Sci-Fi Novels for a Teenager?

BloodySloth

So, my 15 year old sister has asked for books for Christmas. When I asked her what kind, she said she likes science fiction. I have no idea what to look for. As far as books go, the only things I know she has read and enjoyed are The Hunger Games and the Flight series of comics which I have given her a few of over the years. I know that, as far as TV goes, she was a big fan of Star Trek: TNG, Supernatural (up until the more recent seasons), The Walking Dead, and Doctor Who.

So, I come to H/A for help. Any suggestions for good sci-fi books? Essentially, what are the kids reading nowadays?

Echo

Though Orson Scott Card is a tool, Ender's Game might be a good start.

John Scalzi's Old Man's War is pretty good, and has a YA sorta-sequel in Zoe's Tale.

Mike Danger

Isn't The Giver sort of similar to The Hunger Games? (I have not read either.)

7th Sigma was a pretty rad YA SF novel, with tinges of that Hunger Games/Walking Dead fending-for-yourself type of thing. If she likes Firefly, it's even more of a lock.

Bethryn

I have no idea what's hot these days, but I know that at 15 you start to appreciate a little more depth; a lot of people I know started reading authors like Douglas Adams, Iain M Banks and Isaac Asimov more seriously at that age.

iMatt

And although not 'space ship' sci fi - both of the Jurrasic Park books are amazing. I would class them as sci-fi due to their DNA, cloning, future tech angles.

DevoutlyApathetic

Echo wrote: »

Though Orson Scott Card is a tool, Ender's Game might be a good start.

John Scalzi's Old Man's War is pretty good, and has a YA sorta-sequel in Zoe's Tale.

Say what you like about crazy Mormon author but his short story collection Maps in a Mirror is still pretty bad ass. It does have stories that you probably wouldn't pick for a 15 year old but I've found that usually just means they'll like them even more.

saint2e

Was gonna come in here to recommend the Ender's Quartet, and to a lesser extent, the Bean series of books, too.

Zombies are big these days too so "World War Z" and "Zombie Survival Guide" are always good picks.

Kelor

I basically raided my Dad's old sci-fi collection while growing up. Here's some of that along with some more recent work

• A Canticle for Leibowitz - Walter Miller (An order of monks attempt to preserve mankind's knowledge in a post-apocalyptic world till they are ready for it.)
• Wool Omnibus - Hugh Howey (Post apocalyptic survival series, told by various people in an underground bunker. Cheaper as an ebook, but there's a collected works in paper)
• I, Robot - Isaac Asimov (Probably the best entry point to Asimov, she can get into either the Elijah Bailey or Foundation series if she enjoys this)
• Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy - Douglas Adams (Pretty much timeless. Arthur Dent narrowly escapes the destruction of Earth after it is cleared for a intergalactic highway. Excellent humour.)
• Ender's Game - Scott Orson Card (Particularly with the movie coming out next year, you can't really go wrong with this. Follows a child genius who is recruited to attend a space school that develops and trains children to become future commanders of mankind's military forces.)
• The Practice Effect - David Brin (Scientist is transported in an experiment to a world where objects become better with use, rather than degrade. Technology is almost non-existent, as devices simply improve with age.)
• The Postman - David Brin - (Follows a traveler who wanders a United States ravaged by warfare, scientifically developed plagues and militia groups.)
• Sphere - Michael Crichton (A group of scientists are sent into the ocean to investigate new possible life forms)
• Snowcrash - Neil Stephensen (A computer hacker who delivers pizza by night in a world where the US has been carved up by corporations investigates a digital narcotic)
• Starship Troopers - Robert Heinlein (Tells the story of life, training and warfare in the future from the point of view of a soldier)
• Dune - Frank Herbert (A fantastic universe set tens of thousands of years into the future. Mankind exists in a futuristic feudal system, where Houses war against each other through intrigue, politicking and conventional warfare)
• The Stars, My Destination - Alfred Bester (Essentially the Count of Monte Cristo in space, an aimless, unmotivated man is marooned in space for months. He resigns himself to death until a passing spaceship deliberately passes him by. Thus motivated he embarks on a relentless campaign of revenge upon the people who left him to die)
• Red Mars - Kim Stanley Robinson (Jumps between American and Russian scientists in the colonisation of Mars. Deals with the ramifications of overpopulation, global warming and large corporate conglomerates affecting Earth as they attempt to terraform Mars.
• Weapons of Choice - John Birmingham (A small naval UN task force sent to quell an religious uprising in Indonesia decades into the future is thrown back in time to World War by a science vessel it is escorting. They land in the middle of the US fleet bound for Midway and accidentally wipe out a substantial portion of it. Deals heavily with the social issues of having the world's population of the 1940s clash with a group for whom blacks, women and gays all enjoy equal rights. Along with throwing the war into chaos as Germany finds out the results of how the war ended in the original time line, the USSR and the Cold War and immediate rush as the world attempts to get it's hands on the information and technology of the future.)

