Science fiction favorites

[grettaelizabeth]

A co-worker asked me recently for a list of science fiction books I'd recommend. I haven't been reading as much science fiction in the last five years as I used to, but that's partly because my success rate at finding stuff I liked dropped off a bit. If my list of favorites signficantly overlaps yours, please comment and let me know what I'm missing.

I'll follow up with a separate fantasy post sometime soon. It will have some author overlap, but this list was long enough already. My favorites are starred.

Iain M. Banks

*Player of Games
Use of Weapons
Excession

John Barnes

*Orbital Resonance
A Million Open Doors

David Brin

Uplift Series
The Postman
*Heart of the Comet
Glory Season

Orson Scott Card

*Ender's Game and rest of series
Homecoming series

Mary Gentle

First History series

Robert Heinlein

Starship Troopers
Podkayne of Mars
*The Moon is a Harsh Mistress
I Will Fear No Evil
Time Enough for Love

Frank Herbert

*Dune

Nancy Kress

Probability series
Beggars series

China Miéville

Perdido Street Station

John Scalzi

Old Man's War

Dan Simmons

*Hyperion series

Neal Stephenson

*Diamond Age
*Snow Crash
*Cryptonomicon

Vernor Vinge

Marooned in Realtime
*A Fire Upon the Deep
*A Deepness in the Sky

Connie Willis

*Doomsday Book
Bellwether
To Say Nothing of the Dog
*Passage