Other SF Books (while we're waiting)

Just a mention to read Ender's Game ASAP, before the movie comes out. Same with the Hobbit, for you younger readers.

Many liked the David Drake series on Honor Harrington. I stalled halfway through book two. Just not my cup of tea.

Again, for younger readers, go back and read the classics - Heinlein, Niven & Pournelle, Clarke, Asimov. There are some real mind-benders there.

The older books are more often found in libraries than bookstores. Personally, I'd like to have the Complete Works of Isaac Asimov, which even in ASCII text would fill up a data blu-ray. He wrote both fiction and non-fiction (including a guide to the Bible, and he was an atheist!), he loved to write, and was very fast.

David Drake is a bit of hit & miss. Back in 'the day', he was different because he was channeling his inner Viet Nam with Hammer's Slammers. I stopped reading him after reading Fortress & Kill Factor, but forgave him after reading the Bellisarius saga. With the Lightnings is a more fun read, and not so dark as his earlier work.

I remember reading "Ender's Game" as a short story in Analog SF (I don't think it was in Asimovs) and thought it was great. The short story was all in Ender's perspective, except for one sentence which was in his friend's. I figured the editor missed it. It then became a novel with the same sentence, and a bunch of other perspectives added. I haven't liked any of Orson Scott Card's other works, or his short stories that appeared later. If you figure out why the young couple didn't get married in Speaker for the Dead, the whole book is a total drag.

I liked the Lous McMaster Bujold's work. It's pure escapism, but even if you get ahead of the plot it is still fun or funny.

I suppose more later. I read a couple of 'free' novels to introduce a series. The writers may have some talent for writing, but the plot & flow would have had their editor reject them and get a rewrite or two. I read some of their later work, and it is much better, so perhaps making your worst work 'free' is NOT a good way to promote yourself.

I just finished the Spinward Fringe Broadcast series -starts with Origins - by Randolph Lalonde. Space opera. Some of the story gets a little strange, but it all comes together in episode 7 Framework.This universe has fabricators too, a little more sophisticated in that they can make about anything like clothing and food in addition to machine parts and weapons etc. They are called materializers.
Did Star Trek 's replicators make more than food? One of those would use be nice on nights when I don't feel like cooking...and Don't tell me that we have them - they recalled drive throughs... with The Frontiers Saga and the Spinward Fringe series, there have been lots of 2.99 charges to the credit card.

I read Enders Game a month ago or so when I heard about the upcoming movie.

KW, I also enjoyed Lois McMaster Bujold's Vorkosigan series and have read it multiple times. Really cool was that I bought Cryoburn in hardback and she included a CD of the series in ebook format, all except for Memory. That one I picked up at the Baen site.

I just finished Enders Game last weekend. I liked it a lot but wonder how they will get it done on screen, I imagine it will be nothing like the book. I have lately been on a scifi binge, I tend to like multi-book stories, I want to see how the characters develop and move forward.

As for other books, I loved "the lost fleet" series from Jack Campbell, especially since similar to Ryk he tries to keep the tactics true as we would expect them working in space (time delays due to limits of speed of light, interesting tactics, etc). The books do get a bit formulaic at times but I still found it interesting. Now he has expanded to two sets of new story lines which I wish would come faster. I have read all the Honor Harrington series, tons of book to read, always different and the universe is just expanding, though the hero worship does get a bit old. Can't wait for the next book since the last one wasn't the best since it was a "building" book (ie. setting the chessboard up for the next big push).
I have read many books in the Halo universe, some better than others (the ones by Greg bear I like the most). The forever war by Joe Haldeman was interesting perspective of a man who fights a war versus aliens and his trek through time every time he boards a ship (his perception of time is much reduced due to relativity so the real world ages while hes trapped on a ship, the authors interpretation of what may happen didn't fit with what I would expect but its just fiction anyways). I have read a few of the large operatic trilogies by Peter Hamilton, they tend to just be weird and there's always some lesson or twist about his view of mankind, religion, politics but it isn't too bad.
Last but not least, you should check up "old man war", can't say much without spoiling it, but I liked it a lot.

If you haven't read "The Forever War" by Joe Haldeman yet, read Heinlein's Starship Troopers first. It is a great pair of similar scenarios from different viewpoints. Forever War was a response to Starship Troopers. Both unique and interesting.

