Preface - this is my personal taste.
I've read a lot of sci Fi books, but feel like I've started scraping the bottom of the barrel for novels that align with my taste. For reference, some of my recent favorites: (in no particular order)
- Fuzzy Nation - John Scalzi
- Arthur C Clarke - All (he doesn't miss)
- Dawn - Octavia Butler (as well as follow ups in the same series
- Children of Time - Adrian Tchaikovsky (the third was a slog but #1 was wow) -The Expanse - James SA Corey (love them all)
- Old Mans War - John Scalzi (whole series was perfect)
- Project Hail Mary - Andy Weir
Took some punts recently: - Dark Matter - Blake Crouch (6.5/10) - Alien Clay - Adrian Tchaikovsky - The Boat of a Million Years - Poel Anderson (cool idea, dragged on for too long) - The Man Who Fell To Earth - Walter Tevis (actually good read, but depressing) - The Mercy of the Gods - James SA Corey (loved it) - Annihilation - Jeff VanderMeer (didn't do anything for me
Currently reading Slow Gods by Claire North. A third of the way through and it's definitely interesting but not gripping.
My favourite prose is character and conversationally driven, and humour doesn't hurt. Think anything by Scalzi.
Tell me there are a pile of gems out there that I haven't read?!
Gordon Dickson - Dorsai and the rest of the Childe Cycle series. Excellent Military sci-fi
David Brin - Uplift Series
Where is Dune on your List?
Larry Niven - original two ringworld books, most of the rest but not all of the other Known Space books also hold up pretty well.
Vernor Vinge - Across Realtime
Joan D. Vinge - The Snow Queen
Robert Silverberg - Lord Valentine’s Castle and the sequels
Could name dozens more.
Didn't know about the snow queen, looking forward to that!
The Psion Trilogy may also interest you.
I do not see any Iain M. Banks novels in here. You should do something about that.
His ‘Culture’ series is the best blend of hard sci-fi and beautiful writing I’ve ever read. As noted it can be seen as ‘stuffy’ but he’s got Hemingway levels of craft wrapped around mile long intelligent weapons and hand guns that won’t fire when they’re upset. Glorious stuff (but as with any long series the early books are more dated and smaller in scope as he was learning his craft. Later ones become galaxy spanning romps). Suggest you skip ‘Consider Phlebas’ as its book 1 and a bit lumpy. Start with Player Of Games and go from there. Enjoy 🚀
I second this opinion. I don't have every book in the Culture series, but the ones I have read are pretty good. Esp. Use of Weapons.
Hard sf? Hardly. The Culture is a wish fulfillment machine with virtually no limits.
It's fun, but it's hardly rigorous.
As great as the Culture books are, I’d particularly recommend The Algebraist for OP’s taste. It has the galaxy-spanning scope of the best Culture novels, in a self-contained one-book package that delivers that conversational, character-driven focus OP is after. And ample humor. There’s a lightness to it—without being totally unserious—that I think OP will find appealing.
Algebraist is great. And I secretly pretend it's a Culture novel..........
Hyperion, by Dan Simmons.
Yeah - epic. Will need a bit of time before I read this bad boy again
Just pretend books 3 and 4 don’t exist and be content with book 2 ending on a cliffhanger. Books 1 and 2 are really great though
I love books 3 and 4. Feel like a different series but still enjoyed.
Have you read through all of the Nebula and Hugo winners? If you haven't, you have not even scratched the surface. Also go read A.E. van Vogt, Alfred Bester, and the undeniable GOAT, Olaf Stapleton. Oh yeah, also go read Margaret Cavendish. Heck just go through this entire Wikipedia article and read everything they mention, there's not a ghost of a chance in hell that you've read everything the genre has to offer. You're vastly underestimating the depth of the field.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_science_fiction
You’ll hit Gateway by Frederik Pohl along the way. One of my tops
You sir are a man of taste and culture.
Yup, and many of the finalists are well worth reading too. I've read about 50 of them and like you said, it feels like I've barely scratched the surface.
Last and First Men & Starmaker.
Oof, they aged me - but in a good way - blew my concept of generational stories out of the water.
Not sure if it's the OP's flavour, being so expositionary with little to no dialogue, but seriously u/ontheinlet you should give them a go just for the experience.
