Looking for fiction books, preferably steampunk.

EWom

I'm tired of all the fiction books I've been reading lately, mostly high fantasy, wizards and elves and shit, or ye old oldertons of oldery, or futuristic lazorbeampewpew crap. And thought I'd like to give steampunk/dieselpunk fiction a try, but.. don't really know where to start.

So if anyone has any suggestions that'd be nice, or if you've read a particularly good book lately that isn't steampunk, but preferably not of the 3 types I described above, I'd like to hear/read about it also.

A brief description, of any suggested book would be highly appreciated, though if you don't feel up to it, then fuck it, don't describe it.

Thanks!

EliteLamer

Does manga count?

EWom

I've never really been into it, but I've also never really tried it out. So I guess I could give it a whirl.

EliteLamer

I thought Last Exile might have had a manga.. Looks like it only is in anime..

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SUjiXriGFbo

Echo

China Miéville - Perdido Street Station. Magic is just another field of science. The Punishment Factories turn condemned prisoners into Remade beings with pneumatic limbs and a steam boiler on their back. Nobody uses Torque energy any longer after the explosion that created the wasteland called the Cacotropic Stain. A picture is shown of a creature from the Stain, suspected to be the offspring of a train engine that went native and started breeding.

Are you still here? Go read it, damnit.

Next: Alastair Reynolds - Terminal World.

Spearpoint, the last human city, is an atmosphere-piercing spire of vast size. Clinging to its skin are the zones, a series of semi-autonomous city-states, each of which enjoys a different - and rigidly enforced - level of technology. Horsetown is pre-industrial; in Neon Heights they have television and electric trains...

Following an infiltration mission gone wrong, Quillon has been living incognito, working as a pathologist in the district morgue. But when a near-dead angel drops onto his dissecting table, Quillon's world is wrenched apart one more time, for the angel is a winged posthuman from Spearpoint's Celestial Levels - and with the dying body comes bad news.

If Quillon is to save his life, he must leave his home and journey into the cold and hostile lands beyond Spearpoint's base, starting as an exile that will take him further than he could ever have imagined. But there is far more at stake than just Quillon's own survival, for the limiting technologies of the zones are determined not by governments or police, but by the very nature of reality - and reality itself is showing worrying signs of instability...

Skullboys, Swarm and carnivorgs, oh my.

Grey_Area

William Gibson and Bruce Sterling - The Difference Engine

Adda

China Miéville's New Crobuzon stuff as noted above, really is awesome and you should do yourself the favour of going to read them now!

tynic

Stephen Hunt has done some steampunk stuff, though it's nowhere near as good as Mieville (but what is?)

EWom

Thanks for the suggestions I'll look into them.

Wassermelone

You really are not going to find much better than Mieville.

Hes probably the best world builder out there... fantasy or sci fi. Hes good to the point of being just fantastic literature. Now if you want some stuff thats more straight pulp steampunk:

Cherie Priest's Boneshaker

Jay Lake's Mainspring

Echo

Wassermelone wrote: »

Cherie Priest's Boneshaker

Oh, that caught my eye when it was mentioned by Warren Ellis. Need to check that out.

see317

Echo wrote: »

Wassermelone wrote: »

Cherie Priest's Boneshaker

Oh, that caught my eye when it was mentioned by Warren Ellis. Need to check that out.

It's an enjoyable read. Picked it up on a whim last time I went to the book store.

The Deepgate Codex is also enjoyable. May be a bit too Fantasy for what the OP is looking for though.