I feel adrift, waiting for this. Maybe I should just go away for a year, and then I'll have six new books to keep me entertained! 😉

I'm currently reading Azimov's Robots of Dawn. I read it when it first came out in hardback, and then my "friends" hid the book when I had about 20 pages to go. Since this is a murder mystery, this was quite annoying. Unfortunately, they hid it in the library, and it was never seen again.

I've also been reading some old non-SF classics. There is a compendium of all the Sherlock Holmes stories, all four or five volumes, for a few bucks. It is well formatted, has the drawings/engravings of the original books, and took a month to read as it is at least a couple thousand pages. After reading it, I watched the TV series made in the 80's of Sherlock Holmes and the screen adaptations were very well done, and the casting was excellent.

Speaking of screen adaptations, there were more similarities of David Drake's "Fortress" and the unrelated movie "Iron Skies" than between the novelette "Damnation Alley" and the movie of the same name. So even if you've read Ender's Game, the movie adaptation may not bear much resemblance.

I've been buying a lot of kindle books recently and the following series stick out (besides the Frontiers Saga of course). As always, not everyone will enjoy them as well.

In Her Name series by Michael Hicks
The Human Chronicles by T.R. Harris
Star Force Series by B.V. Larson
Just about anything by Evan Currie
Sara King's series about Zero (not sure what the series name is)
-Note: A few books in the series are currently being edited before re-published, so it might be best to wait until they are out before buying.

I'd keep the list short to avoid getting to much of a backlog, but that's a moot point with people suggesting to read all books of several prolific authors.

If you haven't read The Expanse series by James S.A. Corey, I highly suggest you check it out. Corey is actually the pseudonym of two writers, Daniel Abraham and Ty Franck and their narrative and character development skills are incredible.

The Rho Agenda series is also pretty good, even if I personally have a great deal of problems with the physics that Richard Phillips presents in the final tome of the series. Philips does have a master's degree in physics, but the scenario he writes of in "Wormhole" is a bit implausible in my opinion.

I also love the ongoing Odyssey One series by Evan Currie, and every once in a while it occurs to me that Eric Weston would be a great role model for Nathan Scott...the Odyssey is one bad-ass ship, that's for certain.

Finally, if you have never read Jack McDevitt's Priscilla Hutchens novels (e.g. Deepsix, or Odyssey) you might want to take a look. I love Jack's writing skills and he has some interesting takes on alien societies as well as human space travel and its developments. Hutch is also a character that's likable and relatable.

I've read 70 plus books since i got my kindle last christmas all of which are scifi, save the hobbit. I'm just going to list my top five favorite series(besdies fronteir saga which is #1). First off would be spineward sectors novels or the admiral novels by luke sky watcher, 2nd favorite series right now. Fun and lots of action. Next would be exodus empire's at war by doug dandridge a very good series. One of my favorite things in this series are the character names are ridiculously awesome. Next would be warrior wings books by evan currie. I like the feel of these books because humans are at a disadvantage to an alien alliance and are still seperate nations and come togather for the good of humanity. Continuing on is the human chronicles saga by tr harris. Just killing aliens and some super human escapades. Finally the star carrier saga by ian Douglas. Very realistic portrayal of space battles and some very cool tech. Also i would like to recommend the mass effect books. to anyone who has played the games it fills in some of the stuff that goes down before and between the games. The 4th book is by a different author, michael c dietz, and he butchered it so skip that one.

I just hit upon something that resonates with me: Calvin & Hobbes. If you want something to read while waiting for Episodes 23 & 24, go look up the collected works of Calvin & Hobbes.

I was just reading a bit of Nevin Martell's book "Looking for Calvin & Hobbes". It has problems, but it reminded me just how much I miss that comic.

A couple of great scifi books that I enjoyed were Lucifer's Hammer and Footfall, both written by Larry Niven and Jerry Pournelle. One involves a comet impact, the other an alien invasion. Excellent books in my opinion.

Jerry Pournelle has a website, Chaos Manor He and Larry Niven still get together to write.

Oh, I forgot to mention the HeeChee Saga by Frederik Pohl.

The first one (Heechee saga) was kind of disturbing but interesting. I honestly don't remember if I read the follow-ons.