Hope that helpls!

RadicalTurnip

Yeah, I would second the idea that at 15, you can pretty much read any books. Besides Enders Game and Speaker for the Dead by Card, I also have a few other recommendations:

A Fire Upon the Deep by Vernor Vinge is excellent, and there are a few other books in that series as well (if she likes it). If she's still reading Hunger Games and the like, this may be too hard for her to follow

Hyperion and its sequels by Dan Simmons

Retaba

The Lost Fleet is a Science Fiction book about fleet battles. It was pretty good, I'd suggest reading the wiki a bit to see if it is something your sister would like though. Also, there are a ton of Star Trek books out, you could ask one of the Star Trek threads about the good ones, I heard there was a book about Garak from Deep Space 9 that I've been interested in reading.


Also, the Destroyermen series is about some WW2 ships being transported to an alternate earth with no humans but other species. I saw someone suggest Weapons of Choice so I'm gonna throw this one in here too. A bit less science fiction though.

Also while set in a science fiction universe, The Dragonriders of Pern was a series I was reading about that age and it is good. But it is more fantasy/Science Fiction.

illirica

How about David Weber's Honor Harrington series? They're a pretty good read, enough depth to be interesting but not so much as to be overwhelming, especially early on. Lots of strong female characters, which is usually pretty important to a 15-year-old girl.

Also, Margaret Weis' Star of the Guardians series. This was about my favorite thing ever when I was a 15-year-old girl. Skip Ghost Legion, though, the work was way better off as a trilogy.

Namrok

I want to give Ian M Banks another bump. I started reading him around that age, and it completely opened me up to a whole other range of science fiction. As a teenager the sheer thrill of reading about an all powerful super science fiction society was enormous. And as I got older I still return to those novels to appreciate the subtleties of the moral implications various technologies have on the world, at least as the author sees it.

Bowen

Anything by Sir Arthur C. Clarke too.

2001: A Space Odyssey
Childhood's End
Rendezvous with Rama

They're good sci-fi books. But may be ... uninteresting if you'd rather read something like Hunger Games.

Captain Marcus

The Ear, the Eye, and the Arm by Nancy Farmer was my favorite science fiction book as a teenager. It's an adventure story set in a futuristic Zimbabwe.
Her other book The House of the Scorpion deals with cloning. They're good, but they're not "hard" science fiction like Ender's Game or Ian M. Banks.

see317

David Weber's Path of the Fury is an entertaining book. Looks like it has a sequel (In Fury Born) available as well.
My sister enjoyed the Dragon Riders of PERN books at that age. Maybe look into the Harper Hall trilogy as a start point. It's not space ship and laser sci-fi, but it's still pretty entertaining.

Another vote for Vernor Vinge's books. A Fire Upon the Deep is a great read.
If Fantasy is on the table, then I'd suggest the Magic Kingdom of Landover series. The first five books are available in two omnibuses and is an entertaining read.
Maybe the Tremaire books, Napoleonic wars fought with dragons. It's also got an omnibus with the first three books.

schuss

Snow Crash
Neuromancer
Enders series
Anything Heinlein
I'd actually say Vonnegut is good sci fi

The classics
Fahrenheit 451
Dune
etc.