I utterly second u/Not_OP_butwhatevs mention of Gateway.
Have you read the Vorkorsigan novels by Bujold. They remind me of Scalzi’s books.
Philip K Dick is my favorite. You should read Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep, Ubik, a Scanner Darkly, and the 3 stigmata of Palmer eldritch by him
Ursula K Le Guin -Left hand of Darkness, the Lathe of Heaven
Stanislaw lem - Solaris
Read the original Fuzzy novels by H Beam Piper
I don't see any Asimov, Heinlein or EE Doc Smith on your list... IRobot... The Moon is a Harsh Mistress... Lensman.
Leguin (left hand of darkness)
Niven... Mote in Gods Eye. Footfall. Ringworld.
Bujold... Vorksogian
Weber... Honor Harrington series starting with On Basilisk Station
And many, many more. You're far from out of books
Finally see someone reccomend the Honor Harrington series. Lots of books in this one and, whilst maybe a little formulaic at times, are a fantastic blend of hard sci-fi concepts filtered through character lense.
I named my second child Honor, after the character, it got back to david webber through some online discourse and I ended up getting some signed stuff to give to my daughter when she was old enough haha.
You haven't even started!! There are so many you have yet to discover. I am envious of you.
How about some authors from earlier? They might seem derivative, but they came before a lot of the current ones you have read.
Charles Sheffield
Greg Bear
M John Harrison
Kim Stanley Robinson (Red Mars)
Connie Willis
Sherri S Tepper
Stephen Baxter
James Morrow (Towing Jehovah)
CJ Cherryh
(Lots more than this - these are just from the 1990s). A lot of these are doorstoppers, so if you do not like long books, then avoid.
I get the feeling you might need to exclude some authors to prevent bad recs.
Heinleins Moon is a Harsh Mistress, i felt the dialogue was.quite good. Especially between Mike and Manny. But concerned its a bit obvious.
Expanse has some good moments too, but also obvious.
The Mote in Gods Eye - again, its super classic, you may have read it, but the characters and the situation they are in are quite good.
Armor by John Steakley - Catch 22 in space + PTSD is almost a literal drug consumed by civilians.
A Canticle for Leibowitz - One of the bigger fallout inspirations. The monks in the monastery are hilarious, plus decent anti war message.
Charles Stross can be quite good. I like "Glasshouse" but the Laundry Files are an interesting, largely character driven take on lovecraft and horror. Merchant Princes might be up your alley too. Its fantasy coded but slowly the crunchier scifi asserts itself.
Speaking of Lovecraft - at the mountains of madness is quite top notch. And in this one most of his usual racism is directed at penguins.
Off Rock by Kieren Shea - Sort of a cyberpunk heist novel.
Embedded by Dan Abnett - cool premise with no setting baggage. Dates itself to the war on terror but holds up.
Armor is not mentioned enough. The Engine drives such thoughts around motivation and human behavior.
I would almost say Accelerando vs Glasshouse for a starter into Stross. Getting into Stross seems to be a challenge for some and Glasshouse might be more accessible, so I'll agree.
And since you mentioned Expanse and Armor - Livesuit might be worth adding to the list, but it pretty much misses the humor box completely.
Glasshouse was probably a poor place for me to start, but Laundry Files is definitely accessible. Accelerando is great too.
If you like Stross, I might recommend Vetnus by Schroeder. (That entire series is great.)
A huge kudos for mentioning Leibowitz. One of the best of the genre.
John Steakley's Armor is a fantastic book but seems to be missing from a lot of recommendation lists. Maybe people just don't know about it, as it was published a while ago (1984) and Steakley didn't write much. I'm glad to see you recommending it.
Read The Expanse & The Mote In Gods Eye.
I've had The Moon Is A Harsh Mistress on my list for a while. Worth it?
Heinlein is literally the GOAT, super readable, plenty of humor. Start there, then read everything. Google a reading order if you want - a few of his books are loosely connected, but it's not a huge deal.
I couldn’t finish heinlein’s stranger in a strange land. It was super dated, misogynistic, and uninteresting. I put off reading any more of his books for a while. I hesitantly read the moon is a harsh mistress and I loved it.
