# I need the BEST non-depressing sci-fi **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [November 7, 2008, 1:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-need-the-best-non-depressing-sci-fi/471574 "2008-11-07T01:34:02Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Baldwin](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/baldwin/32/7264_2.png) [@Baldwin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Baldwin)\ **Post date:** [November 8, 2008, 4:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-need-the-best-non-depressing-sci-fi/471574/41 "2008-11-08T16:14:34Z")
I think a lot Clifford Simak’s books might be good choices. ---
**Author:** ![Speaker\_for\_the\_Dead](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/c77e96/32.png) [@Speaker\_for\_the\_Dead](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Speaker_for_the_Dead)\ **Post date:** [November 8, 2008, 4:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-need-the-best-non-depressing-sci-fi/471574/42 "2008-11-08T16:20:54Z")
> [@aruvqan](#): > > Well, how about the Fuzzy series, or ho ho hokas, or to arm bears … hazy on the authors, Im at work and cant really surf around I came in to recommend the Fuzzy Trilogy. The first books is _Little Fuzzy_. They’re by H. Beam Piper. ---
**Author:** ![rowrrbazzle](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rowrrbazzle/32/414_2.png) [@rowrrbazzle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/rowrrbazzle)\ **Post date:** [November 8, 2008, 8:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-need-the-best-non-depressing-sci-fi/471574/43 "2008-11-08T20:52:16Z")
As Cal said, Brown and Sheckley are good bets. Clarke’s “Tales From The White Hart”. Asimov did write some humorous stories. He also wrote a number of shaggy dog short-short stories (ending in horrible puns). I did find “Laughing Space”, a 520-page (!) anthology edited by Asimov. I’ve never seen it, and I’ve know only a couple of the stories from elsewhere, so YMMV. It’s not in print, so you’d have to get a used copy. [http://www.amazon.com/LAUGHING-SPACE-Isaac-Asimov/dp/0395305195](http://www.amazon.com/LAUGHING-SPACE-Isaac-Asimov/dp/0395305195) You can get 50s radio productions of sci-fi stories here [X Minus One - Single Episodes : Old Time Radio Researchers Group : Free Download, Borrow, and Streaming : Internet Archive](http://www.archive.org/details/OTRR_X_Minus_One_Singles). Most are dramatic, but I can verify “Early Model” (by Sheckley) is funny. “The Coffin Cure” is here and it’s also in the Asimov anthology. (The text is on Project Gutenberg, too, which is a bit surprising, because it seems too recent to be out of copyright.) ---
**Author:** ![phouka](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/c5a1d2/32.png) [@phouka](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/phouka)\ **Post date:** [November 8, 2008, 9:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-need-the-best-non-depressing-sci-fi/471574/44 "2008-11-08T21:19:22Z")
Yet another person recommending Connie Willis’ _To Say Nothing of the Dog_. It’s not just that it’s funny and lighthearted, it’s sweethearted and romantic without being cloying. It’s uplifting. Maybe even life-affirming. It deals well with the idea of time travel and the idea of paradox. The characters, even the disagreeable ones, are sympathetic. And my favorite part, other than the romance? The story is set about 2050, I think, and at that time, domesticated cats are extinct and have been so for at least a generation. The laws of time travel dictate that a time traveler cannot bring anything back from the past or take anything from the present to the past. By the end of the story, the Oxford professor of time travel discovers that you _can_ bring forward something which has become irrelevant to the time stream - like, oh, kittens thrown in a pond to drown. The two main characters are given two to raise at the end of the story. I always finish that story with a silly, happy grin on my face. ---
**Author:** ![Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/left_hand_of_dorkness/32/7156_2.png) [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Left_Hand_of_Dorkness)\ **Post date:** [November 8, 2008, 10:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-need-the-best-non-depressing-sci-fi/471574/45 "2008-11-08T22:14:26Z")
What about John Scalzi’s [Old Man’s War](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Old_Man's_War)? It’s pretty entertaining and reasonably intelligent, if it’s not great literature. And I don’t recall any moment in which it was all that depressing. Also, there’s Kage Baker’s novels of the Company, starting with [In the Garden of Iden](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/In_The_Garden_of_Iden). They’re a little depressing in places, but mostly they’re satires. Daniel ---
**Author:** ![Zsofia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/7bcc69/32.png) [@Zsofia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zsofia)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2008, 1:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-need-the-best-non-depressing-sci-fi/471574/46 "2008-11-09T01:25:03Z")
I love _To Say Nothing of the Dog_, but when I read it I regretted throughout that I hadn’t read her earlier time travel novels that kind of “set out the rules” more completely. (And there is no way in hell I can send him _The Doomsday Book_. Obviously.) I mean, not everybody’s like me - I always feel robbed if I read things “out of order”, even if there isn’t a real order. ---