Usagi

Basically everything that Kelor said, or just get her a boxed set of Asimov with the Foundation and/or Robot novels and let her go to town

Frank Herbert also did another sci-fi series that starts with Destination: Void, it can be hard to find in print but if she has a kindle I think they're all available that way

If a bit of fantasy is on the table, look into Marion Zimmer Bradley's Darkover books, especially the older ones they've put out in omnibuses. I loooooved those when I was a teenager, and heck I still reread them from time to time.

DevoutlyApathetic

Kelor wrote: »

Snowcrash - Neil Stephensen (A computer hacker who delivers pizza by night in a world where the US has been carved up by corporations investigates a digital narcotic)

Continuing with my "Yes, but..." posts, I think the Diamond Age might be a better fit. Snow Crash goes rocketing off into Sumerian mythology at a point which kills it for some people. Diamond Age has no such crazy digression and he protagonist is a young girl who ages into a young woman over the course of the book. It also features nanotech rather than internet as the snazzy new tech which is actually "science fiction" to current young people. The metaverse is like some weird alternate internet prediction now.

TychoCelchuuu

Why we made it ~20 posts in with only one recommendation for Neuromancer is completely beyond me. Neuromancer Neuromancer Neuromancer Neuromancer.

Quoth

Couple of other ideas that people haven't mentioned:

Ringworld by Larry Niven
The Handmaid's Tale by Margaret Atwood (dystopia)
A Princess of Mars by Edgar Rice Burroughs
Fool's Run by Patricia McKillip (fantastic)
Fools by Pat Cadigan (cyberpunk)
A Season of Passage by Christopher Pike (horror)
The Illustrated Man by Ray Bradbury (short stories)
Lord Valentine's Castle by Robert Silverburg (fantastic)

And this one is Not Good but I remember loving it as a teen... Aliens vs. Predator: Prey by Steve and Stephani Perry

CelestialBadger

The Miles Vorkosigan books by Lois Bujold
Watchmen by Alan Moore
Parable of the Sower by Octavia Butler

Quoth

To double up on previous recommendations, I'd agree with Darkover, the Pern books, and Hitchhiker's Guide

Oh, and if you can find it, she might like Deep Secret by Diana Wynne Jones, which is more fantasy but takes place at a con and involves alternate realities

zepherin

I see many books on this list that are over 10 years old. That makes me a sad panda. I mean I loved those books William Gibson especially, but I think that I need to find some more up to date sci fi. What do we have that is excellent and less than 5 years old.

Quoth

Sorry for being an OLD PERSON

Maybe check these out? http://www.wired.com/underwire/2012/06/sci-fi-fantasy-books-summer-2012/

Librarian

"The Gone-Away World" is fairly new and fun. I enjoyed that book a lot and would have loved it even more at age 15 I am sure.

zepherin

Quoth wrote: »

Sorry for being an OLD PERSON

Maybe check these out? http://www.wired.com/underwire/2012/06/sci-fi-fantasy-books-summer-2012/

I'm an old person too, I didn't mean any offense by it. I'm just saying that some sci fi, while good for it's time isn't as much fun when you pass most of the the tech that made it sci fi, or showed the tech as infeasible.

Although after looking at that list, Red Shirts looks like I could really get into it. Time to get the audio book. Go amazon go.

TychoCelchuuu

I stopped reading a lot a few years ago so yes my suggestions are dated, but if you want newer stuff, M. John Harrison, Iain M. Banks, China Miéville, and Lauren Beukes are at least a good starting point. And hey, Gibson has written books lately. They're not technically sci-fi so much as they are techno-thrillers, but they're as good as anything he's ever written.

edit: also Jonathan Lethem.

see317

If Steampunk is workable, maybe check out the Clockwork Century by Cherie Priest? It's got zombies, airships, general steampunky goodness set against the backdrop of the civil war. Pretty entertaining reads.