This is a big reason I recommend The Moon is a Harsh Mistress whenever I can. It doesn't suffer from the dated-ness that Stranger in a Strange Land does. I'm not sure if there's any particular reason - it might just be chance.
I read Stranger as a kid. Loved it. I Grokk’ed everything for a few days. Tried it again recently, and yeah… sexist much? (I try to see it through a 60s lense when all the civil rights fights were happening)
Moon was fun, though.
I will finish stranger but its been a slog.
Your Lovecraft comment is hilarious. My first Lovecraft was "The Loved Dead", I put it down and never touched Lovecraft again, I literally have flashbacks to that story and it's been 30 years. Messed me up
Lois McMaster Bujold - Vorkosigan series, character-driven, great humor
EDIT: Came back to add this after I read elsewhere that you only read Shards of Honor and stopped:
Don’t stop, that one was prior to Miles Vorkosigan, the main character in the bulk of the series, where she hit her stride. What she does with his character is genius, and she is sooooo funny! And it’s not just me, she has hordes of fans. She is the FIRST author I thought of when reading your description.
Alright - you've convinced me. I'll keep going. Can you read any of them, or are they in chronological order?
Obligatory Book of the New Sun by gene wolfe recommendation. It's not for everyone, but if you dig it, it's an endless trove of discovery and rediscovery.
Came here to say this
All Systems Red
Ancillary Justice
A Fire Upon The Deep
Ancestral Night
The Water Knife
Seveneves
Spin
Dungeon Crawler Carl
The Geographers
Edit: How could I forget Roadside Picnic?!
Second ancillary justice! I think it almost perfectly aligns with what is being asked for
Have you tried current female authors ? Becky Chambers, Martha Wells, Ann Leckie, Bethany Jacob’s? Especially Martha Wells’ “Murderbot” series? Really good stuff.
Take a look at the Bobiverse and Expeditionary Force series.
Smashed the Bobiverse series - bang on prose that I love, and also heavy on humour which I loved.
Haven't read Expeditionary Force series. What's the writing style like?
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Seveneves was such a rollecoaster😂 I went into it looking for another The Martian. It did that kinda-semi-succesfully. And I ended up literally shouting “What?!” through the house at the midpoint twist.
Have you read any of Richard Morgans Books? I recommend the altered carbon trilogy as a good start. I liked scalzi so it might tickle your fancy.
Smashed the Altered Carbon. Awesome concept and really well executed
Some SF comedy (not listing other Scalzi novels since I assume you already know about them), in reverse chronological order:
Murderbot series: lightweight fun about grumpy asocial android being forced to interact with humans.
The long Way to a small Angry Planet: not exactly comedy but excellent coziness and great dialogue between characters of different species.
The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy: very British sprawling comedy, and if you like it, you’ll love it.
Pandora’s Planet: oldie but still fun about what happens when Earth is conquered by aliens and then let loose in the galaxy.
Just read Stanislaw Lem and come back once you run out.
Try Robert A. Heinlein all the books are good
Start with Stranger in a strange land
Commonwealth series and The NightscDawn trilogy by Peter F Hamilton
This isn’t a top-tier list without any LeGuin. The Dispossessed, Left Hand of Darkness at least.
Add some China Mieville too. Samuel Delany for good measure.
Gene Wolfe - Book of the New Sun
I liked Recursion more than Dark Matter by Crouch. If you liked Project Hail Mary, The Martian has a similar feel. The Remembrance of Earth's Past trilogy (Three Body Problem). I just finished Piranesi, which is a bit more fantasy/mystery, but very good.
Peter F. Hamilton, especially the Commonwealth books.
Three Body Problem trilogy
Time to dig into William Gibson start with Neuromancer and Niel Stephenson, start with Snow Crash. Three Body problem is also good.
Gibson's Sprawl Trillogy starting with Neuromancer is a classic for sure.
Come on, You have a lot to read. First to mention Frederik Pohl's Gateaway series (the heechee cycle). Funny , entertaining. Orson Scott Card's Ender series. You didn't mention Asimov - if you like A. C. Clarke, you must love him. You must try the Strugatsky brothers books, two russian fellows, with incredible sense of humour. Douglas Adams, everything from him. The rest of Scalzi's works. Robert Sheckley. Harry Harrison. Poul Anderson, for god's sake. John Varley. Jack Vance. Heinlein. Frank Herbert. If you are into mil SF, then William C. Dietz, or Marko Kloos. I could continue forever.
