|
bc94063
|
Reputation is what other people know about you. Honor is what you know about yourself.
|
|
vorkosigan
inspirational
sci-fi
|
Lois McMaster Bujold |
|
3191f3f
|
This must be Thursday,' said Arthur to himself, sinking low over his beer. 'I never could get the hang of Thursdays.
|
|
sci-fi
|
Douglas Adams |
|
1ea4757
|
The life where nothing was ever unexpected. Or inconvenient. Or unusual. The life without colour, pain or past.
|
|
future
life
the-giver
utopia
sci-fi
|
Lois Lowry |
|
fbee5ba
|
How does one hate a country, or love one? Tibe talks about it; I lack the trick of it. I know people, I know towns, farms, hills and rivers and rocks, I know how the sun at sunset in autumn falls on the side of a certain plowland in the hills; but what is the sense of giving a boundary to all that, of giving it a name and ceasing to love where the name ceases to apply? What is love of one's country; is it hate of one's uncountry? Then it's not a good thing. Is it simply self-love? That's a good thing, but one mustn't make a virtue of it, or a profession... Insofar as I love life, I love the hills of the Domain of Estre, but that sort of love does not have a boundary-line of hate. And beyond that, I am ignorant, I hope.
|
|
the-left-hand-of-darkness
sci-fi
|
Ursula K. Le Guin |
|
3ccf2ef
|
I ask of you your lives," Elend said, voice echoing, "and your courage. I ask of you your faith, and your honor--your strength, and your compassion. For today, I lead you to die. I will not ask you to welcome this event. I will not insult you by calling it well, or just, or even glorious. But I will say this
|
|
inspirational
sci-fi
|
Brandon Sanderson |
|
23d665e
|
People should decide on the books' meanings for themselves. They'll find a story that attacks such things as cruelty, oppression, intolerance, unkindness, narrow-mindedness, and celebrates love, kindness, open-mindedness, tolerance, curiosity, human intelligence.
|
|
philosophy
sci-fi
|
Philip Pullman |
|
dabb607
|
Having solved all the major mathematical, physical, chemical, biological, sociological, philosophical, etymological, meteorological and psychological problems of the Universe except for his own, three times over, [Marvin] was severely stuck for something to do, and had taken up composing short dolorous ditties of no tone, or indeed tune. The latest one was a lullaby. Marvin droned, He paused to gather the artistic and emotional strength to tackle the next verse.
|
|
humor
marvin
h2g2
hitchhikers-guide-to-the-galaxy
sci-fi
|
Douglas Adams |
|
dc6bb2f
|
"And what lesson can we draw from Volantene history?" "If you want to conquer the world, you best have dragons."
|
|
humour
tyrion-lannister
george-r-r-martin
sci-fi
|
George R.R. Martin |
|
bee444b
|
They have nothing to give. They have no power of making. All their power is to darken and destroy. They cannot leave this place; they are this place; and it should be left to them. They should not be denied nor forgotten, but neither should they be worshiped. The Earth is beautiful, and bright, and kindly, but that is not all. The Earth is also terrible, and dark, and cruel. The rabbit shrieks dying in the green meadows. The mountains clench their great hands full of hidden fire. There are sharks in the sea, and there is cruelty in men's eyes. And where men worship these things and abase themselves before them, there evil breeds; there places are made in the world where darkness gathers, places given over wholly to the Ones whom we call Nameless, the ancient and holy Powers of the Earth before the Light, the powers of the dark, of ruin, of madness... I think they drove your priestess Kossil mad a long time ago; I think she has prowled these caverns as she prowls the labyrinth of her own self, and now she cannot see the daylight any more. She tells you that the Nameless Ones are dead; only a lost soul, lost to truth, could believe that. They exist. But they are not your Masters. They never were. You are free, Tenar. You were taught to be a slave, but you have broken free.