Quoth

I wasn't offended, just joking. I would actually say nay to China Mieville, that stuff is seriously dark and wall of text and very unlike the things she seems to like based on the OP.

Quoth

I have been told that Cinder by Marissa Meyer is good

E: and Divergent by Veronica Roth

E2: Under the Never Sky by Veronica Rossi

TychoCelchuuu

Quoth wrote: »

I wasn't offended, just joking. I would actually say nay to China Mieville, that stuff is seriously dark and wall of text and very unlike the things she seems to like based on the OP.

"Let's keep the complex books away from the teenagers because the shit they've been fed their whole life isn't complex" is a horrible strategy that would have crippled me as a child. Everyone reads silly little books as a kid. If nobody ever encourages them to move past that, they grow up into the kind of person who say The DaVinci Code is their favorite book. 15 year olds can handle lots of words in a book. As for worries about "dark," presumably The Walking Dead is pretty dark, yes? I haven't seen it but that's what I hear.

Kwoaru

I like Alistair Reynolds books

Revelation space is a good jumping off point, Galactic North was a fun collection of shortish stories

Pretty much anything by him really. They are all set in the same universe and they all have a macro-level sci fi feel to them even though they are not all directly connected (except the Revelation Space trilogy)

Quoth

Let me rephrase that: I do not like Mieville's books, I think they are purple prose with mean, petty and unpleasant characters who generally meet bitter ends after a whole lot of nothing happens. It's not about keeping complex or challenging books away from teenagers; I think enough of the other recommendations have been adequately challenging, and are much better written and not grimdark. The OP can do as he likes, of course.

Quoth

Oh, skirting the edge of new, but Three Days to Never by Tim Powers is pretty awesome.

BloodySloth

I think the themes of Mieville would be fine, but I dunno if she would dig such an unnecessarily convoluted writing style (at least from what I've seen; I've only read Kraken, which I did actually enjoy despite what I say). I really wanna stay away from YA trash like Perry, but I also kind of wanted to stay away from super serious, dry world building like Dune. I think she ended up reading Ender's Game and The Giver for school. I don't know if she followed up with any of the rest of the Ender/Bean novels, so I may look into that.

I'm investigating all these suggestions you guys have given now. Thanks for the huge amount of input!

November Fifth

A lot of these suggestions are a bit hard/mil-sf for a new reader to the genre.

Pern might be the safest choice here, or maybe World War Z.

There are quite a few Dr. Who novelizations, although I can't speak to their quality.

A more recent suggestion might be Feed by Mira Grant, which was a Hugo nominee in 2011.

WonderMink

Philip K Dick is a classic writer that is missing here. Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? Was made into the Blade Runner film. Definitely scifi im the classic sense, instead of space opera.

CelestialBadger

November Fifth wrote: »

There are quite a few Dr. Who novelizations, although I can't speak to their quality.

They are targeted at younger children, not 15-year-olds, so she'd probably find them a little childish.

Quoth

I've also been told she might like the Mortal Instruments series by Cassandra Clare

Mike Danger

Quoth wrote: »

Oh, skirting the edge of new, but Three Days to Never by Tim Powers is pretty awesome.

I'd strike Three Days to Never (which is probably my least favorite of Powers's novels that I have read) and replace it with On Stranger Tides, which is Pirates of the Caribbean (Disney paid him a truckload of money for the rights so they could do an incredibly loose adaptation for POTC4) but much, much better.

enlightenedbum

While I still really like Ender's Game and Ender's Shadow and think the last three of the Ender Quartet are interesting:

1) I HATED the last three at that age. They're considerably more dull and focused on metaphysics
2) Do not, under any circumstances, buy them. Fuck Orson Scott Card. If you can borrow them from a library or a friend, fine.

Otherwise, stuff in the thread is good. I particularly recommend Asimov (Robot stuff, Elijah Bailey, the original Foundation trilogy) and Hitchhiker. One issue with Asimov is that outside of the last few robot short stories, women basically do not exist. So if your sister likes The Hunger Games in particular because there's a girl as the main character and she identifies with Katniss super hard, she might be a little less into those.