The Stars My Destination

sharing a few books I recommended in my annual list (recommend reading!) https://rohitjha.com/blog/reading-highlights-2025/ Non Fiction: - Breakneck: China's Quest to Engineer the Future by Dan Wang (2025) - How to Live an Extraordinary Life by Anthony Pompliano (2024) Fiction: - The Stars My Destination by Alfred Bester (1956) - Consider Phlebas (Culture Series #1) by Iain M. Banks (1987) - The Way of Kings (2010, Stormlight #1) & Words of Radiance (2014, Stormlight #2) by Brandon Sanderson

I've gotten a lot of good book referrals through HN, including "Starting Strength: Basic Barbell Training" by Mark Rippetoe. So cutting out online stuff is just a bad idea (significantly reduces my "surface area"). OTOH, I really need to get back into a habit of reading books, every day. I used to go through a goodly number of non-fiction books on a regular basis (another good book, "The Pragmatic Programmer: From Journeyman to Master" says you should read at least one non-fiction book in your field a quarter), but recently I've just lacked the discipline and habit to do so. I find myself reading a lot online, but so much of it is so low information and not in-depth enough. That said, I also try to partake of fiction, although in that regard I'm not doing great either, as I opt for a lot of passive fiction in the form of video. Fiction can be just as good for expanding the mind, even exercising empathy. Just reading speculative fiction (to give a broader term to science fiction) can exercise one's mind in visualizing things or give one new ideas. Heck, Google Earth was supposedly inspired by a technology in "Snow Crash".…

Central Station by Lavie Tidhar is an amazing charming story of a world deeply steeped old sitting baking world where new things are coming about. It is charm & delight in the purest & simplest. Spin by Robert Charles Wilson. "Robert Charles Wilson is a hell of a storyteller," said Stephen King and this wonderful tour through time and space, humanity & people's lives is incredible. The Quantum Thief series by Hannu Rajaniemi is open, scenic, wild, & so so vivid, one of the most beautiful worlds I've ever visited, & it reminds me so much of a joyous wild swashbuckling run. The mystery of the main character is enchanting. Infoquake series by David Louis Edelson is a gripping suspenseful rise of a star entrepreneur that redefines and radically expands the world, amid an already boisterous & full & busy beautiful world already overflowing in seamless technology everywhere. Although the plot line whips along with some suspense & tension, the scenery and the voyage is incredible.…

The Stars My Destination was great. It might just be me but I'd like to see what folks who liked it thought of Robert Heinlein's Citizen of the Galaxy.

Just finished reading "Fiasco" by Stanislaw Lem. Between that "Cyberiad" I feel like Lem doesn't get enough credit. Maybe part of it is not being in the Western European writer's camp? At any rate, I would say: Moon is a Harsh Mistress, Heinlein The Dispossessed, Le Guin The Stars My Destination, Bester Childhood's End, Clarke Stand out as some of my favorites. I'm pretty terrible at making top-5 lists, but those stand out as ones that I would read again in a heartbeat if there weren't already 50 books on the floor next to my bed waiting for me :)

Anything by Alastair Reynolds - his Revelation Space series is great, and House of Suns is a fantastic one-off. He's probably the closest to Ian Banks in creating galaxy-spanning civilisations across eons of time. Ian MacDonald is another good one. My favourite of his is The Dervish House, but his others are definitely worth reading. Charles Stross is good. Didn't get on with Accelerando, but his Laundry books are a fun mix of HP Lovecraft/Len Deighton/IT Crowd. Halting State and Rule 34 are good explorations of pervasive augmented reality and intelligent algorithms. Also Glasshouse as an exploration of post-singularity society. Never managed to finish a Cory Doctorow book though. I found William Gibson's Bigend trilogy a slog, but I really enjoyed The Peripheral - it's a fun read. Enders Game and Speaker for the Dead by Orson Scott Card are fantastic, but the remaining books suffer from diminishing returns (with the possible exception of Ender's Shadow). There are a lot of books in the series, but basically, the series finishes wherever you get bored reading it. Anything by China Mieville is well worth your time.…

Stand on Zanzibar, Snow Crash, Cryptonomicon, Childhood's End, A Cantilce for St Leibowitz, The Stars My Destination, Midnight At The Well of Souls, Nine Princes in Amber, Halting State, Strnger In A Strange Land, The Moon Is A Harsh Mistress.