Blindsight by Peter Watts is fairly obvious.
John Varley recently passed, so let's give him some love. I especially recommend The Ophiuchi Hotline and Steel Beach.
Seconding John Varley! Steel Beach and Golden Globe are my favorites, but the Gaia series is great too.
I have switched up from digging through classics to give something more modern a shot with the Red Rising series and have been enjoying it a lot. Would recommend if you have not tried it yet. It is like The Expanse in that it reads like a Blockbuster movie more than it feels like homework to get through.
Some of my older favorites:
Blindsight, The Pliocene Exile Saga, Star Maker, The Sirens of Titan, The Heechee Saga.
The Sirens of Titan is excellent and really underrated.
Pandora’s Star and Judas Unchained Peter Hamilton. My favorite sci-fi.
Couldn’t agree more! Love his aliens and world building
Try reading the actual novel Little Fuzzy, H Beam Piper. Try reading anything by Piper.
I love Piper. Under appreciated.
I have read just about all of his work.
The Stars My Destination by Alfred Bester.
"Am I out of top tier sci fi books "
"Checks list"
"Filled with niche/ semi-popular books and very few praised and well written classics of the genre"
Neal Stephenson, Vernor Vinge, the Ender series, Alastair Reynolds, Will Gibson, Three Body Problem, Peter F. Hamilton, just to mention a few.
Oh, and if you're a gamer, then Matt Dinniman's "Dungeon Crawler Carl" is a fun read.
Maybe try Poor Man's Fight series by Kay if you liked Old Man's War?
Had a look at the first book's blurb.
Is it kinda Red Rising vibes (in its own way)?
Fourth Children of Time coming out in March! Called Children of Strife. Also recommend Seveneves, which is long enough to feel like a series, the Wool trilogy, and all Murderbots, which also have a new one coming in May.
Get down with the classics! Hienlien, Clarke, and Asimov! Also, Joe Haldeman, The Accidental Time Machine, is right up your alley.
Vernor Vinge - Zones of Thought books
A Fire Upon The Deep and A Deepness in The Sky are two of my favorite books.
Try Bujold’s Vorkosigan series. Very much character focused with some good humor and feels very close to Scalzi for me.
I would also recommend almost anything på M. R. Carey, my favorite author next to John Scalzi. His "Koli"-trilogy is amazing, his Pandemonium-duology is also wicked good.
If Scalzi and Weir are your benchmark, I'd say no, you're not out of top tier sci-fi books.
The Expanse?
Sadly read it all
Start The Culture series!
How can we know "what you've read"? You listed 6 recent favorites, that's all. Have you read entire opus of Stanislaw Lem, Philip K. Dick, Theodore Sturgeon, Ursula Le Guin, Strugatsky borthers, Gene Wolfe?
I love that you included Theodore Sturgeon. I made a leather and metal stamped bracelet with "ask the next question" and an arrow because I like his works so much.
All of the Sci Fi Masterworks series. Absolute classics.
Smash the entirety?!
Surely some have dated?
I thought that The Forever War, for example, I was lacking the patriotic context for me to fully immerse.
What are your must reads?
Can I just suggest a systematic approach? Read all the Hugo and Nebula award winners and nominees. If you like a book by a particular author, then read more books by that author. There are a few truly hidden gems that have never been nominated for an award, but not many.
You can often find lots of cheap omnibus novellas on Kindle, just to get a sample.
China Mountain Zhang by Maureen McHugh is amazing and no one’s read it.
Idk if anyone has said it yet, but Three Body Problem is my favorite sci fi trilogy. It’s so good, especially if you like “hard” sci fi.
I’ve really enjoyed these.
Ryk Brown’s Frontier’s Saga. Long-running SF. Fun space opera. Fun characters. Great space battles. Some fun humor and dialogue mixed in throughout.
Kevin J Anderson’s Saga of the Seven Suns was fun. I’m due for a re-read. Very character driven which sometimes slows them down more than I’d like
Joseph Lallo’s Big Sigma series is fun. Rompy space adventure. Lots of humor.
