Out of the closet - Good Sci Fi?

I read quite a bit of sci-fi in my youth and I think the ninety per cent mark is an under-estimate. The only sci-fi books I think I would ever re-read are Isaac Asmiov's "I Robot" and that is really because he just totally reinvented the detective story by setting three laws of robotics that ought to prevent robots killing humans and then wrote a load of short stories setting out the loopholes in those laws (come to think of it, this may be how I came to be a lawyers... still waiting for those robot clients) and the book of Robert Heinlein shorts that features "All us Zombies", where thanks to time-travel and gender reassignment, every single character in the story is the same person, just with different ages and sexes and he/she has no idea. I am sort of interested in reading sci-fi by a guy named Lafferty, because I've read about some of his stuff on the net, and he seemed to write sci-fi set in a Looney Tunes sort of world and was very playful. Plus he wrote one of my favourite lines (Neil Gaiman ripped it off for Sandman "They can kill you... but we can kill you worse") Why, in my view, is sci-fi bad? Principally because it forgets the main rules of fiction - believable characters, convincing dialogue and fresh plot. No sci-fi writer ever manages women characters, the science is either way-off or dense and dull. Yes, ninety per cent of anything is crap, but crap chick-lit or crap thrillers or crap detective stories are less painful to read than crap sci-fi. And this from someone who would stand up like a shot and volunteer for a manned mission to Mars if the chance came along. I know in a sense I'll be preaching to the converted with Mark, but if you are looking for utterly escapist fiction set in strange worlds, then Alan Moore's comics are the way to go - Top Ten about a police force set in a city where everyone has super-powers, The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen where Captain Nemo, the Invisible Man and Edward Hyde join forces to defeat the bad guys/betray the good guys/just have fun pulling peoples arms off, and of course Watchmen. I have not yet read ANY good amateur sci-fi. I'd like to - if someone can point me towards some on abc, I'll give it a try.

I'm a massive fan of this person's writing I think a lot of it is wonderful. Have a skim through it all and you'll see what I mean.

Okay, I'm about to post up a link to all the cherry-picked sci-fi, but I now must confess that I recant my earlier comment about never having read a decent amateur sci-fi story - the first one I read in the list (although I cheated and picked Drew Gummerson) http://dev3.abctales.com/story/36005 It's a doozy, Britney Spears as the last woman on earth, determined to hang onto her virginity, the importance of ironing in space, homo-eroticism, Wallace and Gromit and best of all, a reference to the episode of Steptoe and Son where they partition the house - my favourite half hour of comedy ever. My next challenge is to find something mediocre by Drew - I may be some time...

http://dev3.abctales.com/browse/cherrypicked/science_fiction/story Actually, most of these have got very respectable read-counts, so there are sci-fi fans on the site, most of whom are probably sharpening wooden stakes as I speak.

Good Sci Fi Dune / Dune Messiah / Children of Dune - Frank Herbert Sprawling epics about religion and predestination which are wonderful comments about the uses of religion. The Difference Engine - William Gibson and Bruce Sterling Steampunk where Charles Babbage perfected his difference engine, a proto computer, and the Victorian Age pans out very differently. It manages to be both a books about the nineteenth century and a rip roaring adventure too. The Divine Invasion / Valis / The Transmigration of Timothy Archer / Radio Free Albemuth - Philip K. Dick Four books that probe the links between religion, madness and subjective reality. The last books written by Dick, who wasn't half an interesting but weird man. I'll add more when I've had a chance to think.

Oo-er. I have to confess to reading a fair bit of sf in my youth. I loved Michael Moorcock's Jerry Cornelius stories but I'm not sure they would stand up to re-reading. They were just good at the time. I loved Robert Heinlen's Riverworld stories (I think they were by him) but I'm going to check my bookshelves when I get home.

I love Kim Stanley Robinson's Mars trilogy - Red Mars, Green Mars, Blue Mars. These are brilliant. They follow the first people landing on mars to a whole community being set up, to wars of independence from Earth and then the aftermath. I was so engrossed in these, they are very long, it used to annoy my ex. One copy he threw in the sea - I threw his clothes in the sea - and then I had to go home almost naked on a bus (he took my clothes). Another copy he threw out the window of out 8th story flat. Of course Philip K Dick Richard Mateson and me and Mark have mentioned before. The Canadian woman who looks like Alice Cooper - um - Margaret Atwood. Hey and Andrew thanks for the mention of 'Bob and Dwayne - Astronauts!'.

I read virtually nothing else but sci-fi as a kid, starting with Blake 7 (dvd out soon folks) and Conan the Barbarian, and ending up on Kurt Vonnegut and Phillip K Dick. These days I don't feel the urge to read it anymore - I overdosed perhaps. I make an exeption for Iain M Banks, and recently somebody lent me Only Forward by a Michael Marshall Smith, which I recomend unreservedly. I'm slowly working on a massive epic sci-fi novel that will shake up the whole genre (oh yes).

It is interesting that a lot of us abandon sci-fi after youth...is it because we become more cynical or that we are no longer so impressionable. I think that sci-fi's strengths is that it can challenge our perceptions of reality, anticipate our future or question society's obsessions. The best writers I feel are either those with planet-like intellects, such as Aldous Huxley or those that can lampoon it with wit and verve, such as Douglas Adams. Also worthy of a mention are Verne and Wells. Huxley's Island is a brilliant essay on all our ills, Brave New World is terrifyingly relevant. Michael Moorcock, although a man of his age, still startles - Tony should try 'The Adventures of Catherine Cornelius and Una Persson'. It is sexy, very well-paced and guaranteed to get your heart racing. Bad sci-fi is like projectile vomiting - it leaves you empty when it's all over....