I will pick more than 1: Ubik by Philip K. Dick (it's hard to cherry pick his best work though, ask me a different day and I will choose The Three Stigmata or Do Androids Dream or something else) The Stars My Destination by Alfred Bester (simply a good story and a great background) 1984 by George Orwell. What all these books share is the idea that sci-fi is about social, cultural and economic dynamics, not ships or time travel. That is my definition of sci-fi: An on-going essay about the evolution of the dynamics of society, using exotic technology/science merely as a catalyst. Runner up: Ender's Game by Orson Scott Card Could never finish (can't recommend): - Neuromancer - Cryptonomicon (Does the author feel entitled to mock the homosexuality of Alan Turing? Found that somewhat arrogant and in bad taste.)

It's a tie between two strange books. Alfred Bester's _The Stars My Destination_: It's deeply flawed, wackily 1950s, has ridiculous tech, and is one of the most entertaining books I have read. Stanislaw Lem's _Solaris_: Strange, dry, bordering on boring, breaks every single law about overusing exposition I can think of...and somehow turns that into a riveting meditation on the nature of guilt and consciousness.

I guess op's not really paying attention any more, but there's a relevant discussion on slashdot today: http://ask.slashdot.org/story/12/08/08/2135246/ask-slashdot-... (http://ask.slashdot.org/story/12/08/08/2135246/ask-slashdot-most-underappreciated-sci-fi-writer) I can heartily recommend most of the stuff in the 4+ comments: Ursula Le Guin, Lem, Strugatsky, Kurt Vonnegut... and of course Alfred Bester, especially "The Stars my Destination", proto cyberpunk.

The only book I ever force on people is "A Deepness in the Sky", by Vernor Vinge. If you haven't read it, please do. I've really been enjoying David Weber's Honor Harrington series, if you're open to military sci-fi. It's not on the Amazon site, but it's easy to get from the Baen Webscriptions site. Iain M. Banks - "Algebraist" was a lot of fun, easily the best visualization of a gas-giant alien society I've ever read. I read "Matter" a while ago, and keep feeling pulled back to re-read it sometime soon. For classic sci-fi, I would recommend Bester's "The Stars My Destination" and Miller's "Canticle for Leibowitz". Don't forget to check out all the free public domain books that are available in the Kindle Store. All the Jules Verne, H.G. Wells, etc that you can eat, at no charge.

Snow Crash is great. Generally I'd recommend some "classics", just to see who treaded some ground first, i.e. who gets copied by everyone. Isaac Asimov - Foundation (and the rest of the trilogy) Robert A. Heinlein - Stranger in a Strange Land / Starship Troopers / The Moon is a Harsh Mistress Alfred Bester - The Demolished Man / The Stars My Destination Jack Vance - The Dying Earth Philip K. Dick - Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep / The Man in the High Castle Larry Niven - Ringworld etc. etc. A list of Hugo Award winners[1] might come in helpful. Another advantage of having read "the greats" is that if some critic says that new author X writes "in the style of Y" you have a slightly better idea if you might like it. Tastes vary, of course. Personally I never got what's supposed to be so great about Ender's Game. Teen Mary Sue geek power fantasy with questionable morals. Then again, lots of people said similar things about Heinlein… [1]: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hugo_Award_for_Best_Novel

i like heinlein's "moon is a harsh mistress" and alfred-bester's "tiger-tiger / stars-my-destination". kinda old school though.

depends on the subgenre :) Superhuman: Slan by A.E. Van Vogt More Than Human by Theodore STurgeon Odd John by Olaf Stapledon Post Apocalyptic: The Day of The Triffids by John Whyndham Earth Abides by George R. Stewart A Canticle for Lebowitz by...don't remember Space Opera/Adventure: any of The Culture novels by Iain M. Banks The Reality Dysfunction series by ...don't remember Hyperion series by Dan Simmons To Your Scattered Bodies Go by Philip Jose Farmer Dystopian: We by Yevgeny Zamyatin <---highly overlooked, predates 1984 and Brave New World But the Absolute Best would be anything by: Stanislaw Lem (Cyberiad, Futurological Congress, Solaris) Alfred Bester (The STars my Destination, The Demolished Man) or Samuel R. Delany (Babel-17, Dhalgren, Trtion, Nova) oh and Roger Zelazny's Lord of Light and This Immortal are both great. Some of Philip K. Dick's stuff is great, but everyone recommends him. :) almost forgot John Brunner, check out Steel Beach, The Sheep Look Up, and Stand on Zanzibar.