Timothy Zahn’s OG Thrawn trilogy is some of the best Star Wars writing I’ve read. Lots of great character building
self promo. All the above definitely influenced my own writing as well. I love rompy action adventure with fun dialogue and characters.
You might try the 3 best SF of 2025 inho
Vera or Faith by Gary Shteyngart
What We Can Know by Ian McEwan
Luminous by Silvia Park
The Expanse series! So good
Michael McCullum, Antares Trilogy
Dude try something more than 10 years old. There's decades of writing you haven't even scratched the surface of (except Octavia Butler)
Anything by Joshua Dalzelle
I'll always be the one who suggests "Lord of Light" by Roger Zelazney. It's a tough read the first time through, but one of my all time favorites. Even better on a re-read!
Lord of Light by Roger Zelazny. Fantasy science fiction, but a really fun read.
Left hand of Darkness by Ursula K Leguin
Dungeon Crawler Carl. By far the best series I’ve ever read. Trust me when I tell you that it may seem like it’s not sci-fi at first, but those elements are there. The writing is perfect.
Jack McDevitt is my favorite living sci-fi writer. Every book I’ve read of his is very good. I started with the Priscilla Hutchens books and LOVED them. His Alex Benedict series is also fantastic, and his standalone stories are also wonderful. Highly recommend him.
You liked Hail Mary, so try The Martian.
You liked Scalzi’s Fuzzy book, so try the author who created the Fuzzys - H. Beam Piper.
Try some of Niven & Pournell.
Poul Anderson - Orion Shall Rise
Dennis Taylor - the Bob series
Daniel Keys Moran - Emerald Eyes
2 series that get ignored far more than they should are Phillip Jose Farmer and his Riverworld and World of Tiers books.
Riverwood is one of the greatest series of all time, right up there with Dune.
No Ursula Leguinn on your list, so you got a stack of the best waiting on you, bruv.
Don’t know if anyone mentioned this but a pretty fun mashup of “hard” sci fi and horror is “Blindsight” by Peter Watts. It’s not a spoiler since it’s part of the setup but basically a space ship is captained by an actual vampire with a distrusting, paranoid crew of human scientists, and Watts spends a fair amount of time delving into scientific rubric for the vampire species and why one is the Captain. They encounter a derelict ship and things go south quickly, but it’s a very unique twist on that trope.
I also just started “There is no anti-memetic division” by Sam Hughes aka qntm. It’s a blend of sci-fi and cosmic horror fantasy presented in a narrative style that incorporates lots of classified government documents. For me at least it’s disturbing because the ideas it presents are unique and terrifying. To say more would spoil it.
There certainly are years worth of reading you have not touched.
A good way to find books is to look at the goodreads sci-fi lists. The book lists are unfortunately not sortable but if you scroll through and only consider books with a ranking of 4.0 or more you are going to find a lot of good books.
A favorite of mine is the aeon14 series. Check aeon14 for where to start. Funny, lots of action, interesting and imaginative concepts.
Have you read the Heritage Universe series by Charles Sheffield (RIP) ? Great fun… wild interesting aliens .. starting with Summertide.
The Sparrow by Maria Doria Russell.
Pushing Ice by Alistair Reynolds (and his vast collection of other series)
How High We Go in The Dark by Sequoia Nagamatsu.
The Sea of Tranquility by Emily St John Mandel.
There Is No Antimemetics Division by qntm.
I've seen others say Stephen Baxter - I really enjoyed Proxima and Ultima.
Dissolution and Ascension by Nicholas Binge were really fun.
More Octavia Butler books. I could go on and on per the other recommendations here.
QNTM
The Stainless Steel Rat series by Harry Harrison is a hoot!
Dungeon Crawler Carl for sure
I've been a sci-fi nerd for over 55 years now, have read almost everything you mentioned and more over the years. With all that, "Sea of Tranquility" by Emily St. John Mandel, (also the author of "Station Eleven") is easily in my top ten ever . The end reveal blew me away and made me scurry to read the rest of her novels. It's not lasers and starfleets, it's more of a slow burn and cerebral, but it's magnificant.
Omg read A Deepness in the Sky and A Fire Upon the Deep by Vernor Vinge!! Both won Hugo awards. Also the Dread Empires Fall novels by Walter Jon Williams and super fun.
