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Science Fiction Is Dying. Long Live Post Sci-Fi?

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Re: Science Fiction Is Dying. Long Live Post Sci-Fi?

#61

Post by Frotag »

Funny timing, I was just thinking about this over dinner while scrolling the wiki list on [clarke / seiun / nebula] awards for the thousandth time.

> [Post-sci-fi is] free to allow the science fictional elements of their stories develop slowly, to emerge only in the latter half of the text, or to remain an isolated thread in a larger tapestry, all of which are anathema to genre-machine publishing, which generally wants its spaceships front-and-centre early on, to reassure readers they’re getting what they paid for.

This has always bugged me. There's often an interesting synopsis like (below), but the actual story begins with ~200 pages of backstories. And altogether the actual problem / developments / solution could probably be detailed in a tenth of the page count after subtracting all the character drama.

> "When a signal is discovered that seems to come from far beyond our solar system [...] What follows is an eye-opening journey out to the stars to the most awesome encounter in human history"

But this synopsis is actually from a well known 80s novel [0] so I don't think this slow-burn type of writing has become any more or less common with post scifi. To be clear, I don't have a problem with character-focused stories (I've read a ton!), I just wish they were advertised that way.

At this point I'm finding new / unusual stuff to read by looking for the least liked books whenever recommendations come up. Anyways rant over. On a more positive note, the author's post has put of new names / titles on my reading list. I think my next read will probably be something by Ishiguro:

> [The Buried Giant] follows an elderly Briton couple, Axl and Beatrice, living in a fictional post-Arthurian England in which no-one is able to retain long-term memories. The couple have dim memories of having had a son, and they decide to travel to a neighbouring village to seek him out.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Contact_(novel)

Re: Science Fiction Is Dying. Long Live Post Sci-Fi?

#62

Post by MarkusQ »

crooked-v wrote: post #24
MarkusQ wrote: post #6

I would really like to be able to read something and find out that it's about whatever it said it was going to be about, and not bait to trick me into hearing about the author's 1) politics, 2) sexuality, 3) AI use or 4) investment grift.

>scifi >I don't want to hear about politics or sexuality How actually familiar are you with the genre?

I was talking about the article, actually.

Re: Science Fiction Is Dying. Long Live Post Sci-Fi?

#63

Post by Frotag »

zouhair wrote: post #26

I stopped reading Sci-Fi, it's just all dystopia and even when it's about a Utopia it's mostly about how it crumbles like with the Terra Ignota Series. We live in a dystopia, we need some utopian ideas, enough of the gloom and doom that ends up being a self-fulfilling prophecy..

There's a subreddit called /r/hfy for more positive scifi. It tends to be indie stuff and I think it goes a little too far in the other direction but at least some of the top-voted ones are interesting.

Off the top of my head...

https://www.royalroad.com/fiction/32973/synchronizing-minds-...

https://www.royalroad.com/fiction/67180/here-be-dragons-book...

Re: Science Fiction Is Dying. Long Live Post Sci-Fi?

#64

Post by fragmede »

operatingthetan wrote: post #20
rockskon wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

From a purely economic standpoint, AI is its own worst enemy. Quicker to produce books made even cheaper and even automate-able? You could have AI generate the next Shakespeare and you'll almost certainly never get noticed amidst the flood of competing books.

It's fun to talk to an LLM yourself, but when I come upon someone else's output my eyes glaze over. I'm fine if an author uses AI to help them outline the book, brainstorm ideas, but I want the actual book to be written by a person.

Why read someone else's books? LLMs are the ultimate choose your own adventure story generators. Give it a scenario and some characters and some conflict and generate your own story. Sit down with ChatGPT and just have a good story time for yourself for a couple of hours going however you want to go. Want to focus on action and adventure? Or do you want interpersonal drama? Or both? You decide!

Re: Science Fiction Is Dying. Long Live Post Sci-Fi?

#65

Post by btown »

I don't know what sales numbers look like, but from my perspective as a casual reader who's been trying to keep up with Hugo Award nominees of recent years... science fiction may not be trendy on BookTok, but it's far from dead.

Sure, fantasy has "corrupted" the Hugos, but there's plenty of hard science fiction, and science fiction that grapples with societal questions at large. Arkady Martine's Memory Called Empire and Desolation Called Peace, both Hugo winners, are incredibly thoughtful depictions of societies on the verge of disruption from new technology. Ryka Aoki's Light From Uncommon Stars, a 2022 Hugo nominee, while somewhat of a sci-fi-fantasy genre crossover, is both harrowing and exhilarating in its discussion of gender through a speculative lens (content warnings apply).

If you're looking for whether innovative science fiction is being adapted into popular media - the Three Body Problem (2015 Hugo winner) and the Murderbot series (won the Hugo most recently in 2021) are both being adapted. Andy Weir's post-Martian works continue to be hyped, if not quite adapted yet. The fanbase for Tamsyn Muir's Ninth series is rabid in the best possible way - and while ostensibly centered on necromancy, it's remarkably high in sci-fi hardness.

