Top 10 Science Fiction Books Read in 2024 (Backlist)

[@athena144]

Parable of the Sower was soooo dark and so well written ! Thanks for topping off my TBR with some new titles . I'm particularly interested to check out The Greatwinter Trilogy

[@TheShadesofOrange]

I filmed this before Election Day. Talents would be a tough to read now ooof

[@MokeleMbembeLives]

@@TheShadesofOrange Agreed

[@secretsauceofstorycraft]

L.O.V.E.D. This list! No matter how long we are friends i never know what you are gunna have on your lists and look forward to these videos every year!!!!

[@TheShadesofOrange]

Aw thanks

[@leafsonata]

I read Kindred by Octavia Butler and Stranger in A Strange World by Robert Heinlein. I really enjoyed it them. Thanks for so many good recs! I want to read several mentioned

[@lissavanhouten6628]

I've just started reading Adrian Tchaikovsky novels. I find myself enjoying his works; usually, at least, 4 out of 5 stars.

[@perrywakefield1698]

Octavia Butler is one of the great sci authors of all time.

[@TheShadesofOrange]

Agreed!

[@lymarisestrada588]

Cixin Liu became one of my favorite writers. I loved the way you described the tone of Ball Lightning and how you hinted at important details of the story without a single spoiler!! Great video. ❤ I recently started Stowaway to Mars by John Wyndham. 🚀

[@TheShadesofOrange]

Thanks I try

[@bartsbookspace]

I’ll definitely pick up Ball Lightning, I loved the Remembrance trilogy, and you sold me on this one. Thx

[@TheShadesofOrange]

I hope you love it

[@TheMike28212]

Glad you got to read so many great backlist titles. Some of my favorite backlist sci fi books I read this year are Generation Ship, The Coldfire Trilogy, The Wandering Earth, Electric Forest, and Under the Skin. I am most interested in reading The Dying Earth series and Parable of the Sower.

[@TheShadesofOrange]

Maybe wait 4 years to read Parable

[@candicebarbata5028]

Ball Lightening sounds amazing! Just picked it up on Kindle Thanks Rachel!⚡️✨

[@TheShadesofOrange]

Hope you enjoy it!

[@JohnSaxon-vw5vi]

Thank you for giving me some amazing and wonderful books 📚 to read my friend John xx

[@GwenCooper-l1b]

Thanks for the great video. I am definitely going to check out Electric Forest!

[@TheShadesofOrange]

I hope you enjoy it

[@JoeNicolosi-l8i]

I just added Ball Lightning to my TBR based on your recommendation. I've read quite a few backlist sci-fi novels this year; two of the ones I liked the most were Contact by Carl Sagan and Cloud Cuckoo Land by Anthony Doerr,

[@TheShadesofOrange]

Oo Contact was so good. I'll have to look up the other one

[@AntisocialAuntie]

Added Ball Lightening to my TBR. Thank you for another great list to try 🧡

[@TheShadesofOrange]

Hope you enjoy it

[@miyayume_eclectic_dream]

To Lke the Lightning is on my TBR because I personaly liked the cover of book 4 so much I was "yeah lets read"...but found out its a series and after on channel Literatur Sciency Alliance found a video that hypes the series sooo much that I am more interested than befor. Still haven't started it 🙈

[@rexharrison6827]

I'm just over half way through Cixin Liu's "The Dark Forest", immediately following on from "The Three Body Problem" and am loving both books. Liu's works could be described as slow burners that take awhile to ignite, but once they do, I find them hard to put down. The first book in the trilogy is a fascinating blend of history and fiction, with very human, very conflicted characters. The second perhaps is not quite so riveting in that it doesn't have the same grounding in history, yet has some wonderful character moments. I'm looking forward to the the third book! One thing that impressed me, was how little time 400 years actually is when one is forced into making massive changes in society and technology. There's just never enough time, even when there is! Nothing like impending doom to focus the mind! I've seen both "Wandering Earth" films and they're brilliant. But have yet to read the short story on which they're based. The prequel features the space elevator mentioned in the "Dark Forest". A pity Arthur C. Clarke isn't still alive - I think he would have loved it! It's probably as close as we'll ever get to the real thing! I'm intrigued by "Ball Lightning". I've made a mental note to search it out by year's end, hopefully.

[@TheShadesofOrange]

I hope you enjoy Ball Lightning, it's so good!

[@Maeve_Ever_Books]

I have all but 2 of these in my list to read in the future!! 😅 Pretty sure I’ve added them all from recs in your previous videos.

[@TheShadesofOrange]

That’s awesome! You’re going to have a lot of great sci-fi to look forward to.

[@Maeve_Ever_Books]

@ I definitely do!!

[@FrankOdonnell-ej3hd]

Got the wondering earth and like it also reading American rapture on your recommend and breezing thru it so glad u told us about it⚛❤

[@TheShadesofOrange]

Glad you're enjoying it

[@Jzscrstsprstr]

After 3-BP and these recs I'm definitely sold on Wandering Earth and Ball Lightning, thanks 👍

[@TheShadesofOrange]

Hope you enjoy them!

[@johnturiano]

I clearly have to read more of these. Dark Matter by Blake Crouch and The Humans by Matt Haig are two of my all-time favorites.

[@-clyx-2907]

I'm currently reading Dark Forest by Liu Cixin.

[@khomo12]

Good list!👍👍👍📚🤖🚀🐲

[@cbenson513]

Just added Ball Lightning to my tbr. Thank you

[@TheShadesofOrange]

You’re welcome! I hope you love it

[@nataliethompson5266]

Very interesting list. I recently read The Lathe of Heaven by Le Guin. It was so intriguing!