Iain M Banks (Culture novels, but the rest of his sci-fi is great too). Don’t start with Feersum Ennjin! Good intro would be Player of Games.
Greg Egan (heavy on science, but fantastic ideas)
Alastair Reynolds (space opera)
David Brin Neal Stephenson Martha Wells (Murderbot series) Charles Stross
If you liked Octavia E. Butler’s writing with Lilith’s Brood, you should continue on with the Parable duology, Kindred, and Blood Child (a collection of short stories).
Philip K. Dick is probably the best idea man in all of science fiction.
Ursula K. Le Guin is probably the best wordsmith.
Give Gene Wolfe a try as well, with the Book of the New Sun series.
Vernor Vinge’s Zone of Thought series is really intriguing.
Iain M. Banks’ The Culture is my personal favorite science fiction series.
Three Body Problem
Been on the list forever. Hesitant - it seems very dense in terms of both prose and subject matter
It is, but well worth plowing through it, if you can. Lots of new and unique ideas, and it ties in a bit of Chinese history for spice
House of Suns. Thank me later.
For a fun yet surprisingly deep book: When the Moon Hits Your Eye by John Scalzi.
🧀🌕
Such a silly premise...but there were parts where I found myself tearing up.
Smaller recommendation for a quick read is Livesuit, and accompanying novella for The Mercy of Gods
Im doing Asimov at the moment and loving them
Check out weird lit. It might hit the spot. Check out the sub.
Ive been reading a lot of Adrian Tchaikovsky over the past couple of years. I also struggled through Children of Time, the first one was excellent, the other 2 were a slog for me. I enjoyed his Final Architecture series far more. Other standouts were Cage of Souls and Dogs of War. A recent favorite of mine is The Vagrant series by Peter Newman. Or check out some of Glenn Cooks Sci Fi offerings… a mixed bag, but really enjoyed some of them.
Read the rest of Octavia Butler's books. I read them all this year. While the Xenogenesis trilogy was my favorite they are all good.
The Wayfayers series by Becky Chambers, starting with The Long Way to a Small, Angry Planet. Also her novella, To Be Taught, If Fortunate. I'm going to work on her Monk and Robot duology soon. Her books are very character-driven and any action is almost besides the point.
I would highly recommend the Black Ocean series by J. S. Morin!
Alistair Reynolds is a good option, I've never read something by him that I didn't enjoy.
The inhibitor series - A Reynolds, Muderbot series- M Wells, Flatlander and Ring World Series - Larry Niven, Artifact Space plus - Miles Cameron
Philip K. Dick, Roger Zelazny, Philip Jose Farmer, David Brin, Robert Silverberg, Ursula Le Guin, and Anne McCaffrey come to mind, although some or most of this fiction is somewhat dated. Anne McCaffrey is mostly known for her science-fantasy Pern books, but she also wrote some space opera stuff that was particularly feminist and more hard science oriented. (although the Pern stories are, at heart, very much rooted in science fiction.)
Some specific books:
Lucifer's Hammer by Larry Niven and Jerry Pournelle. It is the definitive end of civilization story, though their treatment of POC was questionable when it was written and needs to be taken with an even bigger grain of salt now, almost 50 years later
Cities in Flight By James Blish. It's science-fantasy but a great read that aged well.
Harlan Ellison's I Have no mouth and I Must Scream is only 10 or 12 pages long, but if you haven't read it, you must read it.
Check out Red Rising. The first book is very Hunger Games but then it’s all mech armor and space battles
Lots of great recommendations here but I haven't seen two of my favorites: The Sparrow and its sequel Children of God by the anthropologist Mary Doria Russell. Both very emotional works with a lot to say about religion and trauma.
Walter John Williams is underappreciated - he's got far future space opera (the Praxis series), near future thrillers (the This Is Not A Game series), science fantasy (Metropolitan) and much more.
Blindsight by Peter Watts seems to be polarising, but is in my personal S tier list.
The Faded Sun series by CJ Cherryh, and the Chronicles of Morgaine are there too. The latter is unique as an implied sci-fi novel hinted at from within a fantasy novel, sort-of.
It’s hard to give a specific book for Heinlein, some of his most famous books I despise, but in general Starship Troopers is a good place to start to see if you like his work.