And outside of traditional publishing - democratized writing challenges like https://www.reddit.com/r/HFY/, genre-crossing serial sci-fi like the works of Wildbow, and fanfiction in general (I continue to follow and adore the To The Stars, a Madoka fanfic which juxtaposes magic with a spacefaring future humanity, with masterful worldbuilding) continue to thrive.

Traditional publishing houses may indeed be in crisis, but contrary to the original article's assertion, there is no shortage of ideas.

Re: Science Fiction Is Dying. Long Live Post Sci-Fi?

#66

Post by bigstrat2003 »

api wrote: post #49
ivraatiems wrote: post #34

I'd really enjoy a return to classic space opera. I think a world where technologies like AI actually work out okay to some extent is a) closer to fiction than the alternative, and b) more interesting than another dystopia. I'd enjoy a swashbuckling noblebright adventures-in-space thing way more than yet another treatise on Technology Bad right about now. That said, I don't know that I think sci-fi as a genre is dyin…

The prevailing narrative is that the optimism collapsed because the real future didn't turn out like we hoped, but I don't think that's it. A lot of very optimistic sci-fi was written right after two world wars. I think it's more of a stylistic conceit. If it's not dark and edgy, it's not profound . Personally I think dark and edgy (or variants like pessimistic and bleak, or depressing and fatalistic) is the cheap ea…

It seems to me like it is a pendulum swing. It used to be that most works were straightforward and heroic, so that when someone had the idea to write a morally gray story, that was fresh and really interesting. Eventually everyone, tired of the worn out heroic tropes, started to get on this dark, edgy bandwagon. But now the dark and edgy stories are just as worn out as heroic stories used to be. Now, a straightforwardly heroic story is actually kind of subversive and fresh! So I think that, over the coming decades, we will see a shift back towards optimistic stories as people get more and more tired of the dark and gritty kind.

Re: Science Fiction Is Dying. Long Live Post Sci-Fi?

#67

Post by bigstrat2003 »

WillAdams wrote: post #58
modeless wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Star Trek TNG was an interesting utopia. I want more of that. (Not more Star Trek, more utopia sci-fi).

But it kept getting undermined every other episode, to say nothing of things such as Section 31.

Section 31 wasn't in TNG. And I wouldn't say the utopia got undermined in TNG either. When you (fairly rarely) had corruption or villainy inside Starfleet, those people were always treated as rogues who were acting on their own, and were decisively defeated by the utopia. It isn't like in DS9 where the writers flirt with the idea that maybe the Federation can't work without a dark side; the TNG writers play the utopia straight.

Re: Science Fiction Is Dying. Long Live Post Sci-Fi?

#68

Post by operatingthetan »

fragmede wrote: post #64
operatingthetan wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's fun to talk to an LLM yourself, but when I come upon someone else's output my eyes glaze over. I'm fine if an author uses AI to help them outline the book, brainstorm ideas, but I want the actual book to be written by a person.

Why read someone else's books? LLMs are the ultimate choose your own adventure story generators. Give it a scenario and some characters and some conflict and generate your own story. Sit down with ChatGPT and just have a good story time for yourself for a couple of hours going however you want to go. Want to focus on action and adventure? Or do you want interpersonal drama? Or both? You decide!

The LLM just reflects you back. I have a system like that and it can be very fun, but it's become clear that it will just lie to try to make me happy. One of the reasons people read books is to have access to another (probably unique) perspective.

Re: Science Fiction Is Dying. Long Live Post Sci-Fi?

#69

Post by awesome_dude »

WillAdams wrote: post #59
awesome_dude wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Or the matrix take - > Agent Smith tells Morpheus that the first, "perfect" Matrix failed because humanity requires suffering, leading them to create a simulation based on the "peak of your civilization"—1999. Smith highlights that the machines actually took over during this era, making it their civilization rather than humanity's. The choice of 1999 provided a stable,, yet inherently flawed, era characterized by 90s…

The thing about _The Matrix_ is that the world-building was much more interesting than the premise (to make a world in which comicbook superheroes made sense). Not seeing why human misery is necessary --- that line always felt propaganda-like --- a utopia would arguably be more stable since there would be less striving for change.

> there would be less striving for change

Precisely, there would be nothing to strive for.

As an engineer I often say "If everything in life went to plan it would be a very boring life indeed"

Re: Science Fiction Is Dying. Long Live Post Sci-Fi?

#70

Post by bigstrat2003 »

ahhhhnoooo wrote: post #40
zouhair wrote: post #26

I stopped reading Sci-Fi, it's just all dystopia and even when it's about a Utopia it's mostly about how it crumbles like with the Terra Ignota Series. We live in a dystopia, we need some utopian ideas, enough of the gloom and doom that ends up being a self-fulfilling prophecy..

Read some Becky Chambers.

I would not wish for anyone to inflict Becky Chambers upon themselves. She is a really awful writer. Interesting world building ideas, but she spends far too much time using her books to lecture the reader about morality, with all the subtlety of a Sunday School lecture.
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