The Sparrow

The Sparrow by Mary Doria Russell. https://marydoriarussell.net/novels/the-sparrow/ Almost didn't finish it. Whatever your feelings on religion are, it's a fascinating and heartbreaking exploration of how far a man can be pushed before he loses faith in his god.

"A Canticle For Leibowitz" "The Sparrow" "Lord of Light" "The Immortal" "Hyperion" "The Last Question" "Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?" "Stranger in a Strange Land" "The City and the Stars" "Childhood's End" "Anathem" "Eifelheim" "A Case of Conscience" "VALIS" trilogy "The Book of Strange New Things" "Behold The Man" "The God Engines" "Book of the New Sun" "The Parable of the Sower" "The Dosadi Experiment" "Grass" "Project Pope" "Calculating God" "Factoring Humanity" "Jesus on Mars" "Surface Detail

Isaac Asimov is one of the classics, of course. I'm particularly fond of the robot novels (all four of the Elijah Baley ones especially) and the entire Foundation series. Of course, you also can't miss the robot short stories. Oh, and The End of Eternity! At some point I found Charles Stross' Accelerando, which is freely available online (along with a bunch of other short stories), and found everything I've read (which is most of it at this point, I think) enjoyably fast-paced. In particular the Laundry series (of which I've bought every iteration as soon as they came out over the past few years) -- though arguably these maybe cross-over from SF into fantasy a bit -- and the Halting State trilogy.…

Everything from Asimov. The Mars trilogy by Kim Stanley Robinson. The Culture books from Iain Banks. The Rama series from Clarke although it got tiresome after a while. The Sparrow and Children of God from Mary Doria Russell. Contact by Sagan which by the way is one of the very few sci-fi books that were successfully depicted in movies. Brave new world from Huxley. Old one but still highly relevant. The first ones from Gibson. The Enter series by Orson Scott Card. Bradbury's Farhenheit 451. This one is a classic. Revelation Space from Alaistair Reynolds who writes the most hardcore sci-fi I've ever come across.

I read 27 books in 2012. Here are some of the more interesting ones: Shogun - James Clavel. 'Epic' is the best word I can use to describe this historical fiction. I first read it in 2009 and have reread all 1100 pages multiple times since. The first English pilot to reach the Japans discovers a culture that, while strange, is in many ways far more advanced than his own. The fictional Lord Toranaga is based on the historical Tokugawa Ieyasu, a brilliant strategist who founded a dynasty that lasted 268 years. The book is full of the real Tokugawa's writings, which can be very profound. For anyone familiar with the 'marshmallow test' for determining how well 5 year olds will do later in life, Tokugawa had it figured out 370 years before Walter Mischel: "The strong manly ones in life are those who understand the meaning of the word patience. Patience means restraining one's inclinations. There are seven emotions: joy, anger, anxiety, adoration, grief, fear, and hate, and if a man does not give way to these he can be called patient. I am not as strong as I might be, but I have long known and practiced patience. And if my descendants wish to be as I am, they must study patience."…

This subject keeps coming up so much I made a site just to keep track of books hn'ers recommend to each other: http://hn-books.com I think out of all the books I read, the stoicism book made the biggest impact on me -- http://www.hn-books.com/Books/A-Guide-to-the-Good-Life-The-A... (http://www.hn-books.com/Books/A-Guide-to-the-Good-Life-The-Ancient-Art-of-Stoic-Joy.htm) . It really came out of left field and provided immediately useful advice on how to conduct myself both as a founder and as a hacker. But "The Sparrow" was the best sci-fi I have read in years, so I can't exclude that. Terrifically good book. http://www.hn-books.com/Books/The-Sparrow.htm

The Sparrow - Mary Doria Russell. Hands down one of the best sci-fi books I've ever read. Oh, and anything by Neil Stephenson (except Zodiac).