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5 Sci-Fi and Fantasy Books to start off the year

We’re already some way into 2017, but I wanted to take the chance to recommend some books I think you’d enjoy this year. These aren’t new publications but are simply books I have enjoyed reading in the last year. If you enjoy Science Fiction (or Speculative Fiction as it’s sometimes called) and Fantasy I’m pretty sure you will find something to enjoy here.

Many of these books to deal with adult themes, contain swearing, or are otherwise aimed at an adult audience. Just giving you a heads-up before you buy them for your children! Anyway… here we go!

1. Rivers of London

by Ben Aaronovitch

A murder witness approaches a Metropolitan Police Constable to give evidence. There’s just one problem… the witness is also dead. PC Peter Grant is then thrown into a world where he learns that ghosts, magic, and all other manner of fantastic situations aren’t actually fantasy; they’re very real.

Not only that, the Met has known this for quite some time and has a department to deal with them! PC Grant winds up working with the “magic department”, and learning a few tricks of his own along the way.

Rivers of London mixes elements of fantasy with comedy, has a cracking story, and plugs right into that sneaking suspicion that there’s more to the world than what we see.

If you enjoy this, there’s a series of follow-up books too.

Find Rivers of London on Amazon.co.uk

2. Old Man’s War

by John Scalzi

Old Man’s War is John Scalzi’s debut novel. I mention this because it’s probably my favourite book of recent times and I’m amazed that it’s his first! It falls firmly into the category of Science (or Speculative) Fiction. It’s the story of an elderly man who joins the Colonial Defence Force. Yes, this OAP just decided to join the army.

Why would he do that? As we learn in the opening pages, the CDF only takes elderly recruits, but it does so on the promise that it can make them “young” again. The process by which that happens and the events that affect our OAP once he enters military service had me completely enthralled from beginning to end.

Again, if you enjoy this novel there is a series of follow-up books.

Find Old Man’s War on Amazon.co.uk

3. The Martian

by Andy Weir

Mark Watney is part of a manned mission to Mars. He didn’t expect to be left behind, though, and become the first human to be completely alone on a planet.

There’s loads of gallows humour and science fiction actually based on science. If you’ve seen the movie and are thinking you would like there to have been more, this is definitely for you!

Someone once told me this book (and the movie) are for people who watched Apollo 13 and wish the entire thing was like the part where they were trying to work out how to make a new Carbon Dioxide scrubber using only what was available in the Lunar Module. That’s probably a fair comparison, actually, but it’s surprisingly fascinating to see how the various problems Watney faces cold be solved.

What surprised me is that Andy Weir didn’t have a contact at NASA he could ask about the tech of a hypothetical Mars mission. Instead, he crowdsourced the material by posting book excerpts online and allowing people to comment and correct him (and you know how the Internet is for correcting people!).

All in all a brilliant read, and highly recommended. Just be aware it drops the f-bomb in the first few lines but, then, if you were stranded on another planet I reckon you might be a bit sweary too!

Find The Martian on Amazon.co.uk

4. The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy

by Douglas Adams

This is an absolute classic, and one I come back to again and again. Douglas Adams’ absurd tale of Arthur Dent, dressing-gown wearing survivor of Earth’s demolition (to make way for a hyperspace bypass), requires a certain willingness to abandon logic and just go with it but, I promise you, it’s worth it.

The story leaps from one bizarre situation to another in a series of highly improbable events that never fail to make me laugh even now, after goodness knows how many readings.

If you enjoy the Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, there is a series of follow-up books too.

Find The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy on Amazon.co.uk

5. Neverwhere

by Neil Gaiman

Is what you see real? What if there’s more than just the mundane world we see around us every day? Richard Mayhew inadvertently manages to leave the mundane world and enter the magical world of London Below… a world where the normal rules don’t apply, and things take on a new and fantastic meaning. The caution to Mind the Gap on the Tube? It’s more than just about being careful not to fall between the train and the platform. The Angel, Islington? Well, in London Below it actually lives up to its name.

Richard’s adventures as he tries to get his life back and save a young girl called Door from assassination kept me enthralled from beginning to end. Now that I think of it, the hidden world here probably puts it in the same category as Rivers of London. If you enjoy one, I’m sure you’ll enjoy both.

Find Neverwhere on Amazon.co.uk

So there we go – five ideas of books to keep you entertained and enthralled. I loved all of these, and I have some others I want to tell you about in a future post. If you do read them, please do let us know what you think by leaving a comment or, if you want to say something after comments have closed here (we do that after a while to cut down on comment spam) you can pop over to our SubReddit and leave your thoughts there instead.



This post first appeared on Geek-Speak — Pure Geekery, please read the originial post: here

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5 Sci-Fi and Fantasy Books to start off the year

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