Ship concept by Emmy-winning VFX artist Steve Messing [his site | IMDB credits]
When authors hit it out of the park on their first book, they often go on to have stellar careers, but some, including a few authors on this list, decide one is enough.
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I first saw the word “seapunk” in an ad for an aquarium, and as a lapsed marine biologist who loves science fiction, I liked it immediately, despite the “punk” in its name making it a little cheesy.
Everyone on Earth now has a slightly more developed feel for what it’s like to live through a pandemic. Note that not all of these books feature a horrifying descent into a plague-ridden apocalypse; some go in stranger and quirkier directions.
Even in the future, hardboiled detectives will put everything on the line to solve baffling cases of murdered little nobodies that everyone else wants to forget. And despite being filled to the brim with cynicism so thick you could spread it on toast, they’re still driven by a small kernel of integrity that they can’t shake loose, no matter how hard they try.
With very few of us on vacation at the beach right now, diving into someone’s deep blue imagination can be just as thrilling as a splash in the ocean.
With an emphasis on more recently-written books, this list should provide fun, thoughtful fare.
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Gothic science fiction (or “space goth”) focuses on the macabre, reveling in mystery, darkness, death, decay, madness, and monsters. Bonus goth points if vampires or werewolves appear and are explained non-magically.
There are supernatural elements in some gothic SF, so I recommend relaxing your definitions of what is or isn’t science fiction, and drift down the black river of the irrational into these stories.
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I’ve read that the most futuristic-sounding technologies tend to be ones that could be achieved in the next fifty years. Oddly, if you made that list today (flying cars, bases on the moon, self-aware AI), it’d be similar to that list made 50 years ago.
Front and back cover of The Black Speculative Arts Movement edited by Reynaldo Anderson and Clinton R. Fluker—John Jennings
Afrofuturism is not just “the future with black people in it.” Its stories tend to focus on black identity, African mythology, and alternate histories involving the African Diaspora (the movement of people from Africa due to slavery).
Here’s me, a white guy, explaining a black culture thing. For a more authentic take on afrofuturism, read Jamie Broadnax’s (founder of Black Girl Nerds) “What The Heck Is Afrofuturism?”
As one of the most popular franchises in movie and TV history, Star Trek is not lacking for extensive and thoughtful source material.
As of November 2019, approximately 850 novels, short story anthologies, novelizations, and omnibus editions have been published.
Star Trek books are often ignored (sometimes rightly so) by review sites like Kirkus Reviews and Publishers Weekly, so you’ll have to decide for yourself if a certain book sounds like your cup of Earl Grey tea (hot).
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