|
|
sci-fi
|
Ursula K. Le Guin |
|
6f2e3a5
|
"So, like I said, these are a bunch of really sweet guys, but you wouldn't want to share a Galaxy with them, not if they're just gonna keep at it, not if they're not gonna learn to relax a little. I mean it's just gonna be continual nervous time, isn't it, right? Pow, pow, pow, when are they next coming at us? Peaceful coexistence is just right out, right? Get me some water somebody, thank you." He sat back and sipped reflectively. OK," he said, "hear me, hear me. It's, like, these guys, you know, are entitled to their own view of the Universe. And according to their view, which the Universe forced on them, right, they did right. Sounds crazy, but I think you'll agree. They believe in ..." He consulted a piece of paper which he found in the back pocket of his Judicial jeans. They believe in `peace, justice, morality, culture, sport, family life, and the obliteration of all other life forms'."
|
|
irony
sci-fi
|
Douglas Adams |
|
7c997ca
|
"Share and Enjoy' is the company motto of the hugely successful Sirius Cybernetics Corporation Complaints Division, which now covers the major land masses of three medium-sized planets and is the only part of the Corporation to have shown a consistent profit in recent years. The motto stands-- or rather stood-- in three mile high illuminated letters near the Complaints Department spaceport on Eadrax. Unfortunately its weight was such that shortly after it was erected, the ground beneath the letters caved in and they dropped for nearly half their length through the offices of many talented young Complaints executives-- now deceased. The protruding upper halves of the letters now appear, in the local language, to read "Go stick your head in a pig," and are no longer illuminated, except at times of special celebration."
|
|
sci-fi
|
Douglas Adams |
|
7138344
|
I could not help feeling that they were evil things-- mountains of madness whose farther slopes looked out over some accursed ultimate abyss. That seething , half-luminous cloud-background held ineffable suggestions of a vague, ethereal beyondness far more than terrestrially spatial; and gave appalling reminders of the utter remoteness, separateness, desolation, and aeon-long death of this untrodden and unfathomed austral world.
|
|
sci-fi
|
H.P. Lovecraft |
|
ec6de6b
|
Robert Neville looked out over the new people of the earth. He knew he did not belong to them; he knew that, like the vampires, he was anathema and black terror to be destroyed. And, abruptly, the concept came, amusing to him even in his pain. ... Full circle. A new terror born in death, a new superstition entering the unassailable fortress of forever. I am legend.
|
|
sf-masterworks
richard-matheson
post-apocalyptic
sci-fi
|
Richard Matheson |
|
d085f93
|
He must have been handsome when he was alive and was handsome still, although made monstrous by his pallor and her awareness of what he was. His mouth looked soft, his cheekbones as sharp as blades, and his jaw curved, giving him an off-kilter beauty. His black hair a mad forest of dirty curls.
|
|
mad
dark
teen
monstrous
tana
sci-fi
gavriel
paranormal
paranormal-romance
tana-bach
the-coldest-girl-in-coldtown
insane
ya
|
Holly Black |
|
744201b
|
He stood there for a moment looking around the silent room, shaking his head slowly. All these books, he thought, the residue of a planet's intellect, the scrapings of futile minds, the leftovers, the potpourri of artifacts that had no power to save men from perishing.
|
|
i-am-legend
existential
post-apocalyptic
plague
sci-fi
|
Richard Matheson |
|
c646de4
|
"We're not obsessed by anything, you see," insisted Ford. "..." "And that's the deciding factor. We can't win against obsession. They care, we don't. They win." "I care about lots of things," said Slartibartfast, his voice trembling partly with annoyance, but partly also with uncertainty. "Such as?" "Well," said the old man, "life, the Universe. Everything, really. Fjords." "Would you die for them?" "Fjords?" blinked Slartibartfast in surprise. "No."
|
|
irony
sci-fi
|
Douglas Adams |
|
8a89997
|
The story of how I left Huckleberry begins -- as do all worthy stories -- with a goat
|
|
sci-fi
|
John Scalzi |
|
daf48da
|
Aimless extension of knowledge, however, which is what I think you really mean by the term curiosity, is merely inefficiency. I am designed to avoid inefficiency.
