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Message: <blockquote data-quote="RainOfSteel" data-source="post: 5713466" data-attributes="member: 24460">Top 10 Geek Must Read/See List, Avoiding the ObviousThis lists avoids obvious choices such as Dune, The Lord of the Rings, The Matrix and so on.  If you haven't read or seen that type of material, you aren't even on the Geek radar, much less worry about a top ten list.<ul> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">The Golden Age ~ by John C. Wright: In a world of overused cliches, this book really is a tour de force of Science Fiction and literate writing.  Reading it will expand your mind alone on cutting edge science fiction, with ethics, morality, and philosophy thrown in for good measure.</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">Hyperion ~ Dan Simmons: Stasis versus adaptation, conformity versus choices, slavery versus freedom.  A war is approaching between the central forces of civilization and the Outsiders, hideous mutants whose changes were self-inflicted by genetic perversions, who subvert everything it means to be human, and who relentlessly attack innocent civilian settlements around the edges of settled space.  In the face of this coming war, seven individuals are chosen to go to the planet Hyperion and undertake the traditional long overland route to the mysterious ruins of a city apparently travelling backward in time to meet the even more mysterious robot/cyborg called the Shrike; they aren't given a choice in the matter.  Each person is already a survivor from a previous encounter with the Shrike, who normally kills everyone it meets.  During the trek, each person, expecting that they are all about to die in the near future, shares his or her story of the previous personal encounter in the hopes that they will all find some clue that will aid their survival.  They find more than they bargained for.  A collection of stories binding the various characters together, each story told in a distinctly different style of writing, it all weaves together the plot and story into a brilliant ending.</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">Inherit the Stars ~ by James P. Hogan: In the early 21st Century, an expedition from a base on the Moon discovers a cave in the side of a crater wall.  Caves don't form on the Moon because there is no erosion.  Inside the cave, they find a dead human body in a space suit.  Forensics confirms that cellular biology shows it is human and dates the body's age at 50,000 years.  The author thus founds the central question of the novel: How did a modern human wind up on the moon 50,000 years ago?  The author delivers a staggering answer.  There is no conventional "action" in this book.  The action is all in the scientific inquiry and investigation, the debates and opinions and conflicts held by those pursuing the answer to the question.  It is one of Science Fiction's finest hours.  Available free from the Baen Free Library at <a href="http://www.webscription.net/p-584-inherit-the-stars.aspx" target="_blank">Inherit the Stars by James P. Hogan - WebScription Ebook</a>.</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">Lord of Light ~ Roger Zelazny: Arguable as being as good as, and as important as, Dune.  One of Science Fiction's greatest novels.</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">The Ophiuchi Hotline ~ John Varley: Written in 1977, it reads as if it could have been written yesterday, the true test of Science Fiction that stands the passage of time.  It contains numerous elements of what would later be known as post-humanism.</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">Hardwired ~ Walter Jon Williams: My personal favorite cyberpunk novel, written entirely in the present tense.  Numerous concepts and tropes of the genre arose directly from this novel.  A former famous smuggler gets caught up in the schemes of a giant megacorporation and tries to turn the tables against the super elite.  Deltas, panzers, reflexes, muscle lacing, cybersnakes, age-retardant hormones, you'll see it all here alongside the basic little-guy vs. titans theme.</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">Nausicaa ~ Miyazaki Hayao (Manga): Quite possibly the most significant and greatest manga of our time.  This is the ecological disaster cautionary story by one of Japan's greatest storytellers.  Approximately a thousand years after giant robotic super soldiers to are raised up to the entire world with fire, mankind struggles to survive against the face of a threat that inches slowly across the world, a forest of fungus and insects that generates a cloud of particles so toxic it can kill in minutes.  In an environment of ever shrinking land and resources, the remaining superpowers strike out against one another to take final control over what little remains, no matter how many have to die along the way.  Nausicaa, sole heir to a tiny one-village kingdom on the periphery of a superpower is caught up in the larger struggle.  She will become the foundation of the future.  Superb artwork, writing, plotting, theme, and a story that grips from the beginning and never lets go guides you through a world that never ceases to amaze.</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">The Amber Novels: Nine Princes in Amber, The Guns of Avalon, Sign of Chaos, The Hand of Oberon, The Courts of Chaos ~ Roger Zelazny: Yes, Roger Zelazny gets two entries on this list.  He is that good.  This is one of Fantasy's greatest adventures.  It will lead you across a million separate realms and into mysteries for which you may never receive answers.  You may read the series again and again and always find something new, never seen before.</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">The Dragaera Cycle (Jhereg, Yendi, etc.) ~ Steven Brust: Come meet one of Fantasy's first anti-heroes, Vladimir Taltos, paid inductee into the Mafia of the local elvish empire.  Jhereg and Yendi are two of the most tightly plotted and quick action novels of Fantasy, and along the way you will meet a fantastic cast of characters and see just how the Organization works in a Fantasy milieu.</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">Ladyhawke, 1985 ~ Edward Khmara, Michael Thomas, Tom Mankiewicz, David Webb Peoples: A story of a thief, a warrior, a villain, a love, and a curse.  What more could you want in a Fantasy?</li> </ul></blockquote>

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