Others: Positive Genetic warfare and the invasion of Europe by mutants from outer space are the tenets of this science fiction novel written as if the author had been Adolf Hitler
Genres: fantasy, science fiction, historical fiction
Lists: …
Robert Silverberg
1971 · 187 pages · 5 reviews
Others: PositiveIn 2381, the highly regulated life at the giant building known as Urbmon 116 may seem ideal, but some residents are experiencing dangerous dissatisfaction.
What made the match, strongest first
Natasha Pulley
2021 · 416 pages · 3 reviews
Others: Overwhelmingly positiveA time twisting alternative history that asks whether it's worth changing the past to save the future, even if it costs you everyone you've ever loved. Joe Tournier has a bad case of amnesia. His first memory is of stepping off a train in the nineteenth-century French colony of England. The only clue Joe has about his identity is a century-old postcard of a Scottish lighthouse that arrives in London the same month he does. Written in illegal English—instead of French—the postcard is signed only with the letter “M,” but Joe is certain whoever wrote it knows him far better than he currently knows himself, and he's determined to find the writer. The search for M, though, will drive Joe from French-ruled London to rebel-owned Scotland and finally onto the battle ships of a lost empire's Royal Navy. In the process, Joe will remake history, and himself.
What made the match, strongest first
J. G. Ballard
1962 · 175 pages · 4 reviews
Others: PositiveFluctuations in solar radiation have melted the ice caps, sending the planet into a new Triassic Age of unendurable heat. London is a swamp; lush tropical vegetation grows up the walls of the Ritz and primeval reptiles are sighted, swimming through the newly-formed lagoons. Some flee the capital; others remain to pursue reckless schemes, either in the name of science or profit. While the submerged streets of London are drained in search of treasure, Dr Robert Kerans - part of a group of intrepid scientists - comes to accept this submarine city and finds himself strangely resistant to the idea of saving it. (via 2014 Fourth Estate edition)
What made the match, strongest first
David Mitchell
2004 · 528 pages · 8 reviews
Others: Leaning positiveFrom David Mitchell, the Booker Prize nominee, award-winning writer and one of the featured authors in Granta’s “Best of Young British Novelists 2003” issue, comes his highly anticipated third novel, a work of mind-bending imagination and scope. A reluctant voyager crossing the Pacific in 1850; a disinherited composer blagging a precarious livelihood in between-the-wars Belgium; an ambitious journalist in Governor Reagan’s California; a vanity publisher fleeing the mendicant and violent family of his star author; a genetically modified “dinery server” on death-row; and Zachry, a young Pacific Islander witnessing the nightfall of science and civilisation -- the narrators of Cloud Atlas hear each other’s echoes down the corridor of history, and their destinies are changed in ways great and small. In his captivating third novel, David Mitchell erases the boundaries of language, genre and time to offer a meditation on humanity’ s dangerous will to power, and where it may lead us
What made the match, strongest first
Thomas M. Disch
1967 · 167 pages · 5 reviews
Others: Overwhelmingly positiveThis spectacular novel established Thomas M. Disch as a major new force in science fiction. First published in 1965, it was immediately labeled a masterpiece reminiscent of the works of J.G. Ballard and H.G. Wells In this harrowing novel, the world's cities have been reduced to cinder and ash and alien plants have overtaken the earth. The plants, able to grow the size of maples in only a month and eventually reach six hundred feet, have commandeered the world's soil and are sucking even the Great Lakes dry. In northern Minnesota, Anderson, an aging farmer armed with a Bible in one hand and a gun in the other, desperately leads the reduced citizenry of a small town in a daily struggle for meager existence. Throw into this fray Jeremiah Orville, a marauding outsider bent on a bizarre and private revenge, and the fight to live becomes a daunting task.
What made the match, strongest first
Neal Stephenson
2006 · 456 pages · 1 review
Others: MixedThe Baroque Cycle, Book 1 of 8 In which Daniel Waterhouse, fearless thinker and courageous Puritan, pursues knowledge in the company of the greatest minds of Baroque-era Europe -- in a chaotic world where reason wars with the bloody ambitions of the mighty, and where catastrophe, natural or otherwise, can alter the political landscape overnight. Also contained in Quicksilver: Volume One of The Baroque Cycle
What made the match, strongest first
Loved itnothing I think can ever diminish my esteem for this particular book. This is one of the most important, most elucidating science fiction books that I have ever read. I think this should be required reading... It's a great book. It's a genuinely great book.