**Author:** ![Just\_Some\_Guy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/ad7895/32.png) [@Just\_Some\_Guy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Just_Some_Guy)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2008, 1:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-need-the-best-non-depressing-sci-fi/471574/47 "2008-11-09T01:48:48Z")
> [@Zsofia](#): > > I love _To Say Nothing of the Dog_, but when I read it I regretted throughout that I hadn’t read her earlier time travel novels that kind of “set out the rules” more completely. (And there is no way in hell I can send him _The Doomsday Book_. Obviously.) I mean, not everybody’s like me - I always feel robbed if I read things “out of order”, even if there isn’t a real order. I don’t know; I had no hesitation in giving _To Say Nothing of the Dog_ to my mother who had read none of the previous stories. The only important information for _To Say Nothing of the Dog_ is that Willis’s time travel is done as university projects through Oxford and that it shifts the destination a bit if the traveler would create a paradox. It’s true that knowing the reoccurring characters gives it a bit more depth, but the story vital exposition is all there. ---
**Author:** ![Andy\_L](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/c67d28/32.png) [@Andy\_L](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Andy_L)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2008, 11:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-need-the-best-non-depressing-sci-fi/471574/48 "2008-11-09T23:50:30Z")
> [@Just\_Some\_Guy](#): > > I don’t know; I had no hesitation in giving _To Say Nothing of the Dog_ to my mother who had read none of the previous stories. The only important information for _To Say Nothing of the Dog_ is that Willis’s time travel is done as university projects through Oxford and that it shifts the destination a bit if the traveler would create a paradox. It’s true that knowing the reoccurring characters gives it a bit more depth, but the story vital exposition is all there. By the way, the next book in the Oxford time travel series should be out next year - Connie reported at Balticon in May 2008 that she had finished the initial draft, so I’ve been eagerly awaiting “All Clear” since then. ---
**Author:** ![Attack\_from\_the\_3rd\_dimension](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/b38774/32.png) [@Attack\_from\_the\_3rd\_dimension](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Attack_from_the_3rd_dimension)\ **Post date:** [November 10, 2008, 12:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-need-the-best-non-depressing-sci-fi/471574/49 "2008-11-10T00:29:43Z")
> [@Zsofia](#): > > I love _To Say Nothing of the Dog_, but when I read it I regretted throughout that I hadn’t read her earlier time travel novels that kind of “set out the rules” more completely. (And there is no way in hell I can send him _The Doomsday Book_. Obviously.) I mean, not everybody’s like me - I always feel robbed if I read things “out of order”, even if there isn’t a real order. I’ve never read this author. Can anyone recommend where to start? ---
**Author:** ![Eleanor\_of\_Aquitaine](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/a88e4f/32.png) [@Eleanor\_of\_Aquitaine](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eleanor_of_Aquitaine)\ **Post date:** [November 10, 2008, 3:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-need-the-best-non-depressing-sci-fi/471574/50 "2008-11-10T15:26:35Z")
> [@Attack\_from\_the\_3rd\_dimension](#): > > I’ve never read this author. Can anyone recommend where to start? She’s most famous for her short stories and novellas, as **Just Some Guy** pointed out. _The Winds of Marble Arch_ is a great new collection of her best stories, but it’s an expensive hardback. There are other collections you can get in paperback. _Doomsday Book_ comes first in her time travel series, but it is a very serious book (about the Black Plague) where _To Say Nothing of the Dog_ is a comedy. I think they both work well as a standalone novel. Her other novels are all standalone - \*Bellwether \*is one of my favorites. I did not like the couple of books she wrote with Cynthia Felice. I’m really glad to hear she has a new novel coming out soon. ---
**Author:** ![Zsofia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/7bcc69/32.png) [@Zsofia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zsofia)\ **Post date:** [November 10, 2008, 3:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-need-the-best-non-depressing-sci-fi/471574/51 "2008-11-10T15:53:24Z")
> [@Attack\_from\_the\_3rd\_dimension](#): > > I’ve never read this author. Can anyone recommend where to start? Depends on what you’re looking for. Her short stories are awesome, but her novels are fantastic, too - the thing is, they’re all very different. I’d suggest either _To Say Nothing of the Dog_ (Victorian time-travel, very funny, riffs on _Three Men in a Boat_) or _The Doomsday Book_ (medieval time travel, heartbreaking and amazing). I’ve read _To Say Nothing of the Dog_ characterized as the first Hugo winner that was funny _on purpose_, if you know what I mean. Or just pick up a collection of her short stories; I believe “The Last of the Winnebagoes” is a famous one. ---
