I haven’t had any luck in finding sci-fi books recently. I’m looking for a longer story that takes its time to establish the world/universe and the characters living in it. I like the idea of exploring space or futuristic cities/landscapes and being on a journey together with the protagonist. The story doesn’t have to have a happy end or flawless characters, but I also don’t like it when everything is hopeless/dystopic and all the characters stumble from one flawed decision to the next one. Some examples of what I enjoyed so far are:
- Dune
- Project Hail Mary
- The Expanse Series
- Hyperion Cantos Series
- Bobiverse Series
- The Murderbot Diaries Series
- Tuf Voyaging
- Night’s Dawn Series (Might not be for everyone… contains excessive violence and some smut, but also some very interesting ideas)
- Vatta’s War Series (I usually don’t like military sci-fi, but this one wasn’t bad)
- The Interdependency Series
- Falling Free
If you enjoyed some of these stories and have any similar suggestions, feel free to share them here. If not, maybe consider checking out the list above… I highly recommend each of these entries.
Asimov’s Foundation series is pretty solid. Mostly the same main character for a few of them and then it’s his relatives / friends for the rest. Lots of “space politics” very similar to Dune but with a little less war and more science adventuring. I especially liked the first book in the series. The prequels are good but not required reading. It’s one trilogy with two prequels and two sequels released decades later.
edit: I also strongly recommend “The World at the End of Time,” which has a couple narratives intertwined but is mostly about one man who gets cryogenically frozen a couple times. Very adventurous and pretty sad. Lots of speculative future visions in that one.
Thanks for mentioning it. I definitely should’ve added it to my post, since I enjoyed that story so much. Also, just in case you haven’t seen the Apple TV adaptation of it… don’t… They completely botched that one imo.