|
|
olivaw
robots
sci-fi
|
Isaac Asimov |
|
17a37a3
|
He may become like a glass filled with a clear light for eyes to see that can.
|
|
sci-fi
|
J.R.R. Tolkien |
|
675798e
|
The lights were off so that his heads could avoid looking at each other because neither of them was currently a particular engaging sight, nor had they been since he had made the error of looking into his soul. It had indeed been an error. It had been late one night-- of course. It had been a difficult day-- of course. There had been soulful music playing on the ship's sound system-- of course. And he had, of course, been slightly drunk. In other words, all the usual conditions that bring on a bout of soul searching had applied, but it had, nevertheless, clearly been an error.
|
|
humor
sci-fi
|
Douglas Adams |
|
b6dc15c
|
The king was pregnant.
|
|
feminist
science-fiction
gender
sci-fi
|
Ursula K. Le Guin |
|
1febdce
|
"In accordance with the terms of the Clarke-Asimov treaty, the second-best science writer dedicates this book to the second-best science-fiction
|
|
sci-fi
|
Arthur C. Clarke |
|
2f0d142
|
"Only the framing material," Lucas demurely, "obvious influences, Neo-Tokyo from Akira, Ghost in the Shell, Metal Gear Solid by Hideo Kojima, or as he's known in my crib, God."
|
|
ghost-in-the-shell
hideo-kojima
mgs
video-games
cyberpunk
japan
sci-fi
|
Thomas Pynchon |
|
9b8db17
|
Civilized man longs for the illusion of barbarism. Either his culture fulfills this need by adopting its outer trappings, or he will be seduced by his first contact with a culture that does.
|
|
sci-fi
|
C.S. Friedman |
|
2b1a149
|
They can send death at once, but life is slower...
|
|
philosophical
sci-fi
|
Ursula K. Le Guina K. Le Guin |
|
570d606
|
"We'll fight back, we'll fight back, we'll fight back," a man near Doctor Stockstill was chanting. Stockstill looked at him in astonishment, wondering who he would fight back against. Things were falling on them; did the man intend to fall back upward into the sky in some sort of revenge?"
|
|
atom-bomb
anti-war
sci-fi
|
Philip K. Dick |
|
549d24e
|
His wax-white skin was cool to the touch when she brushed his neck to find the knot of cloth. She'd never been this close to a vampire,never realized what it would be like to be so near to someone who didn't breathe, who could be as still as any statue. His chest neither rose not fell. Her hands shook.
|
|
romance
tana
sci-fi
gavriel
paranormal
paranormal-romance
tana-bach
the-coldest-girl-in-coldtown
ya
|
Holly Black |
|
10c2a5f
|
"Sometimes I think Earth has got to be the insane asylum of the universe. . . and I'm here by computer error. At sixty-eight, I hope I've gained some wisdom in the past fourteen lustrums and it's obligatory to speak plain and true about the conclusions I've come to; now that I have been educated to believe by such mentors as Wells, Stapledon, Heinlein, van Vogt, Clarke, Pohl, (S. Fowler) Wright, Orwell, Taine, Temple, Gernsback, Campbell and other seminal influences in scientifiction, I regret the lack of any female writers but only Radclyffe Hall opened my eyes outside sci-fi.
|
|
fairy-tales
morality
science
hope
humanist
belief
science-fiction
secular
danger
utopia
atheist
respect
sci-fi
|
Forrest J. Ackerman |
|
d1350fe
|
If natural selection can create creationists it can manage a caterpillar with a face on its arse.
