**Iain M Banks **would get my recommendation for an intro to sci fi.
Consider Phlebas and **The Use of Weapons ** are probably the best to start with, the later books tend to require having read the earlier ones to get an understanding of his universe.
Since plenty of you are contributing to this thread.
Yesterday, In the Courts of the Crimson Kings, the latest by S M Stirling, appeared on my front porch. (Not a surprise–it was an Amazon pre-order.) I started reading immediately but decided to slow down. Because I don’t want to finish it too soon.
Get your hands on a copy immediately! I’ve not supplied any links, in hopes you will remain unspoiled. (Especially for the first chapter.)
Definitely worth its own thread–later…
(Returning now to the thread topic. Lots of good recommendations!)
I saw this thread and immediately knew what I wanted to post. The anthology Adventures in Time and Space. It’s so packed with great Science Fiction from the “Golden Age” of SF that the very fist reply, by CalMeacham mentioned it. Just about every story and/or author in this anthology was instrumental in shaping SF for years.
In fact I was thinking one of these days I should start a thread dedicated to this anthology.
**A Treasury of Great Science Fiction ** is also a tremendous collection. It’s a 2-volume set edited by Boucher. If I recall, it’s got Bester’s The Stars My Destination; Re-Birth; and an expanded version of *The Weapon Shop * (a shorter version is in Adventures…)
Agree completely. Brunner deserves to be better known.
I don’t think Robert Silveberg has been mentioned yet. I don’t like everything by him, but his Dying Inside is an underrated classic.
There’s also Keith Richards’ alternate history novel, Pavanne and Michael Moorcock Dancers at the End of Time books.
I mentioned Boucher’s anthology in my post above, too. It used to be EASILY available, because it was given away as a premium by the Science Fiction Book Club for many years, but it seems to be hard to come by now. On the other hand, I see adventures in Time and Space at used bookstores still.
It intrigues me that Adventures contains so many stories that formed the basis of science fiction films of the fifties – The Thing, The Day the Earth Stood Still and The Twonky were based on items in here. Also, Raymond F. Jones’ story i it is first cousin to the Alien Machine, which was the first part of what became This Island Earth
For Heinlein, the collection originally issued as The Past Through Tomorrow has the future history series in one place. Old, but very important, and good reading.
I much prefer Adventures in Time and Space to the Boucher collection - though The Stars My Destination is a must.
I disagree that Hal Clement was the first hard sf writer - Uncle Hugo thought he was doing that. He was the first good hard sf writer.
Not only avoid the sequels to Rama, but if you see anything with the name Gentry Lee on it, back slowly away and do not return without HazMat equipment. Cradle is even worse than the Rama books, and is, I think, even worse than Pel Torro. It doesn’t have the advantage of being bad enough to be funny, it is just bad.
My only real addition to the list is Theodore Sturgeon- he’s more “Social Fiction with a Science MacGuffin” than he is “Real Science Fiction” (though, he does have some hard SF), but he’s phenomenal. More Than Human is one of the finest books I’ve read, and his short story “A Saucer of Loneliness” is a classic.
Also, to Heinlein, one of my favorites was The Door Into Summer.
Despite the fact that many people seem to charge the man with sexism, it’s only bad in Stranger in a Strange Land, where all the women are interchangable geriatric-philes. In most other books, his women have more depth, personality, and capability than you’ll see in most books of the time or genre. They’re usually bit parts, if they’re not the main character, because everyone who’s not the main character tends to be a bit part, save Peewee form Have Spacesuit, Will Travel.
The “adoptive incest” theme in later works is always creepy, though.
It really is a shame that Lee just cannot write fiction. Or maybe it’s a shame that Lee thinks he can. Either way…the man was partially responsible for possibly the most amazing scientific television series ever produced, Cosmos. I have a huge amount of respect for that and for his engineering endeavors in the field of space exploration. But the man just cannot write fiction…
OOps. I meant Keith Roberts. You don’t always type what you want.
