Books tagged with: first contact

A Deepness in the Sky is the prequel to A Fire Upon the Deep by Vernor Vinge. Long awaited prequel to A Fire Upon the Deep. The stories are taking place in the same universe, but are otherwise not connected. I don't think that it matter what order you read them in – the important thing is that you...

A Million Open Doors is the first volume in the Thousand Cultures series by the author John Barnes. When I started on this I was quite surprised; Barnes starts the story off in a tavern, with tales of sword fights and honour. Afraid that Barnes had hidden a fantasy behind the rather futuristic cove...

Yoss is one of the most controversial and successful of Cuba's science fiction writers. As well known for his rock-and-roll style as he is for his portrait of Cuba under Communism, his work is modern, dynamic and yet deep and thoughtful. A Planet for Rent is set in the near future where Earth, wrack...

The partnership of Benford and Niven is a coming together of two icons of science fiction. Both have won Nebula awards for their work and are contemporaries of each other - an unusual collaboration as many partnerships tend to be of an older established writer and a young talent, but in this case we...

Code of the Lifemaker is a science fiction novel by James P Hogan. I can hardly believe that this is the same author, which wrote Realtime Interrupt. Okay, it's not exactly a character driven story, but it's much better than RI and Hogan has a lot of interesting things to tell here. Code of the Lif...

Contact is the first I have read by Carl Sagan and (shame on me) I don't know anything about him, so I do a search on his name on the web and it takes me about two minutes to find that he has just died, this December (1996)! I find myself in a very strange situation, thanks to the free flow of infor...

Cosmonaut Keep is the first volume in the Engines of Light trilogy by Ken Mcleod. This is the first book in a brand new universe, called "Engines of Light", and as that the first book that MacLeod has written outside the universe of Star Fraction and Cassini Division. As I've understood it the univ...

Dark Light is the second volume in the Engines of Light series by Ken Mcleod. This is the first time that I've had any kind of doubt as to what I should write about a MacLeod book. Normally I would just heap words of praise upon other words of praise, until it hit a fitting length for a book...

On the concrete balcony of a third-floor industrial complex in London, China Miéville was speaking earnestly about his early experiences of reading H.P. Lovecraft. He was remembering the Cthulhu. They were, he said, quite sexy. Three years later and the alien species of Embassytown are a language-im...

Firefall is a collected duology and includes the previously released novel Blindsight along with the new sequel Echopraxia. Firefall is hard science fiction which places a firm grip on high-concept science. While many hard-science fiction novels can tend to exclude the casual reader, Watt's writes...

Footfall is a classic science fiction novel by Larry Niven and Jerry Pournelle. This book handles a subject that H.G. Wells defined in his 'War of the Worlds': hostile first contact. Earth is overrun by aliens that bombard the planet with asteroids and are quickly victorious. The story follows a...

These books are the third and fourth in the Rama series (number one being Rendezvous with Rama and number two being Rama II). I have decided to review them together - as they should be read together and right after each other. If you haven't read the first two Rama books, do not read these books and...

In the Blood is a science fiction novel by Robert J Sullivan. The Utu festival was only three days old when the first body was found, 22 year old Gloria Ashlock, naked except for her shoes, lashed to a column in a warehouse and stabbed 35 times. The discovery was a shock but not a surprise to the p...

Jem is a classic science fiction novel by Frederik Pohl. Pohl writes a new book every year, this one is high on the pile of what I've read. It was just sitting simply and carefully almost precariously in the 'forget it' pile up til page 80 and then whammo! I got so jumped on with the typeface I scr...

Some time ago, I reviewed the novel Mine by Lin Sten and at the time I had mixed feelings about the book, there were some great ideas, a strong central premise and in parts great dialogue however this was all obscured behind some serious lack of editing, poor language and quite ropey running comment...

Nemesis ex nihilo is an apocalyptic science fiction novel and is the first in a two part series (dilogy), written by William Pascoe. Barry Edwards is a fairly average guy who is working on his PhD in astrophysics at the University of Longminster, England. In 1995, while still working on his PhD he...

First Impressions: Odyssey took some getting used to in order to plow through it! My only other introduction to the author Jack McDevitt is through his excellent novel, "Time Travelers Never Die" so I was hoping this book was going to be a continuation of the excellent style I was used to. "Not so...

