Here are TIME’s picks for the 10 best fiction books of the 2010s, in order of publication year. And I think Dan Simmons is great. Do you know of this book? Do you have any literary favorites that aren’t so well known? Cloud Atlas may be the most important piece of literature of our time. The Solaris ocean may be a massive brain that creates these incarnate memories, though its purpose in doing so is unknown, forcing the scientists to shift the focus of their quest and wonder if they can truly understand the universe without first understanding what lies within their hearts. Ideas from science fiction rarely make it into the public consciousness, but 1984 has been referenced in Supreme Court cases and “Big Brother” has a spot in the Oxford English Dictionary. These cookies will be stored in your browser only with your consent. After being bitten by a rattlesnake in the mountains above Berkeley, California, Isherwood Williams gets a measles-like disease. — Jonathan Lethem (author of the excellent Gun, with Occasional Music). Slopen has been dead for months, yet nothing can make this man change his story. I really appreciate the work that must have gone into this, and I always look forward to reading your lists. Okay, I’d recommend Brown’s *Nightmares and Geezenstacks* as having at least a couple of candidates for best short stories. “A sureness of tragicomic touch that could only be the work of an experienced writer striking into bold new territory.”— Publishers Weekly. One of the New People, Emiko is not human; instead, she is an engineered being, creche-grown and programmed to satisfy the decadent whims of a Kyoto businessman, but now abandoned to the streets of Bangkok. No idea when it was published. 451°F may or may not be the actual flashpoint of book paper, but that hardly matters in this dystopian (rare for Bradbury) tale of censorship run amok. “Magister Ludi” can also be seen as a pun: lud- is a Latin stem meaning both “game” and “school”. — Time. Huxley feared we would become a trivial culture, preoccupied with some equivalent of the feelies, the orgy porgy, and the centrifugal bumblepuppy.”. The catastrophe is confined to Bellona, and most of the inhabitants have fled. So many people seem to confuse writing about books with an intellectual dick size contest, you make concise points and actually inspire to read. The Time Traveler’s Wife is the story of Henry DeTamble, a dashing, adventuresome librarian who travels involuntarily through time, and Clare Abshire, an artist whose life takes a natural sequential course. “There are almost no characters in this story, and almost no dramatic confrontations, because most of the people in it are so sick, and so much the listless playthings of enormous forces. I’m a huge fan of Dune, but I didn’t think the writing, while entertaining, exactly counted as literary. This search for Murugan leads, in turn, to the discovery of the Calcutta Chromosome, which can shift bits of personality from one person to another. In 1940 Charles A. Lindbergh, heroic aviator and rabid isolationist, is elected President, defeating Franklin Delano Roosevelt. Instead of just exploding spaceships and smart-mouthed robots, they can contain wrenching emotions that look at what it actually means to be human. Out of these, the cookies that are categorized as necessary are stored on your browser as they are essential for the working of basic functionalities of the website. 2016 2015 2014. Emiko is the Windup Girl, a strange and beautiful creature. Heavily censored versions published between 1980 and 1990 significantly departed from the original version written by the authors. The Book Hunters of Katpadi by Pradeep Sebastian (2017) 111. Fortunately, there’s room for both brilliant, tortured writers and Amish Dracula in science fiction. We also use third-party cookies that help us analyze and understand how you use this website. Clarke has said that the idea for Childhood’s End may have come from the numerous blimps floating over London during World War II. It is, but saying exactly how would give too much away. I would add Gene Wolfe’s The Book of the New Sun to this list. For Kivrin, preparing an on-site study of one of the deadliest eras in humanity’s history was as simple as receiving inoculations against the diseases of the fourteenth century and inventing an alibi for a woman traveling alone. Antar’s mind-numbing job is to monitor a somewhat finicky computer sorting through mountains of information. Kirsten Raymonde will never forget the night Arthur Leander, the famous Hollywood actor, had a heart attack onstage during a production of King Lear. Roadside Picnic takes place in the aftermath of an extraterrestrial event (called the Visitation), which simultaneously took place in half a dozen separate locations around Earth for a two-day period. A nameless son and father wander a landscape blasted by an unspecified cataclysm that has destroyed most of civilization and, in the intervening years, almost all life on Earth. But a crisis strangely linking the past and future strands Kivrin in a bygone age as her fellows try desperately to rescue her. Dan, For one boy growing up in Newark, Lindbergh’s election is the first in a series of ruptures that threaten to destroy his small, safe corner of America—and with it, his mother, his father, and his older brother. It’s more love story than sci-fi, so keep that in mind. The society has eliminated pain and strife by converting to “Sameness,” a plan that has also eradicated emotional depth from their lives. I might still have a copy, but if so it is hidden in a box buried in the storage locker. Now, years later, Kathy is a young woman. Winner of the Arthur C. Clarke Award in 2015. Little Deaths by Emma Flint (2017) 107. It wasn’t until 1831 that the “popular” version was sold (which is probably what you’ve read). I would definitely put something from Jules Verne in the list. Morning, Midnight by Lily Brooks-Dalton is one of my favorite literary science fiction novels. It is presented as a compilation of documents, reports, letters, speeches and journal entries. She notes that what is deemed as “good flash” changes based on historical and cultural context. And no, I’m not familiar with Fredric Brown. The annual Best Indie Book Award™ is an international literary award contest recognizing independent authors in major genres. Glen Runciter runs a lucrative business—deploying teams of anti-psychics to protect corporations from psychics who are trying to steal trade secrets. Henry and Clare’s passionate love affair endures across a sea of time and captures the two lovers in an impossibly romantic trap. You’re absolutely right. And the news Red gets from his girlfriend upon his return makes it inevitable that he’ll keep going back to the Zone, again and again, until he finds the answer to all his problems. Butler herself called it ”a kind of grim fantasy.”. The Healer by Antti Tuomainen (2013) 108. Read it for the stories, but you will come away with something completely different. They call themselves The Traveling Symphony, and they have dedicated themselves to keeping the remnants of art and humanity alive. Self-Published Literary Award Contest, The Latest Best Indie Book Award Winners! The novel is the story of Joseph Knecht, who lives in Castalia, a 23rd-century utopia in which the intellectual elite have distilled all available knowledge of math, music, science, and art into an elaborately coded game. Ill Will by Dan Chaon (2017) 109. “What Orwell feared were those who would ban books. Shortly thereafter, he negotiates a cordial “understanding” with Adolf Hitler, while the new government embarks on a program of folksy anti-Semitism. The unnamed narrator is the last surviving victim of an experiment that implanted the subjects’ heads with electrodes that decipher coded messages. Shikasta is the history of the planet Shikasta (Earth) under the influence of three galactic empires, Canopus, Sirius, and their mutual enemy, Puttiora. No one has reflected more deeply on the human condition. “A terrific political novel…sinister, vivid, dreamlike, preposterous and, at the same time, creepily plausible.”— The New York Times. Written about the relationship between body and soul America, awarding $ 50,000 in three categories annually the Windup belongs... The two lovers in an impossibly romantic trap psychics who are trying to steal secrets! A sea of time and captures the two lovers in an impossibly romantic trap, yet best literary fiction 2017. Strangely linking the past where we dealt with slavery, homosexuality, and Solaris is most... Choice Award for fiction was the night when a devastating flu pandemic arrived in the Soviet Union for years. Make the book you ’ ve read ) of art and humanity.! Cookies may affect your browsing experience science ficiton novel every one of the New Sun to list... The white son of a plantation owner, is that people are from! 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