The Honor Harrington by David Weber series is quite good but the first book is a slog
Brian Aldiss. Start with Hothouse and go from there. Greybeard, Non-stop, and Helliconia trilogy are all top tier science fiction.
The Culture series by Iain M Banks is incredible.
Musk ripped off most of his rocket ship and barge landing names from that series
If you SA Corey, you can give the 2nd series of the a shot: mercy of gods
Also Altered Carbon by Richard K. Morgan is great if you love gore
Oh, and read literally anything else by Octavia Butler, but the Earthseed series is my favorite.
Artifact Space trilogy by Miles Cameron
Nophek Gloss trilogy by Essa Hansen
Ancillary Justice by Ann Lecke
Velocity Weapon trilogy by Megan E. O'Keefe And also The Blighted Stars Trilogy by her.
Finder (series) by Suzanne Palmer
Try Dahlgren by Delaney. Will also suggest Gene Wolf- The Book of the New Sun cycle.
XeeLee sequence books by Stephen Baxter.
Your taste appears to match mine!
Anyways, I love Peter F Hamilton, he has a lot, maybe start with something Pandora's Star.
Iain M Banks' Culture series is fantastic.
Allister Reynolds is another of my favorites.
Just getting into David Weber's Honor Harrington series.
PS. Agree, Children of Time book 3 seemed a slog.
James P Hogan….start with “Inherit the Stars” and roll through the Giants series
Popular or well known do not equal top tier. There are tons of hidden gems out there, and they are not "lesser" just because they're harder to find.
If you can veer into anthologies, Ted Chiang is brilliant.
Also, 3 Body Problem!!
Bobiverse
Adrian Tchaikovsky’s “Final Architecture” series was pretty awesome. Also; I didn’t see anyone suggesting the ORIGINAL Dune series by Frank Herbert. Stay far, far, far away from anything with Dune in the title and Brian Herbert/Kevin J Andersen as the authors.
The Sun Eater series by Christopher Ruocchio.
I’m enjoying Mickey7 right now, it’s a fun read. Check out Nancy Kress, Charles Sheffield, Greg Egan, Peter Watts, Jasper Fford… merry Christmas!
The Dorsi! books are good.
Dune
Foundation Trilogy by Asimov is top tier.
I, Robot, also by Asimov is such an easy cheese read, but the good kind. It’s not the movie in book form.
Broken Earth Trilogy by NK Jemisin. This is some weird mesh between sci fi and fantasy (but not elves, dragons or wizards) and I love it. One of the best series I’ve read in a long time.
Red Rising series by Pierce Brown. The first book isn't anything like the rest of the series. The rest of the series is amazing.
Currently reading the first Red Dwarf book - Infinity Welcomes Careful Drivers. Its way better than I was expecting.
You might dig it. I have and I also like Scalzi.
Anne Leckie, Ancillary series.
A bad run sucks but it's just a pause before you get your mind blown by something incredible! Someone mentioned Vernor Vinge, he's a recent find of mine. I like reading Peter Cawdron's First Contact series as "in between" books because they are always quality and interesting. It's like 20+ books all about first contact scenarios but not related to each other.
I just finished Slow Gods and can tell you that you’re in for a rough ride if you’re not all-in by the first third. The second half feels totally rudderless and the main character never gets more interesting. And the ending…oof.
My recommendation for something different is Venomous Lumpsucker. Timely and hilarious.
The Long way to a small angry planet by Becky chambers is very fun.
Moon is a Harsh Mistress
Starship Troopers
The Forever War
Red Planet Blues
We Are Bob (series)
Starter Villain (Scalzi)
I recently read every winner of the Hugo and Nebula awards for the last 20-30 years. Very worthwhile.
Brandon Sanderson wrote a YA science fiction series called Skyward that was an absolute delight. Very funny and original.
Try Norstrilia by Cordwainer Smith
You’ve got a couple things by John Scalzi on your list and I’ve recently be re-listening to Redshirts and having a very nice time with it.
Also on the off chance you haven’t read The Martian by Andy Weir, my strongest recommendation if you liked PHM.
OHHH and the Bobiverse series. It’s great. The lift of a sentient Von Neumann probe.