|
|
humour
quantum
robert-rankin
douglas-adams
parallel-universe
multiverse
sci-fi
|
Zane Stumpo |
|
53753bb
|
"Having to amuse myself during those earlier years, I read voraciously and widely. Mythic matter and folklore made up much of that reading--retellings of the old stories ( ), anecdotal collections and historical investigations of the stories' backgrounds--and then I stumbled upon the books which took me back to and the like. I was in heaven when began the Unicorn imprint for Ballantine and scoured the other publishers for similar good finds, delighting when I discovered someone like , who still remains a favourite. This was before there was such a thing as a fantasy genre, when you'd be lucky to have one fantasy book published in a month, little say the hundreds per year we have now. I also found myself reading (the Cormac and Bran mac Morn books were my favourites), and finally started reading science fiction after coming across 's Huon of the Horn. That book wasn't sf, but when I went to read more by her, I discovered everything else was. So I tried a few and that led me to and any number of other fine sf writers. These days my reading tastes remain eclectic, as you might know if you've been following my monthly book review column in . I'm as likely to read as as as
|
|
reading
books
fantasy
book-genres
recommendations
sf
science-fiction
sci-fi
influences
|
Charles de Lint |
|
22bbea5
|
The dentist swiveled on his heels and disappeared, leaving me there to massage my jaw back into feeling after its brief, masochistic marriage to the top of my wooden desk.
|
|
sci-fi
|
Jonathan Lethem |
|
c35acae
|
When, however, the lay public rallies round an idea that is denounced by distinguished but elderly scientists and supports that idea with great fervor and emotion--the distinguished but elderly scientists are then, after all, probably right.
|
|
science
humor
arthur-charles-clarke
clarke
robotics
scientists
sci-fi
|
Isaac Asimov |
|
7e2a774
|
"Issib wasn't thrilled to see him. I'm busy and don't need interruptions." "This is the household library," said Nafai. "This is where we always come to do research." "See? You're interrupting already." "Look, I didn't say anything, I just came in here, and you started picking at me the second I walked in the door." "I was hoping you'd walk back out." "I can't. Mother sent me here." Nafai walked over behind Issib, who was floating comfortably in the air in front of his computer display. It was layered thirty pages deep, but each page had only a few words on it, so he could see almost everything at once. Like a game of solitaire, in which Issib was simply moving fragments from place to place. The fragments were all words in weird languages. The ones Nafai recognized were very old. "What language is that?" Nafai asked pointing, to one. Issib signed. "I'm so glad you're not interrupting me." "What is it, some ancient form of Vijati?" "Very good. It's Slucajan, which came from Obilazati, the original form of Vijati. It's dead now." "I read Vijati, you know." "I don't." "Oh, so you're specializing in ancient, obscure languages that nobody speaks anymore, including you?" "I'm not learning these languages, I'm researching lost words." "If the whole language is dead, then all the words are lost." "Words that used to have meanings, but that died out or survived only in idiomatic expressions. Like 'dancing bear.' What's a bear, do you know?" "I don't know. I always thought it was some kind of graceful bird." "Wrong. It's an ancient mammal. Known only on Earth, I think, and not brought here. Or it died out soon. It was bigger than a man, very powerful. A predator." "And it danced?" "The expression used to mean something absurdly clumsy. Like a dog walking on its hind legs." "And now it means the opposite. That's weird. How could it change?" "Because there aren't any bears. THe meaning used to be obvious, because everybody knew a bear and how clumsy it would look, dancing. But when the bears were gone, the meaning could go anywhere. Now we use it for a person who's extremely deft in getting out of an embarrassing social situation. It's the only case that we use the word bear anymore. And you see a lot of people misspelling it, too." "Great stuff. You doing a linguistics project?" "No." "What's this for, then?" "Me." "Just collection old idioms?" "Lost words." "Like bear? The word isn't lost, Issya. It's the bears that are gone." "Very good, Nyef. You get full credit for the assignment. Go away now."
|
|
book-clip
sci-fi
|
Orson Scott Card |
|
980d2e7
|
To a man with only a hammer, a screw is a defective nail.
|
|
hammer
sci-fi
|
Orson Scott Card |
|
0763c1a
|
Once, I believed that space could have no power over faith, just as I believed the heavens declared the glory of God's handwork. Now I have seen that handwork, and my faith is sorely troubled.