At 75 years old, John Perry takes stock of his remaining life, with his wife dead and buried and a retirement of increasing dotage to look forward to he does the only sensible thing possible - he joins the army. Now known as the Colonial Defense Force (CDF) the war of the 22nd century is fought out...

Outies is the sequel to the much acclaimed novel The Mote in God's Eye by Larry Niven and Jerry Pournelle. This novel has been written by Jerry Pournelle's daughter, Jennifer. It has been a very long time since I read The Mote in God's Eye, the review on this site was written by my predecessor TC....

Pandora's Star is the first volume in the The Commonwealth Saga by Peter F. Hamilton. "Part one of the Commonwealth Saga" it says on page five. "Main characters" it says on page seven and then it goes on to list 44 characters. Then follows nearly nine hundred page of story which ends with the text...

Pattern Seeker is the first volume in the Random Happenings series of novels by L Keith Wheeler. Set in the near future, Pattern Seeker follows the privileged life of Jason Armond who possesses the rare talent of being able to see patterns where others just see chaos. This talent has led him to a s...

Poseidon's Wake is set in the same universe as Reynolds previous two Poseidon's Children novels (Blue Rembered Earth and On the Steel Breeze) but is written as an informal conclusion to the trilogy, a book that works equally well as a stand-alone story. The story begins on Crucible, a distant plane...

Ringturn is a science fiction novel by British Author John C Mawson. A number of people are abducted from earth during the time of the black death by alien forces and repopulated on a planet orbiting Epsilon Eridani, eleven light years from Earth. Slowly those frightened humans build a new civilisa...

I first read this book about 20 years ago, one that I picked up at random having not heard anything about the author in the slightest, it become one of the most memorable books I have read before or since and this will be the third or fourth time I have read it. Ironically it's still the only...

In Denmark there is a thriving science fiction subculture with many short stories being written every year. Since 2007 the Danish science fiction association (Science Fiction Cirklen) has published an annual anthology of a selection of these original stories, written by Danish authors. For the very...

A near future that sees an altered world, changed by flooding, climate change and terrorism. The biggest change however is by the arrival of the aliens who call themselves the Jackaroo. The Jackaroo seem to be Earths hope and salvation, saving it from itself. At last the question of whether we ar...

Speaker for the Dead is the second volume in the Ender Saga, by Orson Scott Card and has won the Hugo, Locus and Nebula awards. This book could probably be read on it’s own, but it contains numerous spoilers for Enders Game and I can’t think of any good reasons why you wouldn’t want to read that...

Startide Rising is a science fiction novel by the acclaimed author David Brin. Finally I have some luck with a Brin book. SR has its good sides even if parts of it make me kind of sick. Sorry, but intelligent dolphins not my cup of tea. I'm not sure why, but I think its because I really loath the k...

A near future premise that quickly transforms into a Lovecraftian space opera, as you may guess, Static Push is full of surprises. The title, whilst directly relevant to the story really doesn’t do the ideas contained in the novel justice. A science team at Dennison Industries are investigating a m...

Terra is a very different novel. It doesn't take itself too seriously and on the surface appears very light-hearted, a safe novel with prose full of soft curves rather than sharp edges. This is after all a young-adult novel and yet there is much more to this book than meets the eye. The story follo...

The Book of Strange New Things, is itself quite strange. It's one of those genre books that have managed to convince the mainstream that it's more mainstream literature. I must admit that it's also not a bad example and will certainly not do the reputation of science fiction any harm. It is however&...

The Darwinian Extension: Completion is the third volume in the The Darwinian Extension trilogy, written by Hylton H Smith. Over twenty years have passed since the Red planet was first colonised and contact was made with an alien intelligence. Much has changed in this time, Mars now has a thin, brea...

The Darwinian Extension: Initiation, is the first volume in a trilogy of novels from author Hylton H Smith. The Darwinian Extension begins in 2033, with a planned mission to populate Mars. The mission is not one of simple habitation however, but one of true colonisation including terraforming, rese...

The Darwinian Extension: Transition is the second volume in the science fiction trilogy from author Hylton H Smith, and follows on from the events in Initiation. Transition begins in the year 2038, 2 years have passed since the return of the Copernicus, the ship carrying the first Mars colonisation...

The Forever War is the Hugo and Nebula award winning military science fiction novel by Joe Haldeman. Originally written in 1974, the novel begins in the relative future of 1997 where thanks to the discovery of the collapsars - wormhole type gates that allow faster than light travel between the st...