Wolfgirl, yes I agree about Huxley, Island and Brave New World are brill. As is Douglas Adams. I recently bought the original radio series of Hitchhikers on CD. Dan, I've tried to read Iain M Banks but have never managed more than a few pages. Agree about Vonnegut tho. I often brose the sci-fi shelves but nothing great leaps out at me. It's a shame because I'd like to read more. I feel this about most genre fiction. Where are the authors these days who in 50 -100 years we'll look back as we do Huxley, Wells, Verne, Orwell? In this country we seem to have become obsessive about books about relationships or books with tiny themes. Hmm. Last years McSweeney's Anthology of Thilling Tales was great. A few sci-fi stories in there - one by Moorcock.

I think that at a point in our development, (pre to early teens) we need stories as much as anybody else but lack the experience/maturity/empathy/thing to understand the machinations of real characters. Put simply what goes on inside the human head is of less interest to us than what goes on outside it. At this point genre stories (war/crime/sci-fi/cowboy) come into their own. The interesting parts are all in the plot (battles/murders/spaceships/cows) and very little to do with the characters. Romance is the exeption to this rule but I think a case could be made for it fitting in. Sci-fi stands out (and crime to a lesser extent) because it has the scope to convey interesting and intellectual ideas within this mechanism. This obviously appeals to clever (if emotionally stunted) boys and retains a certain lesser appeal into adulthood. Hence the popularity of people like Clarke and Asimoz - who couldn't write a well rounded character for toffee but had all sorts of smart ideas.

Just thought of three wonderful books that are about characters but are also Sci Fi The Death of Grass and The Tripods Trilogy by John Christopher and I am Legend by Richard Mathison. The Man in The High Castle has a good dose of well drawn character and psychology to it as well. Oh and The Forever War by Joe Haldeman is pretty good on that too.

Ah, am now reconsidering my stance on certain matters. I wouldn't consider John Wyndham sci-fi, but suppose he is, really. And I still adore John Wyndham. Dan's theory is a bloody interesting one. If I look back at the stories I was writing when I was fifteen, none of them had people in them, just cut-outs who lived through exciting plots. (Actually, in passing, I tend to like a great deal of what Dan says on the forums. I ought to check out his work - have you got somewhere you think I should start, Dan? For ages and ages I thought you were Ivoryfishbone's son Dan, but I'm now tending to think that you aren't. ) Iain Banks is a good illustration - up until Complicity, I loved his "straight" fiction, (if that isn't wide-of-the-mark I don't know what is), but couldn't bear his sci-fi stuff. Have to say I found Dune incredibly tedious (although I did read about half the books). It clearly is possible to write good sci-fi by keeping the central idea simple and zingy and putting some character into it, but I suspect that this simply wouldn't sell.

I was a massive Philip K Dick fan, pretty much read everything I could lay my hands on, but was re-reading some of his stuff recently, including Man in the High Castle, and thought it was a load of painfully pretentious, cod philosophical rubbish, which i found quite upsetting given how highly I rated him. I think only A Scanner Darkly and The Three Stigmata of Palmer Eldritch stand the test of time. I haven't re-read the short stories - kind of scared to now. William Gibson is alright. Iain Banks is crap. His Sci-Fi and non Sci-Fi alike. No idea what he's writing about to be honest. Brave New World never did it for me at all. Huxley's best book by a country mile is Point Counter Point. Orwell's 1984 is terribly, terribly overrated. The best Sci Fi I've read of late is Solaris by Stanislav Lem. Goes off the rails for about 20 pages near the end, but the pace and mood is fantastic for the rest of it. Good Sci-Fi has real characters in surreal circumstances, and Lem gets that to a T. [%sig%]

Aw shucks Andrew, No I am not Ivoryfishbone’s son, though she did call me 'fresh faced' last Friday. I have posted some sci-fi stuff, the one people seem to like most is I adore Iain Banks and am shaken to discover other people who don't. I put one of his sci-fi books on my top ten (which there is still no link to Mark... is it being kept a secret? I know it wasn't that great but...) Phillip K Dick books are not what you'd call 'good'. Like a lot of sci-fi authors his best stuff is in his short stories. He was an ideas man and the entertainment comes from the nuttiness (and paranoia) of the ideas. I've always suspected Kilgore Trout was based on PKD.

Marc, I think 1984 is great. As for PKD I couldn't finish Palmer Eldritch. My favourite is 'A Scanner Darkly'. It has some hilarious moments in it. Other Mark, I read Dune when I was 11 one Summer holiday in France. I can't remember them now. I will check out Solaris.

Happened to be at my local library today and picked up a copy of Nebula Awards Showcase 2000, edited by Gregory Benford. In this book is a chapter titled, Genre and Genesis: A Discussion of Science Fiction's Literary Roles. The chapter contains essays by Johnathan Lethem, Gordon Van Gelder, George Zebrowski, David Hartwell, and Bill Warren. These gentlemen discuss science fiction in terms of literary relevancy/literary criticism; in terms of the history of the genre; of the money that can be expected to be made or not made from sci-fi books; in terms of how both the fan base and the writers have changed over the last 50 years; and in terms of the "current" publishing realities for science fiction, both at the larger publishing houses, and in the small press and with e-publishers as well. I put "current" in quotation marks because this book is at least four years old now. However, this chapter is still one of the most intelligent and realistic analyses of the present state of science fiction that I have seen. I recommend this book to anyone interested in the genre, if for no other reason than to read these essays. To answer Mark Brown, yes I could come up with a top 10--very easily. But if I do what the gentlemen in the above essays are suggesting, and begin to evaluate sci-fi in terms of not just speculative fiction and escapism, but in terms of both good storytelling and academic literary criticism, I may have change my definitions and even my standards a bit. Anyway, I recommend this book and these essays. Best wishes, Havemouse.