|
|
religion
science-fiction
sci-fi
|
Arthur C. Clarke |
|
70cb081
|
But the Butlerians turn fear into violence and panic into a weapon. By creating imaginary problems and raising the specter of nonexistent enemies, they transform common people into a wild herd that destroys everything they do not understand.
|
|
sci-fi
|
Brian Herbert & Kevin J. Anderson |
|
dceec98
|
"Never been here before. It's like something on the top floor of a luxury high-rise casino in Atlantic City, where they put semi-retarded adults from South Philly after they've blundered into the mega jackpot" Hiro Protagonist - Snow Crash"
|
|
hiro-protagonist
snow-crash
sci-fi
|
Neal Stephenson |
|
a35a418
|
"In the beginning," Scripture taught, "there was the Word," and Danny would come to believe that the two great gifts his God had given to the species He loved were time, which divides experience, and language, which binds the past to the future."
|
|
religion
sci-fi
|
Mary Doria Russell |
|
319bb2e
|
An Odonian undertook monogamy just as he might undertake a joint enterprise in production, a ballet or a soap-works. Partnership was a voluntarily constituted federation like any other. So long as it worked, it worked, and if it didn't work it stopped being. It was not an institution but a function. It had no sanction but that of private conscience.
|
|
relationships
women
politics
love
moraily
property
sci-fi
|
Ursula K. Le Guin |
|
b8951bb
|
Welcome to the Information Jungle.
|
|
inspirational
sci-fi
|
Tad Williams |
|
40160ef
|
He thinks perhaps there's a reason our memories are kept hazy and out of focus. Maybe their abstraction serves as an anesthetic, a buffer protecting us from the agony of time and all that it steals and erases.
|
|
time
science-fiction
sci-fi
memory
|
Blake Crouch |
|
0edf387
|
If you write literary fiction that's set partly in the future, you're apparently a sci-fi writer ... I think of it as being more of a story about what remains after we lose everything and the importance of art in our lives.
|
|
sci-fi
|
Emily St. John Mandel |
|
e4c4ab1
|
They compose poems to their knives.
|
|
fremen
science-fiction
sci-fi
|
Frank Herbert |
|
8c62719
|
Perhaps everything you say is true and these are the death throes of the human race, but even if that was true, I would not lose faith. There must be hope, and I must fight for my Emperor against Chaos and it's servants. That is insanity. Wrong, it's being human.
|
|
inspirational
sci-fi
|
Ben Counter |
|
a20bbb6
|
They lay together in a sheltered place among the ruins of Brasilia while deathbeams from Chinese EMVs played like blue searchlights on broken ceramic walls.
|
|
war
poetry
poetic-prose
sci-fi
|
Dan Simmons |
|
a29ccdd
|
We were the lucky ones, the notthese, we were the ones who had survived the aerial bombing and fire-clusters, the final flash. Regrettable, unavoidable, a war to end all wars, a war for democracy, a war for freedom, peaceful war. Sometimes war is necessary. Sometimes war is right. But to the broken and the dead, to the wounded and the maimed, to the exploded and the shrapnelshattered, to minds gone dark, to eyes that have seen agony no tears can wash away, it hardly matters that the dead language of war repeats itself through time. The bodies that can say nothing have the last word. What is it -- the last word? No. No more war.
|
|
sci-fi-romance
the-stone-gods
sci-fi
|
Jeanette Winterson |
|
adf2c4f
|
Eso hubiese sido una paradoja -hablo Lesperance-. El tiempo no permite esas confusiones..., un hombre que se encuentra consigo mismo. Cuando va a ocurrir algo parecido, el tiempo se hace a un lado.
|
|
ray
ruido
sceince
trueno
thunder
sci-fi
|
Ray Bradbury |
|
19d1265
|
Weightlessness is like heroin, or how I imagine heroin must be. You try it once, and when it's over, all you can think about is how much you want to do it again. But apparently the thrill wears off.
|
|
funny
science
humor
mary-roach
space
sci-fi
|
Mary Roach |