Reading: Science Fiction
Science Fiction -- Recommended Books!
If you like stories about space travel, or new technologies and imagined futures, check out these titles!
Recommended Science Fiction Books
- Binti byHer name is Binti, and she is the first of the Himba people ever to be offered a place at Oomza University, the finest institution of higher learning in the galaxy. But when she left her home for the stars, she found more adventure than she bargained for. Winner of the Hugo and Nebula awards. Fiction. 90 pages.
- Brave New World byThe World Controllers have finally created the ideal society. From the Alpha-Plus mandarin class to the Epsilon-Minus Semi-Morons, designed to perform menial tasks, man is bred and educated to be blissfully content with his pre-destined role. Fiction. 340 pages.
- Delirium byLena looks forward to receiving the government-mandated cure that prevents the delirium of love and leads to a safe, predictable, and happy life, until ninety-five days before her eighteenth birthday and her treatment, she falls in love. Young Adult Fiction. 441 pages. Available as ebook and audiobook
- Divergent byA 16-year old must choose among 5 factions to define her identity for life, a decision made more difficult when she discovers that she is an anomaly who does not fit into any one group, and that the society she lives in is not perfect after all. Young Adult Fiction. 487 pages. Available as ebook and audiobook
- Elsewhere byAfter fifteen-year-old Liz Hall is hit by a taxi and killed, she finds herself in a place that is both like and unlike Earth, where she must adjust to her new status and figure out how to "live." Is it possible to grow up while getting younger? Young Adult Fiction. 288 pages.
- Ender's Game byA veteran of years of simulated war games, Ender believes he is engaged in one more computer war game when in truth he is commanding the last fleet of Earth against an alien race seeking the complete destruction of Earth. Fiction. 324 pages. Available as ebook
- The Fifth Season byThis epic, award winning fantasy novel begins with the great red rift across the heart of the world's sole continent, spewing ash that blots out the sun. Fiction. 486 pages. Available as ebook
- Flight byA hilarious and tragic portrait of an orphaned half Indian, half Irish, acne-ridden teen who travels back and forth through time in a violent search for his true identity. "Raw and vital, often racously funny ... there isn't a false word in it." (NYT). Young Adult Fiction. 181 pages. Available as ebook
- The Golden Compass byAccompanied by her daemon, Lyra Belacqua sets out to prevent her best friend and other kidnapped children from becoming the subject of gruesome experiments in the Far North. Young Adult Fiction. 351 pages. Available as ebook
- The Hunger Games byThis action thriller is set In a future North America, where the rulers of Panem maintain control through an annual televised survival competition pitting youth against one another. First part of a trilogy that includes Catching Fire and Mockingjay. Young Adult Fiction. 374 pages. Available as ebook Catching Fire and Mockingjay also available as ebooks.
- I Am Number Four byA 15-year old from the planet Lorien is running from the Moagadorians, an alien race that is hunting him and 8 other teenage Lorics who are living on the Planet Earth. These 9 teens are a group of Loric people gifted with special powers called Legacies. Young Adult Fiction. 440 pages.
- Incarceron byTo free herself from an upcoming arranged marriage, Claudia, the daughter of the Warden of Incarceron, a futuristic prison with a mind of its own, decides to help a young prisoner escape. Young Adult Fiction. 442 pages.
- Kindred byDana, a modern black woman, is celebrating her twenty-sixth birthday with her new husband when she is snatched abruptly from her home in California and transported through time to a slave plantation in the South. Fiction. 287 pages. Available as ebook
Recommended Science Fiction Books
- Little Brother byAfter being interrogated by Homeland Security following a terrorist attack on San Francisco, Marcus is released into what is now a police state and uses his expertise in computer hacking to set things right. A rousing tale of techno-geek rebellion. Young Adult Fiction. 429 pages.
- The Man in the High Castle byIt's America in 1962. Slavery is legal once again. In San Francisco, the I Ching is as common as the Yellow Pages. All because some twenty years earlier the United States lost a war-and is now occupied by Nazi Germany and Japan. Fiction. 274 pages.
- The Martian byAn edge-of-your-seat thriller about an astronaut stranded on Mars. Mark Watney draws on his ingenuity, his engineering skills, and a dogged refusal to quit as he confronts one seemingly insurmountable obstacle after the next. Fiction. 369 pages. Available as ebook
- Matched byAll her life, Cassia has never had a choice. The Society dictates when and how to play, where to work, where to live, what to eat and wear, and whom to marry. But if she is Matched to Xander, why is she thinking about Ky? Young Adult Fiction. 369 pages. Available as ebook
- The Maze Runner bySixteen-year-old Thomas wakes up with no memory in the middle of a maze and realizes he must work with the community in which he finds himself if he is to escape. Young Adult Fiction. 375 pages. Available as ebook and audiobook
- Midnight Robber byIt's Carnival time and the Caribbean-colonized planet of Toussaint is celebrating. To young Tan-Tan, the Robber Queen is simply a favorite costume to wear at the festival--until her power-corrupted father commits an unforgivable crime. Fiction. 329 pages.
- Mr. Penumbra's 24-Hour Bookstore by" An unemployed web designer lands a job as the night shift clerk at a San Francisco bookstore. But why don’t the customers ever buy anything, and what mysterious riddle are they trying to solve?" Fiction. 288 pages.
- Neuromancer byCase, a nerve-damaged data thief, is recruited by a new employer for a last-chance run against a powerful artificial intelligence. Fiction. 276 pages.
- Never Let Me Go byThe students of Hailsham, an elite school in the English countryside, are so special that visitors shun them, and only by rumor and the occasional fleeting remark by a teacher do they discover their unconventional origins and strange destiny. Fiction. 288 pages. Available as ebook
- Parable of the Sower byIn a chaotic 2025 California, a young African American woman flees northward from her small community and its desperate savages. This flight for survival leads to a startling vision of human destiny and the birth of a new faith. Fiction. 345 pages. Available as ebook
- The Power byIn this alternate world, teenage girls and women now have immense physical power-- they can cause agonizing pain and even death. And everything changes. Described as "fast paced, thrilling, and even funny." Fiction. 386 pages
- Ready Player One byIt’s the year 2044, and the real world is an ugly place. In the virtual utopia called Oasis, gamers must navigate clever puzzles and outwit enemies in the virtual world to save the real one. Described by reviewers as “completely fricking awesome. Young Adult Fiction. 374 pages.
- Ship Breaker byIn a futuristic world, teenaged Nailer scavenges copper wiring from grounded oil tankers for a living, but when he finds a beached clipper ship with a girl in the wreckage, he has to decide if he should strip the ship for its wealth or rescue the girl. Young Adult Fiction. 326 pages.
- World War Z byAn account of the decade-long conflict between humankind and hordes of the predatory undead is told from the perspective of dozens of survivors who describe in their own words the epic human battle for survival. Fiction. 342 pages. Available as ebook
- A Wrinkle in Time byMeg Murry and her friends become involved with unearthly strangers and a search for Meg's father, who has disappeared while engaged in secret work for the government. Young Adult Fiction. 245 pages. Available as ebook