35/ The Forever War, by Joe Haldeman. A response and rebuttal to Starship Troopers, and the only mil SF novel to ever equal or perhaps even exceed it, on its own terms.
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45/ Deep Drive by Alexander Jablokov. The solar system has been visited by dozens of aliens, but they won't sell humans the technology to travel to the stars. Intrigue happens.
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46/ Farewell Horizontal by K. W. Jeter. A very weird setting that haunts the entire tale: everything takes place on the outside of a very (infinitely ?) tall building.
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47/ Beggars in Spain, Nancy Kress. In a near future where a fraction of 1% of people produce 99% of the value, and everyone else lives off of welfare which they "earn" by voting, what responsibility does the 1% have for the others? Nancy answers the question incorrectly.
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48/ Red Mars, etc. trilogy by Kim Stanley Robinson. An epic tale of teraforming, politics, and ecoterrorism.
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Espedair Street, oh, wait, that's by Iain Banks, not Iain M Bankshttps://twitter.com/TheClarksTale/status/1331355477897166850 …
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49/ Against a Dark Background, by Iain M Banks. A stand alone novel, outside of his culture universe, set in a world that is far far far from any galaxies, and which therefore is trapped in tens or hundreds of thousands of years of rise-and-fall-and-rise history
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50/ and speaking of endless cycles The Mote in God's Eye by Niven and Pournelle. Best first contact novel ever, IMO. I s̶t̶e̶a̶l̶ pay homage to one particular scene in Aristillus 4.
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ok, need to write at 4,242 words today and would love to hit 5k
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51/ Absolution Gap, Alastair Reynoldshttps://twitter.com/hmmm_bot/status/1331448131624579073 …
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52/ Neuromancer, William Gibson I just re-read it a year ago, and it's an entirely different novel when read at 49 than at 13 or so. An absolute classic of cyberpunk / ennui / Beat
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53/ The World Inside, Robert Silverberg Yet another 1960s/70s overpopulation tale, an adult counterpart to the YA This Time of Darkness, but without the hope. A good view into a future culture entirely unlike our own.
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54/ Bug Jack Barron, Norman Spinrad 1969 media mogul Donald Trump's son Barron Trump, uncovers a future adenochrome conspiracy by the pedo elite. I...am only 20% joking.https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bug_Jack_Barron …
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55/ The Snow Queen, by Joan D Vinge (ex wife of fellow SF great Vernor Vinge). Two human cultures alternate ruling a single planet on a 300 year cycle, as the climate oscilates, one high tech, one low.
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56/ Soldiers of Paradise by Paul Park Another in the "cyclical history" subgenre. On a world where seasons last for decades or centuries, it seems that all of this has happened before.
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57/ Helliconia Spring / Summer / Winter by Brian Aldiss. Yet another entry in the "long seasons / cyclical history" subgenre. Against the background of this subgenre, Martin's failure to do much of interest w the variable seasons in his Throne series is damning.
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58/ The High Crusade, Poul Anderson Light hearted romp, but fun. Aliens land in the middle ages and ... aren't prepared for how effective humans can be.
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59/ Little Fuzzy, H Beam Piper First contact story with, may Allah forgive me, furries.
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60/ The Rolling Stones, Robert Heinlein (YA) A three generation family from Free Luna (the grandmother is an all-grown-up-now Hazel Stone from TMiaHM !) buy a spaceship and set out on adventures / profit seeking businesses.
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61/ Emerald Eyes / The Long Run / The Last Dancer by Daniel Keyes Moran. A very convincing 21st century where individual autonomy is slowly giving way to the logic of centralization. Three books in an insanely audacious [ unfinished ] future history of 33 that he mapped out
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62/ Flinx in Flux, Alan Dean Foster. A fun series in a galaxy populated with dozens of sentient species.
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63/ A Boy and his Dog, Harlan Ellison he's a good dog, Bront
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as a side note, I'm looking at list of Hugo award winning novels, and it breaks my heart how the SJWs have corrupted this it used to be awarded, 19 times out of 20, to insanely good novels that altered and improved the genre forever ; now it's all woke trash awarded by entryists
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64/ Cowboy Angels, Paul Mcauley A little known work that posits cross time gates ... and US foreign policy inevitably has opinions about Similar Americas. Not absolutely amazing as a novel, but I keep coming back to the concept.
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65/ Schismatrix, Bruce Sterling 1980s cyberpunk, and, yes, I'm sure I'm listing so many of these because "the golden age of science fiction is 13", but also - there was something in the water then - a golden age two human cultures (cyborg vs biohackers) battle for solar system
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66/ The Difference Engine (Sterling, Gibson) The single novel that created steampunk. Alt history where Babbage built his Difference Engine. Novel didn't quite cohere or pay off perfectly, but still worth reading. The Macguffin may tie into Stephenson's Cryptonomicon ( ??)
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67/ Startide Rising, David Brin Brin might have been a complete cock the one time I met him, but his Uplift universe was great. Galactic civilization, gene hacking animals to give them intelligence ( this is the trope I stole for the Dogs in my novels ).
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68/ Singularity Sky, Charles Stross A future warblogger encounters omnipotent AI, time travel, posthumans, and more. Stross dumped 20 years of ideas into this + sequel, and it's overflowing. avoid Accelerando (the economic ideas of which I mock in passing in my novels)
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69/ Fallen Angels by Niven, Pournelle, and Flynn Lightweight fan-service, hitting all of the "rah, rah SCIENCE!" and "space travel good, greens bad!" talking points of the in crowd...but fun, if you like that sort of thing.
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70/ Eifelheim, by Michael Flynn A medieval European village encounters cross-universe travelling aliens. Philosophy, science, and theology ensue.
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71/ The January Dancer, Up Jim River, etc. by Michael Flynn Small scale interstellar spy adventure, set in a background that explicates Flynn's great ideas about cultural evolution, facts becoming narrative becoming myth, and the fragility of the scientific method
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