Edward Ashton's novels have that breezy Scalzi prose feel. Alastair Reynolds is great hard sci-fi. Iain M Banks is just great.
THere's been times in my life when I was sure that nobody on this planet read that book except me.
Olivia Butler - her Xenogenosis trilogy is a must read.
Ursula K. Le Guin - too many that I love!
Martha Wells - Murderbot!!!
C. J. Cherryh
Anne McCaffrey
Marion Zimmer Bradley
And if you want to find one of the best authors (who everyone from Neil Gaiman to many others plagiarized) - check out Tannith Lee. Her “Tales from the Flat Earth” is one of my favorite series.
N K Jemisin. Won the Hugo three years running. Great great writer
Stranger in a Strange Land a novel by Robert A. Heinlein.
It's been a long time since I read it, but it was transformative for my teenage brain. Martians, culture shock, sex drugs and cannibalism.
Schizmatrix by Bruce Sterling.
I think all of these below are must-reads that I didn’t see mentioned already:
Gnomon by Nick Harkaway
Fine Structure, Ra, and There Is No Antimemetics Division by qntm
The City and The City by China Miéville
The Martian Chronicles by Bradbury
I am working my way through the Hugo winners. Have you read them all?
Diaspora by Greg Egan
Peter F Hamilton calls!
I recently struggled through Scalzi's Interdependecy Series and I wish I could go back in time and un-buy them. Despised that series.
Gotta add Alastair Reynolds to the list. Revelation Space series. House of Suns. And more Scalzi, especially Old Man’s War series. And no Neal Stephenson? Add Snow Crash, Diamond Age, Seveneves, and Anathem to the list.
I strongly recommend Alastair Reynolds. His Revelation Space series is one of my favorite all time series. His standalone novels are also incredibly interesting.....Eversion, Terminal World, and Halcyon Years. I also loved the Poseidon's Children trilogy
Luna Book trilogie Altered Carbon Book trilogie The Murderbot diaries Red Rising
Pat Cadigan's Synners. Prescient and human, just great stuff.
Start with all the Hugo and Nebula award winning novels that you haven’t read.
Three body problem.
Too Like the Lightning by Ada Palmer
You can also look up decades of Hugo & Nebula prize-winning books / authors. You won’t run out anytime soon 🖖
A call to arms trilogy - Alan Dean Foster
Have you read the Passage Trilogy or The Ferryman by Justin Cronin? What about the Broken Earth Trilogy? Also, the Bobiverse books and the Murderbot series is excellent.
Get thee to your library! Set up an online account and start downloading from the SF sections. Pick a random author and read something by him or her. Pick a random title and read it. Pick any of the author's people have pointed to you. If you like it, great. If you dont, return it and try another!
Not even close, crack on with Nueromancer for a starters. Pick up some Ted Chaing he's incredible. Ian M Banks if you want something stem and in space. Le Guins scifi is beautiful, atmospheric personal and political. Long Way to a Small Angry Planet if you want comfort and to meet lovable characters.
My book of the year is a wild card but I think it counts as scifi: Venomous Lumpsucker by Ned Beauman. It's at once once of the funniest books I've read and the most depressing. It'll make you think about ecological philosophy in ways you never have I've minute and laughing the next.
The Expanse is the answer. The Expanse is always the answer.
Pohl, piper, bester, leguin, Gibson, heinlein, dick, etc etc….
Look at the books that were nominated for the Hugo and Nebula award (Wikipedia has a complete list) Read all the nominated books, not just the winners.
If you want to get a better idea of whether a particular book is for you (or not), I suggest you go to Amazon or GoodReads and read the more in-depth reviews of the books. I always suggest reading a few of the 1 or 2 star reviews to see if they mention something about the book that would make it a "no-go" for you as well.
No 3BP?
Forever Hero
Lynn’s six star list in November 2025:
Somebody told me that these are a bunch of young men's adventure stories. Being an old man, I liked that.
Lynn
Dune???
I would say try the following if you haven't:-
Asimov - foundation, night fall, the last question, etc
The ones who walk away from omelas
The expanse
Three body problem
Red rising
Some works of Crichton
Neal Asher is a wonderful sci-fi author that combines Alien, AI, and superb characters into unforgettable novels!
Try Gridlinked (agent Cormack series) and also his Spatterjay series