The Forge of God is a science fiction novel by Greg Bear. First Europe (as in the sixth moon of Jupiter) disappears, then a strange cinder cone/spaceship including a sick and dying alien is found in Death Valley and a giant new mountain/spaceship including robots is found in the desert of Australia...

John Scalzi is a household name as character-driven sci-fi goes. The Human Division, 5th in his Old Man’s War series detailing the fate of the Colonial Union and it’s increasingly tenuous relationship with the Earth, is actually the first I’ve read. This sequel to Zoe’s Tale concerns the new diploma...

The Human Front is a science fiction novel by Ken Mcleod. I read this after finishing the Engines of Light series, and to be honest didn't expect a whole lot from it, especially after finding out that it was only 90 pages long... but to my pleasent surprise, my inital views were nothing to go by....

Another novel being published by those good people at Scifi Cafe, The Inosculation Syndrome is something of a surprise. The book tells the story of the astronaut Kal who becomes stranded on an alien planet due to a series of errors after losing touch with his star ship while charting regions of sp...

The Left Hand of Darkness was first published almost 50 years ago, receiving critical acclaim and firmly establishing Le Guin as a serious, talented author. It's known as one of the first examples of feminist science fiction and retrospectively won the Hugo and Nebula awards. I don't think i...

And so we come at last to the final volume in the remarkable journey that is The Long Earth. It also happens to be the swansong of that singular author Sir Terry Pratchett. And what a finale it is. The Long Cosmos lives up to the promise the authors have been building with this series, it is quite s...

The Moat around Murcheson's eye is the sequel to the scifi classic The Mote in God's eye by Larry Niven and Jerry Pournelle. (Released as "The Gripping Hand" in the US) The Gripping Hand is the sequel to The Mote In God's Eye and as that I think that it's utterly uninteresting for people that ha...

The Mote In God's Eye is a classic science fiction novel by Larry Niven with Jerry Pournelle. I not sure how I have managed to put off reading this classic for so long - but better late than never. The Mote takes place in 3017 when the human empire makes its first contact with an alien species. T...

The Nexus Odyssey is an omnibus featuring the Darwinian Extension series along with the follow-on novel "Renewal", a series that presents a bold vision for the human race. It begins in 2033 with a planned mission to populate the red planet, Mars. But rather than a simple plan to create a settlement...

The Song of the Swan is a science fiction novel by Arthur D'Alembert. Normally I don't comment on the finish of a book or the price of the book that I'm reviewing. Normally there's no reason to. The Song of the Swan is different. First of all it mainly published in electronic form as an Acrobat doc...

The Song of the Swan II is the sequel to The Song of the Swan by Arthur D'Alembert. This Part II is a direct continuation of the first Song of the Swan even if it takes place fifty years later. As that it's kind of uninteresting if you haven't read the first part, but then again it's interesting to...

The State of The Art is an anthology collection by Iain M Banks. The State of The Art is a collection of eight stories with the story The State of The Art making up one hundred of the two hundred pages. As can be expected with Banks all of the stories are well written and interesting, but I will st...

I've said a number of times now that Adam Roberts is a gifted author and this is increasingly evident with each new book he writes. His work overflows with ideas and at the same time he seems to delight in using different structures, to experiment in forming his narrative. This time he's turned his...

The Three-body Problem was originally written in Chinese by Liu Cixin. Launched to great acclaim within China, it became one of the most popular science fiction novels within the country and won the 2006 Chinese Science Fiction Galaxy Award. Thankfully it has now been translated by the talented auth...

Far in the future the humans of Earth have spread to the stars, but at great cost to Earths fragile ecosystem. For a world that is largely concrete and plastic, wood has more value than gold and the Terrans waste no time in establishing a logging colony and military base named "New Tahiti" on an idy...

Trader to the Stars is a collection of science fiction short stories, written by Poul William Anderson. Three stories copyrighted from 1956 to 1962 from one of the old masters. All three stories have the space merchant Nicolas Van Rijn as the main character and what a character! He's the kind of ch...

This Frank Herbert fella wrote the book Dune which was a semi sleeper for me as it walked around this barren planet with some aristocracy stuff going on, got to try to read it again maybe I'm missing something? This other "WHIPPING STAR" is swell though. Frank's little obtuse and abstract words and...

