Favorite Speculative Fiction Books--On Being Human
Explore top speculative fiction books that delve into what it means to be human. Discover favorite reads blending philosophy, futurism, and profound storytelling.
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Little, Big
by John Crowley
Edgewood is many houses, all put inside each other, or across each other. It¿s filled with and surrounded by mystery and enchantment: the further in you go, the bigger it gets. Smoky Barnable, who has fallen in love with Daily Alice Drinkwater, comes to Edgewood, her family home, where he finds himself drawn into a world of magical strangeness. Crowley¿s work has a special alchemy - mixing the world we know with an imagined world which seems more true and real. Winner of the World Fantasy Award, Little, Big is eloquent, sensual, funny and unforgettable, a truly Fantasy Masterwork.
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Mockingbird
by Walter S. Tevis
Mockingbird is a powerful novel of a future world where humans are dying. Those that survive spend their days in a narcotic bliss or choose a quick suicide rather than slow extinction. Humanity's salvation rests with an android who has no desire to live, and a man and a woman who must discover love, hope, and dreams of a world reborn.
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More Than Human
by Theodore Sturgeon
In this genre-bending novel—among the first to have launched sci-fi into the arena of literature—one of the great imaginers of the twentieth century tells a story as mind-blowing as any controlled substance and as affecting as a glimpse into a stranger's soul. There's Lone, the simpleton who can hear other people's thoughts and make a man blow his brains out just by looking at him. There's Janie, who moves things without touching them, and there are the teleporting twins, who can travel ten feet or ten miles. There's Baby, who invented an antigravity engine while still in the cradle, and Gerry, who has everything it takes to run the world except for a conscience. Separately, they are talented freaks. Together, they compose a single organism that may represent the next step in evolution, and the final chapter in the history of the human race. As the protagonists of More Than Human struggle to find out who they are and whether they are meant to help humanity or destroy it, Theodore Sturgeon explores questions of power and morality, individuality and belonging, with suspense, pathos, and a lyricism rarely seen in science fiction. Winner of the Hugo, Nebula, and International Fantasy Awards
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Friday
by Robert Anson Heinlein
Engineered from the finest genes, and trained to be a secret courier in a future world, Friday operates over a near-future Earth, where chaos reigns. Working at Boss's whimsical behest she travels from far north to deep south, finding quick, expeditious solutions as one calamity after another threatens to explode in her face....
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The Breaking of Northwall
by Paul O. Williams
To the Pelbar, the sentence seemed a living death -- exile to distant Northwall for a year, facing barbarian tribes, isolated from the security and order of Pelbarigan society. But the rebellious Jestak embraced his punishment -- for only with the lore of Northwall and the battle-craft and bravery of the wild tribes could he free the woman he loved from the slaveholding Emeri. This he swore to do -- even if he had to destroy utterly the power of the Emeri . . .
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The Child Garden
by Geoff Ryman
The multiple-award-winning sf classic from the acclaimed author of Was. In the city of the future, humans photosynthesize, viruses educate people, organics have replaced electronics . . . and almost no one lives past 40. The outcast Milena feels alone--until she meets the genetically engineered Rolfa.
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Air
by Geoff Ryman
What happens when the whole world goes online . . . through the air? A brilliant literary SF novel by the author of 253.
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Was
by Geoff Ryman
This haunting, wildly original novel explores the lives of several characters entwined by The Wizard of Oz--both the novel written by L. Frank Baum and the strangely resonant 1939 film. Was traverses the American landscape to reveal how the human imagination transcends the bleakest circumstance.