[@TheShadesofOrange]

Still need to read that one

[@socaltoobie8984]

This year I read and absolutely ADORED Project Hail Mary. I do have Ball Lightening and The Wandering Earth on my TBR. I read and enjoyed The Three Body Problem and then petered out halfway through The Dark Forest. I so, SO wanted to read that trilogy but felt it was a bit overwritten 🙈 for a reader like me. I can get an hour of reading in M-F and realized it was going to take way too long. 😬 And mind you… I committed to, and succeeded in reading The Count of Monte Cristo this year. 😂🤷‍♀️

[@TheShadesofOrange]

Monto Cristo is SO good!

[@bocconom]

Jack Vance was a true word smith. His works are many in both sci-fi and fantasy and with crossover. His Lyonesse trilogy is one my favorite reads. He also wrote many short stories.

[@TheShadesofOrange]

I really nee do read more by him

[@O.M.G.Puppies]

Loved Three-Body Problem. I read the book, and watched both the Chinese mini series and the Netflix. And yet, I still have not read the two sequels; must do. Did you read Red Mars, by Kim Stanley Robinson? Great story and great character development, about colonizing Mars and the battle between political/ecological factions. There are two sequels, Green and Blue Mars.

[@alanweiman1521]

There is a 4th book called 2312. Though it is not a direct sequal, it makes several refernces to events in the trilogy. It's sort of a mystery as the main characters follow clues that take them all over the solar system.

[@TheShadesofOrange]

I read Red Mars but was disappointed how bogged down it was with character decisions I didn't care about (like who was sleeping with who)

[@Beach652]

Denial sounds very interesting, I'm surprised I haven't heard of it! It sounds a bit like my favorite read of 2023 - Adrift by Brideau which is also set in the near future against a climate change backdrop but is a character -driven story/mystery about an amnesic. I loved it and wish more people would read it!

[@TheShadesofOrange]

I'll have to look up Adrift

[@AccipiterF1]

I haven't had much luck with backlist sci-fi this year. Frontera by Lewis Shiner was a fairly entertaining, very 80s, thriller story set on Mars. Gateway by Frederik Pohl was fairly disappointing to me given it's reputation. Which leaves my favorite as Fountains of Paradise by Arthur C. Clark. It's a pure hard sci-fi, great man invents great technology story, but I like Clark's writing, so I found it fun.

[@TheShadesofOrange]

Sorry it's been a dry year. I'll have to look up those

[@WickedGoodBooks]

Have you read The Rivener? I thought for sure I'd seen it in one of your videos....

[@TheShadesofOrange]

No I haven't

[@WickedGoodBooks]

@@TheShadesofOrange Thank you for replying I was losing my mind!

[@WordsinTime]

I really enjoyed The Electric Forest. I don’t know if the ending worked for me quite as well, but overall it was a great read. And I loved The Remembrance of Earth’s Past with The Dark Forest being my favorite as well!

[@TheShadesofOrange]

Ah Dark Forest was so good

[@Montie-Adkins]

Well I will not encourage you to go on with Too Like The Lightning. There were these fictional history drops as if they were some kind of trivia I was supposed to know or be concerned about and it did not read well. DNF. Black Sun Rising I read long ago but only recall the start and the end. But I have the trilogy and want to give it a go. The first book cover is one of the best covers ever by Whelan.

[@TheShadesofOrange]

Appreciate the nudge to keep going

[@josephiyeke8946]

If Souls in the Great Machine could be similar to the Bobiverse, then I’m in!

[@TheShadesofOrange]

Definitely much darker in tone without any humor

[@arekkrolak6320]

I liked Too Like The Lightning, it was very good, but a friend told me next tomes are not as good, so I am fine with just reading the first one :)

[@TheShadesofOrange]

Some people are saying to keep reading and some people saying to stop

[@Castabulan]

Souls in the Great Machine is the first of a trilogy. They are all worth your attention.

[@TheShadesofOrange]

Thanks for the heads-up!

[@phroz3n]

Coldfire trilogy not talked about enough. Friedman has got some bangers.

[@phroz3n]

Check out The Madness Season by her if you haven't.

[@TheShadesofOrange]

Agreed! Hoping to read Maddess next year

[@whileriding]

YES! To Ball Lightning. Except, they say Ball Lightning way too much lol

[@TheShadesofOrange]

Lol !... true

[@kid5Media]

The Dying Earth is not a novel. Glad you liked it, though.

[@TheShadesofOrange]

Doh!

[@blakebellis]

✨

[@CoachellaValleyOverland]

🚀

[@cynthiafialka]

The president in Parable of the Sower is oddly prescient to a certain president elect in the USA. It’s like Butler knew about him.

[@TheShadesofOrange]

I should mention I filmed this before the election

[@Moco_Cork1]

❤

[@roanokebrooks]

🛸

[@Octobig]

🌩⚡🌠

[@lda1737]

😁

[@bookmarcreads]

⚡️⚡️⚡️

[@Tetsujin-28]

🎄🦃

[@toniblessing4624]

🌗🌞💫

[@zacharyrome3432]

👍👏🎩

[@zubaerchaudhari8267]

Hi there Hi there Hi hey hello there

[@Fabulist]

As soon as that garbage book Too Like the Lightning appeared I was out. This fascination with serial killers is a sickness, and that is one of the most badly-written novels I’ve encountered.