And a resounding “Yes” to Sturgeon.
There was plenty of hard SF before Hal Clement (who, as far as I know, never claimed to be first), and you’re overlooking the guy who really did make hard SF big – Jules Verne. there are errors in his work, but he researched his stuff very heavily, and a lot of it still stands up.
My favorite example – In Master of the World the aeronef, the heavier-than-air flying machine, is built of composites. No fudging, honest-to-god composites, which Verne rightly chose because of the combination of light weight and high tensile strength. They’ve only started using those in real flying machines in the last few decades, but Verne suggested it years before the Wright brothers got off the ground.
Of course, other things in that book don’t hold up. I srriously doubt that the Albatross could have lifted the fuel it needed for sustained flight. And the plot’s an unimaginative rip-off of his own 20,000 Leagues. But this prediction (and his errors) are typical of Verne’s work. He gets credit in my book for hard SF. Others davvled in that game – Poe, Hale, “Reade” – but Verne kept it up over a huge succession of books and topics.
There’s a Verne rebnaissance going on. In the past few years a lot of his books have been translated in their entirety – like the Mysterious Island (or even translated at all, like The Kip Brothers)-- for the first time. It’s a good time to get into Verne.
If you are mentioning Verne, then you should also mention H. G. Wells.
The Time Machine
The War of the Worlds
The Invisible Man
The First Men in the Moon
The Island of Dr Moreau.
Just so you know, co-workers looked at me funny when I giggled at this…
Red Thunder reads like an updated Rocket Ship Galileo, and I think it would bother me if Varley didn’t point out on the dedication page that the whole book is an homage to Heinlein. A good old-fashioned “college drop-outs and ex-alcoholic ex-NASA pilots go to Mars in a tin can” story. And The Golden Globe is a Double Star ripoff, but a good one. Have you tried Steel Beach? It’s more about that universe, from the point of view of the reporter in The Golden Globe.
Frederik Pohl is a luminary mostly as an editor- he’s written many novels but I only ever really enjoyed Gateway. I’d trust him as the editor of any short story compilation, though, and his own short stories are usually pretty good.
Another SF author worth trying is Ursula LeGuin, especially her spectacular The Left Hand of Darkness. No blazing rayguns, but wonderful speculation on what gender really means through looking at an androgynous society. That book won both the Hugo and the Nebula, and is a personal favorite of mine.
But I’ll supply a link – if you can’t put your hands on a hard copy right away, you can read the prologue and first six chapters online on Stirling’s website. (Scroll about midway down, to the “Lords of Creation” section.)
Most of my favorites have already been mentioned. So I’ll just add a few comments.
Larry Niven: The novel Ringworld is his most famous work, but his short stories are his favorite works, and mine, too. They seem to be re-issuing many of his short stories in new collections. I don’t know if he has added new stories, or just re-shuffled the deck. But they are still good reading.
Hal Clement: Mission of Gravity is his most famous work. I kind of like Needle, and its sequel, Through the Eye of a Needle.
Poul Anderson: I’ve read more of his fantasy books than his science fiction. *Three Hearts and Three Lions * is one of the classics of the fantasy genre. He created one of the great “alien races” in Fire Time.
Speaking of alien races, check out Barlowe’s Guide to Extra-Terrestrials, by Wayne Barlowe. He paints his interpretation of some of the classic science fiction ET’s, each accompanied by a brief description of the book it came from. You will probably find something you like in there.
For lighter reading, try Andre Norton. Most of her stuff is aimed at younger readers, but it is still fun. I grew up reading Heinlein and Norton.
This is a very popular notion here at SDMB, but I will have to chime in as part of the minority who did like, and even preferred the sequels.
I have to recommend 100 Science Fiction Short Short Stories. Delightful anthology of stories each less than two pages long (there’s an equally good Fantasy one too).
Knowing what non-SF books you have liked would probably help with a more catered recommendation…
When I was younger, I read a lot of Asimov. It’s probably somewhat dated, but he’s an easy read, especially his short stories.
