Others: Positive Flatland: A Romance of Many Dimensions, though written in 1884, is still considered useful in thinking about multiple dimensions. It is also seen as a satirical depiction of Victorian society and its hierarchies. A square, who is a resident of the two-dimensional Flatland, dreams of the one-dimensional Lineland. He attempts to convince the monarch of Lineland of the possibility of another dimension, but the monarch cannot see outside the line. The square is then visited himself by a Sphere from three-dimensional Spaceland, who must show the square Spaceland before he can conceive it. As more dimensions enter the scene, the story's discussion of fixed thought and the kind of inhuman action which accompanies it intensifies.
Genres: fantasy, science fiction, historical fiction, classics
Lists: …
Boris Natanovich Strugatsky
1980 · 243 pages · 2 reviews
Others: PositiveThe Snail on the Slope takes place in two worlds. One is the Administration, an institution run by a surreal, Kafkaesque bureaucracy whose aim is to govern the forest below. The other is the Forest, a place of fear, weird creatures, primitive people and violence. Peretz, who works at the Administration, wants to visit the Forest. Candide crashed in the Forest years ago and wants to return to the Administration. Their journeys are surprising and strange, and readers are left to puzzle out the mysteries of these foreign environments. The Strugatskys themselves called The Snail on the Slope “the most perfect and the most valuable of our works.”
What made the match, strongest first
Brian W. Aldiss
1982 · 361 pages · 5 reviews
Others: Leaning negativeFrom the back cover: Imagine a world in a system of twin stars, where Winter is 600 ice-locked years and every Spring is the first remembered. Imagine a People finding ruined cities beneath the melting snows. Never dreaming they had built them. And would again...
What made the match, strongest first
Claire North
2014 · 411 pages · 9 reviews
Others: Overwhelmingly positiveHarry August is on his deathbed. Again. No matter what he does or the decisions he makes, when death comes, Harry always returns to where he began, a child with all the knowledge of a life he has already lived a dozen times before. Nothing ever changes. Until now. As Harry nears the end of his eleventh life, a little girl appears at his bedside. 'I nearly missed you, Doctor August, ' she says. 'I need to send a message.' This is the story of what Harry does next, and what he did before, and how he tries to save a past he cannot change and a future he cannot allow.
What made the match, strongest first
William Hope Hodgson
2009 · 330 pages · 4 reviews
Others: NegativeThe Sun has gone out: the Earth is lit only by the glow of residual vulcanism. The last few millions of the human race are gathered together in a gigantic metal pyramid, the Last Redoubt, under siege from unknown forces and Powers outside in the dark. These are held back by a Circle of energy, known as the "air clog," powered from the Earth's internal energy. For millennia, vast living shapes - the Watchers - have waited in the darkness near the pyramid: it is thought they are waiting for the inevitable time when the Circle's power finally weakens and dies. Other living things have been seen in the darkness beyond, some of unknown origins, and others that may once have been human.To leave the protection of the Circle means almost certain death, or worse, but as the story commences, the narrator establishes mind contact with an inhabitant of another, forgotten, Redoubt, and sets off into the darkness to find her.
What made the match, strongest first
George R. R. Martin
1986 · 376 pages · 1 review
Others: Negative"Haviland Tuf is an honest space-trader who likes cats. So how is it that, in competition with the worst villains the universe has to offer, he's become the proud owner of the last seedship of Earth's legendary Ecological Engineering Corps? Never mind, just be thankful that the most powerful weapon in human space is in good hands--hands which now control cellular material for thousands of outlandish creatures. Armed with this unique equipment, Tuf is set to tackle the problems that human settlers have created in colonizing far-flung worlds: hosts of hostile monsters, a population hooked on procreation, a dictator who unleashes plagues to get his own way ... and in every case, the only thing that stands between the colonists and disaster is Tuf's ingenuity--and his reputation as a man of integrity in a universe of rogues."--Page 4 of cover.
What made the match, strongest first
A. E. van Vogt
1950 · 192 pages · 2 reviews
Others: MixedOne of the great original classics of modern SF returns! An all-time classic space saga, The Voyage of the Space Beagle is one of the pinnacles of Golden Age SF, an influence on generations of stories. An episodic novel filled with surprises and provocative ideas, this is the story of a great exploration ship sent out into the unknown reaches of space on a long mission of discovery. They encounter several terrifying alien species, including the Ix, who lay their eggs in human bodies, which then devour the humans from within when they hatch. This is one of the most entertaining and gripping stories in all of classic SF.
What made the match, strongest first
Loved itFlatland somehow simultaneously explores really cool mathematics dimension jumping pseudo aliens. the social construct, the scientific method, religion, philosophy, and it's a dystopian novel. And all in under 100 pages, and it was written over 140 years ago.