I read a lot of science fiction and one element I am not duly bothered about is feelings. I prefer the imagery of cold steel roaring through space over the relationship between two characters, but without emotions what is the point of a story at all? Our Child of the Stars by Stephen Cox is a depart...

It is feels increasingly complex to be a Star Trek fan. Things started off being about Kirk and co, then Picard, then Sisko etc. By now there are various TV shows that have been and gone, but also films that are set in parallel universes and I have no idea what is happening in Discovery ha...

Junction asks the question: what would we do if we had access to a brand new, virgin world? Would we destroy it like we are doing with our own world? Or would we learn from our mistakes and treat this as a second chance to do things right? Daisuke Matsumori is a Japanese nature show host who happen...

What is religion? Most of us aren’t used to contemplating that question too hard. The answer seems self-evident. In the world around us now, we have Christianity, Judaism, and Islam as the big three monotheistic religions. India and East Asia provide numerous examples of the polytheistic...

A Hopeful Future Review kindly provided by Vanessa Smyth.  Welcome to the third and latest instalment in The Wayfarers series, Record of a Spaceborn Few by Becky Chambers. This current narrative is set within the same captivating universe as the first two books and, despite a few oblique char...

Wars can go on for years. Not just the moments of action in which thousands of people die, but the cold wars between. Different factions may have an uneasy peace, but is this peace just an excuse to build for the next conflict? You may not imagine that Star Trek: The Next Generation is the best plac...

  Having read more than a few Starship loads of science fiction in my time I am particular about what type of aliens I like. I have a fondness for the Star Trek tactic of gluing some plasticine to the forehead of a humanoid but in today’s fiction I like some...

I have been a fan of Star Trek for a long time and am happy to overlook many of the contradictions and technobabble that it has a habit of spouting but one thing I can never get my head around is why. Why are they on these ships? Why risk their lives? For a scienti...

One of those books I missed the first time around, The stone man is the first in a series of science fiction thrillers. It looks like it's already become a bit of a self-published success story and the second in the series, The empty men is out now. The story begins on one July afternoon in a busy c...

I may be biased, but I think that science fiction is the greatest of genres because you can explore so many avenues. I have read many a future dystopian that have explored human’s obsession with science or lack of care with climate change. What I have never read is a science fiction...

If I lived in a Star Trek universe I would always travel by shuttlecraft and refuse to use the transporter. I am just uneasy with the idea of being split into atoms and reformed elsewhere. I am, for all intents and purposes, the same person, with the same memories, but am I? Is it not true that one...

Space is for the few. You may have been trained as a professional astronaut and pushed the boundaries of science. Maybe you are a geek done good and decided to spend your billions on the vanity project of commercial space travel. Maybe, just maybe, you are a celeb or competition winner who won...

Having a family is a beautiful thing, but they can also be a pain. They do not listen and when they do, they get it wrong. Days are made up of petty squabbles that have lived below the surface for decades, but the foundation is all built on love. Writing a flawed, realistic family is not easy, but S...

There are many roads to enlightenment. You can spend decades mastering the art of meditation, becoming one with the universe. You can seek to achieve the divine through the depraved, in acts so vial that you push through what is acceptable into the other. Any of the routes take commitment and none o...

Imagine the sacrifice required to sign up for a long-term mission into the depth of space. You are to be cryogenically frozen for 80 years and will awake to a new world. It could be that this is what you wanted all along. A chance at a new life free from the Old Earth, but they have only gone and br...

One of the biggest problems to overcome when writing science fiction is how do humans communicate with an alien race? They may speak a different language or may not even have mouths in which to make noises. The Universal Translator is a popular cheat, or fundamental maths that should be universal, b...

Writing a futuristic science fiction novel will allow you to explore strange new worlds but can also be used to explore our past and culture. Reading a wide range of stories from different people, from different parts of the world is a gift that will keep giving your entire life. There has been a lo...

Unto Leviathan was originally released back in 2001, under the title Ship of fools, winning the Philip K Dick award in the process. It's since been re-released by Orbit under the current title. The generational ship Aragonos travels the galaxy, looking for signs of life and a possible place to...

I stumbled across this one at WorldCon in Glasgow last year. You know how it is, wandering the dealer's room, picking up flyers, trying to avoid eye contact with anyone who looks like they want to talk about their self-published epic. But I’d previously attended a panel about Scottish sci-fi a...