with O'Brien's detailed and accurate nautical terminology, of which I know nothing - I just loved the movie. A challenging read - and I've covered The Mars Trilogy and some lighter Pynchon).

Re: The Realism of Our Times: Kim Stanley Robinson on how science fiction works

#39

Post by anyonecancode »

jpm_sd wrote: post #28

Really loved the Mars trilogy when I was a teenager. The clunky character development and invented politics haven't aged super well, but the stories are still interesting. I also enjoyed The Memory of Whiteness and The Years of Rice and Salt. More recently I tried reading Aurora (2015), but the book is a downer and a slog. Not recommended. Didn't finish it. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aurora_(novel)

Currently reading Ministry for the Future, which in some ways is a very optimistic book, but is still quite grim. Also, I'm thinking perhaps next time I'm tempted to read a book with climate change as the subject, I'll wait until winter to do it, rather than in the summer when the described scenes are a bit too easy to imagine by simply stepping outside.

Read the mars trilogy and Rice and Salt as well. I like his optimism in humans' ability to actually make radical political change. I suppose this is what I mean by his being both optimistic and grim -- severe outcomes aren't avoided in his books, but in the end societies do change before the absolute worst comes to pass. A "hard optimism" I suppose, which I find valuable.

Re: The Realism of Our Times: Kim Stanley Robinson on how science fiction works

#40

Post by throw1234651234 »

everyone wrote: post #4

Can ye recommend any novels / authors that are as hard sci-fi as KSR or Arthur C Clarke?

Not the The Fifth Season by N. K. Jemisin - recommending it is when the Nebula awards became a joke.

Other than that, it used to be a trusted resource: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nebula_Award_for_Best_Novel

Post reply on HN