**Author:** ![chorpler](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chorpler/32/2888_2.png) [@chorpler](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/chorpler)\ **Post date:** [November 10, 2008, 4:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-need-the-best-non-depressing-sci-fi/471574/52 "2008-11-10T16:02:03Z")
> [@Unauthorized\_Cinnamon](#): > > Now, this is not SF. I’m not really sure what to call it - hilarious fantasy religious horror? But [The Stupidest Angel](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Stupidest_Angel) will make you bust a gut laughing, and is likely to appeal to geeky types. Of course, a lot of the characters and situations in **The Stupidest Angel** are even better if you’ve read his previous novels. **The Stupidest Angel** is probably the closest thing to a sequel Christopher Moore had until he came out with an actual sequel to one of his earlier books last year. Maybe [**Lamb: The Gospel According to Biff, Christ’s Childhood Pal**](http://www.amazon.com/Lamb-Gospel-According-Christs-Childhood/dp/0380813815/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1226332792&sr=8-1) would be good for a depressed religious person. It’s lighthearted, and I don’t think it would be considered blasphemous. And it has a relatively happy ending! ---
**Author:** ![Zsofia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/7bcc69/32.png) [@Zsofia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zsofia)\ **Post date:** [November 10, 2008, 6:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-need-the-best-non-depressing-sci-fi/471574/53 "2008-11-10T18:13:25Z")
Well, unfortunately today I got the word that you can send him packages, but not books. (Somebody probably send _A Canticle for Leibowitz_ last year and made somebody hang themselves with their shoelaces.) I’m going to pick up a few and give them to him when he gets back, though. ---
**Author:** ![chorpler](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chorpler/32/2888_2.png) [@chorpler](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/chorpler)\ **Post date:** [November 10, 2008, 6:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-need-the-best-non-depressing-sci-fi/471574/54 "2008-11-10T18:38:01Z")
Send him a Kindle and tell them that it’s a calculator. 😉 ---
**Author:** ![GargoyleWB](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gargoylewb/32/199_2.png) [@GargoyleWB](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GargoyleWB)\ **Post date:** [November 10, 2008, 7:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-need-the-best-non-depressing-sci-fi/471574/55 "2008-11-10T19:05:35Z")
I’d vote for **John Varley**. He has a wonderful swashbuckling space-opera tone to his books, though with hard-scifi themes underlying them, that make them wonderful reads. ---
**Author:** ![wonky](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wonky/32/393_2.png) [@wonky](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wonky)\ **Post date:** [November 10, 2008, 7:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-need-the-best-non-depressing-sci-fi/471574/56 "2008-11-10T19:08:05Z")
How can people feel better if they’re cut off from reading (that is, if they’re readers)? That makes me very sad. ---
**Author:** ![pmwgreen](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/edb3f5/32.png) [@pmwgreen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pmwgreen)\ **Post date:** [November 10, 2008, 7:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-need-the-best-non-depressing-sci-fi/471574/57 "2008-11-10T19:52:54Z")
I’ve read the Demon Princes series by Jack Vance more times than I can count. ---
**Author:** ![levdrakon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/49beb7/32.png) [@levdrakon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/levdrakon)\ **Post date:** [November 10, 2008, 7:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-need-the-best-non-depressing-sci-fi/471574/58 "2008-11-10T19:57:08Z")
> [@jsgoddess](#): > > How can people feel better if they’re cut off from reading (that is, if they’re readers)? That makes me very sad. Well, there are times I’m up for the latest depressing holocaust prison camp black slavery massacre of Native Americans flick, and times I really just want happy. I don’t see why it would be different for reading. ---
**Author:** ![wonky](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wonky/32/393_2.png) [@wonky](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wonky)\ **Post date:** [November 10, 2008, 8:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-need-the-best-non-depressing-sci-fi/471574/59 "2008-11-10T20:30:03Z")
> [@levdrakon](#): > > Well, there are times I’m up for the latest depressing holocaust prison camp black slavery massacre of Native Americans flick, and times I really just want happy. I don’t see why it would be different for reading. I was responding to the news that books couldn’t be sent to the gentleman. ---
**Author:** ![levdrakon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/49beb7/32.png) [@levdrakon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/levdrakon)\ **Post date:** [November 10, 2008, 8:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-need-the-best-non-depressing-sci-fi/471574/60 "2008-11-10T20:33:49Z")
> [@jsgoddess](#): > > I was responding to the news that books couldn’t be sent to the gentleman. Oh, okay. Sorry. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-need-the-best-non-depressing-sci-fi/471574.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-need-the-best-non-depressing-sci-fi/471574.md?page=4)