Some of my favorites are The Man Who Folded Himself, Timefall, The Green Futures of Tycho, and Replay.
I really love Greg Egan’s stuff, especially Diaspora, but it’s very hard sci-fi, so that may or may not be to your taste. I guess it’s also not very popular since half of his stuff seems to be out of print 
I like the novelization of the Robotech series, it added a lot of depth and fixed a lot of the continuity problems.
As much as I hate L Ron Hubbard for his Scientology crap, and as much as I couldn’t past page 2 of Battlefield Earth, I did read his 10 book Mission Earth series and found it to be a very enjoyable sci-fi satire.
I would definitely, if you don’t mind humorous sci-fi, insist you read the Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy series! I would also check out his one non fiction book, Last Chance to See, which has similar absurd characters except they happen to be real people
The Memoirs of Elizabeth Frankenstein is an interesting feminist quasi-pagan take on the Frankenstein mythos.
Possibly more fantasy than sci-fi, but the books of Michael Ende are all wonderful, especially Momo and The Neverending Story.
The Ecstasy Club is an interesting genX novel with cyber themes by Douglas Rushkoff.
You might also want to check out some graphic novels. I recommend Watchmen, The Invisibles, Club Zero-G and Testament.
Michael Chrichton has some readable stuff, altho in later years it’s starting to get full of whatever his personal rant is at the time to the detriment of the writing. I also recommend his non fiction book Travels.
Fifth Sacred Thing is another thought provoking novel for the ecofeminist.
Tom Robbins books are excellent and quirky, perhaps similar to Douglas Adams, but perhaps not truly sci-fi.
Stephen King and Dean Koontz are more strictly horror, but some of their stuff has sci-fi elements. I would take a stab at the Dark Tower series.
Cory Doctorow is a great relatively recent author with some cool ideas.
William Sleator’s stuff is great if you don’t mind it being lumped in with ‘young adult’ books in some places.
I’ve heard Snow Crash is one of the must reads of the cyber genre. I read and enjoyed Vurt.
Creator is only loosely scifi but a great read that was made into a movie.
Philip K Dick stuff is great if you’re into that sort of thing (I am), but if you’re not into mind-bending psychedelic and cold war paranoia sci-fi then steer clear Try either Bladerunner (aka Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep, or one of his many short story collections.
The original novel that Contact was based on was also great.
A lot of Ray Bradbury’s stuff is sci-fi and a good easy read, tho some of it is a little dated. I would check out his short stories and the Martian Chronicles.
That’s all I can think of right now…
also, Enemy Mine which was also made into a movie…
I’ve read a lot of Verne. The first book I ever read bigger than a Dick and Jane reader was From the Earth to the Moon. But anyone who didn’t have the passengers in the cannon built by the Baltimore Gun Club smeared on the floor upon takeoff doesn’t hack it as a good hard sf writer in my book.
That’s part of a major dichotomy in sf. Verne scorned Wells for inventing cavorite to get to the moon, but at least it didn’t violate known physical laws quite so blatantly. Do you ignore physical laws or invent something to get around them. It’s the difference between ftl drive by just going faster and inventing warp drive, inertialess drive or infinite improbability drive. I tend to favor the latter solution.
ETA: I actually prefer Verne to Wells, have lots of the old Ace Fitzroy editions, and a few volumes from the late 19th century - pirated in the US. But he’s a hard sf writer in the same sense as some of the early Amazing writers.
Darn. I was going to ask what alternate universe Keith Richards wrote sf in.
It was probably the same alternate universe in which I condemned the sexism in Double Star, even though the book I was actually thinking of was The Door Into Summer.
As for anthologies, besides the classic ones already mentioned, if you can find ones edited by Groff Conklin in used book stores, get them. I have lots, and the stories are uniformly well chosen. They are from the '50s and '60s, so may be a bit hard to find these days.