Suggest me sci-fi novels with space and planetary exploration themes.

I'm looking for something like 'A Fire Upon the Deep' or 'The Stars my Destination'. There should be a lot of world building and the plot shouldn't linger in just one place most of the book.

36 points · 21 comments · view on lemmy.world

21 Comments

Im_old@lemmy.world · 17 pts · 360d (1 reply)

The expanse

iturnedintoanewt@lemmy.world · 3 pts · 360d

This. Really good world/society building.

Pencilnoob@lemmy.world · 9 pts · 360d (2 replies)

I really like science fiction that involves world building. These are some of my favorites:

  • The Sparrow
  • Martian Chronicles
  • The Dispossessed
  • Left Hand of Darkness
  • Xenocide / Speaker for the Dead
  • Piranesi (no spaceships but still feels like sci-fi)
  • Hyperion Cantos
  • Dune
  • Farmer in the Sky
  • Beowulf's Children
brendansimms@lemmy.world · 3 pts · 360d

Hell yea Ursula LeGuin

Karl@programming.dev · 0 pts · 360d

I've read and loved some of these. Thanks

InvisibleShoe@lemmy.world · 7 pts · 360d

The Bobiverse

Ceedoestrees@lemmy.world · 6 pts · 360d (2 replies)

Anything by Alastair Reynolds is pretty big picture. Revenger is about space pirates with crazy unique lore. House of Suns spans tens of thousands of years and the whole galaxy. Terminal World is all on one planet but the concept is so unique it goes everwhere from a sci-fi wonderland to a western to airship pirates.

The Gods Themselves by Asimov stays pretty local to earth/the moon but there's whole other dimension, too.

JayleneSlide@lemmy.world · 4 pts · 360d (1 reply)

You're going to bring up Alastair Reynolds and just not mention the Revelation Space series?! Fie! FIE ON YOU!!! :D

Ceedoestrees@lemmy.world · 3 pts · 360d

Because I found it hard to get through. His ideas are so big and so cool but I personally found the pacing with those dragged on. I couldn't finish.

Diddlydee@feddit.uk · 6 pts · 360d (1 reply)

This might not be specifically what you're after, but the Rama series by Arthur C Clarke has world building after book 1, and doesn't linger in one place plotwise (although most of the setting is in one place, albeit a huge place).

Even if it doesn't fit your spec completely, if you haven't read it, it should be on your list.

Karl@programming.dev · 2 pts · 360d

Ok thanks

perishthethought@piefed.social · 5 pts · 360d

Ringworld by Larry Niven

Delta_V@lemmy.world · 5 pts · 360d (1 reply)

The Three Stigmata of Palmer Eldritch by Phillip K. Dick

Delta_V@lemmy.world · 5 pts · 360d

I can't edit the above post for some reason?

Wanted to add:

The Dispossessed by Ursula K. Le Guin

nemanin@lemmy.world · 5 pts · 360d (2 replies)

A Deepness in the Sky is also by VV and is, IMO, so much better than AFUTD. If you haven’t read it yet, you ought!

Children of Time is also exploration based. And good. But not nearly as good as a A Deepness in the Sky.

Karl@programming.dev · 1 pts · 360d (1 reply)

ADITS is a book that has been in my tbr for almost a year and still hasn't gotten anywhere near to getting touched by me. I'm gonna read it once I'm done with my current read.

nemanin@lemmy.world · 3 pts · 360d

I’m jealous. I wish I could read it for the first time again.

Couldbealeotard@lemmy.world · 3 pts · 360d

The Freeze-Frame Revolution by Peter Watts.

Not so much planets, but the galaxy.

zewm@lemmy.world · 3 pts · 360d

Foundation series by Isaac Asimov

Ender’s Game series by Orson Scott Card

Blackwood & Virtue series by Bennet R Coles

hoodles@lemmy.world · 2 pts · 360d

Lots of good suggestions in here. Id like to echo :

  • Anything Alastair Reynolds (particularly Revelation Space)
  • Hyperion Cantos
  • Ender/Enders Shadow series
  • Children of Time/Memory/Ruin
  • Bobiverse
  • The Expanse

Also adding:

  • Aurora by KSR
  • Project Hail Mary
dandelion@lemmy.blahaj.zone · 2 pts · 360d

haven't seen yet mentioned Kim Stanley Robinson's Mars trilogy