The Last Three Sci-Fi Books I Read

Recently,           

About five or so months ago, I realized two things simultaneously: the first is that the primary classics list can be exhausting to work through, like the latest book The Consolation of Philosophy by Boethius, despite however interesting they may be. The second is that while I want to be an author, primarily a science fiction and fantasy one, I don’t read a lot of either genre. At the suggestion of my boyfriend, whose birthday is today btw (HAPPY BIRTHDAY to him!), I’ve also started going through a science fiction book list. After I read a particularly arduous book, I reward myself with a science fiction book. So without further ado, here’re the last 3 science fiction books I read.

The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy

By Douglas Adams

            I just finished this book Saturday. As I said to one of the students I’m pre-student teaching, this is probably the funniest book I will have read all year. It reminds me of this podcast I listen to, Welcome to Night Vale, where the out of the ordinary is commonplace. While I was reading it, in between laughing myself completely out of breath, I noticed that Douglas Adams is incredible at world building. As I become an author, world building is one of the skills that I want to excel at. In order to be a great world builder, an author must not only create lifelike societies and be meticulously detailed, but also integrate that information seamlessly into their writing. The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy does this through interweaving a literal guidebook to the galaxy within the narrative.

Additionally, the narrator quickly gives away information about things without stopping to talk about them, but makes sure to include context clues so that the reader can figure out what the author is talking about without another paragraph to explain a single word. For example, while introducing the first alien in the book, Douglas Adams wrote, “Ford Prefect was desperate that any flying saucer at all would arrive soon because fifteen years was a long time to get stranded anywhere, particularly somewhere as mindboggingly dull as the Earth.” With that single sentence, readers learn several things. As was hinted at several sentences later, Ford Perfect isn’t from Earth. He didn’t deliberately stay on Earth for this long, 15 years. Plus, we learn he’s been much more interesting places, which suggests he travels a lot. Besides the fact that this book was amazing, I hope to be able to learn from Douglas Adams’ masterful world building.

Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?

By Philip K. Dick

After reading his short story, “The Minority Report”, in a dystopian fiction class last spring, I decided to read Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? mainly because the question intrigued me. While Philip K. Dick also packs a lot of information into this book, the skill I want to replicate in my own writing from this book is his ability to keep intrigue, while moving from episode to episode. The bare bones plot follows a rather straightforward path, as the main character receives an assignment at the beginning of the book to neutralize six androids. The rest of the book revolves around him killing those six androids. However, at no point, while reading the book, was I bored or counting down the androids left until the book ends.

Admittedly, I am no expert, but I think one facet of Philip K Dick’s ability to keep his readers’ attention is the supplementary stories, aside from the android hit list. Rick Deckard is the main character. We follow him as he kills androids, negotiates his relationship with his wife, deals with pressure to earn more money, questions the value of increasing the apparent humanity of androids, tries to keep up with the jones’ through wanting a real animal or at least a more impressive fake one to care for, and begins to sympathize with the androids. That’s only the main character. I haven’t even mentioned John R. Isidore and the possible fraud that is Mercerism and humanity’s attempts to grapple with the meaning of empathy. Therefore, while Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? could be viewed as a hired android assassin going down his hit list, it would be a gross over simplification. Nevertheless the book doesn’t feel scattered and is a cohesive narrative that tackles immense questions like, “What is the nature of humanity?”  “Does the realness of religion even matter?” etc. I hope to emulate the complexity of Philip K Dick in my future novels.

Starship Troopers

By Robert A. Heinlein

            Finally, around Christmas time, during winter break, I read this book. It is a war narrative, which gradually increases in complexity, while immersing the reader more and more fully in its world along with the main character. What’s remarkable about this novel, turned purportedly horrible movie (I haven’t watched it), is how it covers the passage of time. It can make the first week of training last multiple chapters, and then cover the main character’s moving up from regular infantryman to corporal in a sentence or two without jarring the reader. It’s as though Heinlein skips his readers over the lake of the main character’s life, plunging into the depths to touch the bottom every once in a while, and still has enough momentum to break through to the surface and continue skipping across. All of this to say, that Heinlein deals with the passage of time in his novel incredibly well.

            Commentators have said that this book isn’t very plot driven, though it does cover a lot of time, and instead is focused on ideas (1). I think that the way Heinlein is able to cover large expanses of time so nonchalantly is a big part of that. It's easier to dive into ideas, when time is at the control of your fingertips. 

Let me know what books you’re reading in the comments below!

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Sources: 

Image Credit: "Hubble Spies a UFO" by NASA Goddard Space Flight Center 

Book covers: Belong to the people who made them. I don't own them. 

(1) Booker, M. Keith; Thomas, Anne-Marie (2009). The Science Fiction Handbook. Singapore: John Wiley & Sons. ISBN 9781405162067.