Science Fiction Books > 5 GBP to 9 GBP Science Fiction Books

The Foundation series continues brilliantly

Advantages: Its one of the greatest science fiction book ever written
Disadvantages: None

Foundation and Empire is my favourite of Asimovs foundation series, it continues on from Foundation and at the start of the novel Terminus has established itself as the central light in its particular area of the universe. Terminus is a stable government with an edge over its near competitors due in part to a lack of resources on the planet which forces innovation and technological advance. Foundation has been watching the slow decline of the galactic ...
...historian who has arrived at Foundation in his bid to find the original home planet of man. The historian has travelled for the first time and has learnt everything from a book, this is used as a show of decline of the empire and an example of stagnation and laziness. Eventually the empire starts to notice the upstart young civilisation and inevitably starts a war led by a brilliant general called Ben Roise who at the start of the encounters wins ...

alderman55 03.07.2009 · Read Full Review
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Review of Foundation And Empire - Isaac Asimov

Shame It Ended Here

Advantages: Funny and witty novel from the late Douglas Adams
Disadvantages: Doesn't live up to expectations, seems incomplete

Douglas Adams' Hitch-Hiker's Guide 'trilogy' entertained and inspired me, and I was wary to read this final instalment due to reviews on the internet which suggested it was of poor quality and may hunder my enjoyment of the series. The fifth and final book chronicling the experiences of Arthur Dent and his less human comrades does seem much less original and enjoyable than the previous books, and although this was my opinion of the fourth book "So ...
...the way that book's style was taken in a different direction. This book seems to be a mix between the fast-paced comedy adventures of the first three books and the reflective, stationary nature of the fourth, and it doesn't fit together too well. "Mostly Harmless," once again taking the title from a memorable concept in the first book, occurs an unspecified several years after the events of the last book and sees the "thirty-ish, tall and never quite ...

gunmenoftheapocalypse 10.12.2003 · Read Full Review
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Review of Mostly Harmless - Douglas Adams

With a Bang and a Clunk (Polity Agent - Neal Asher)

Advantages: decent world, good technology, lots of action
Disadvantages: Boring: too much technology, too many battles, not enough social background

...fourth book set in the Polity and it features Agent Cormac and some other characters known from previous instalments. It's not part of a saga, though, and it's perfectly readable as a stand alone, as enough explanation (in fact, perhaps even bit too much, as it often is the case with s-f books) is provided. Jain nodes, a lethal nanotechnology designed to destroy civilisations is rearing its ugly head again in the Polity. Who is distributing the ...
...questions and possibly save the Polity from destruction. Meanwhile, a haiman (a human highly augmented with AI) Orlandine engages in a careful research on the Jain node she has in her possession - will she manage to control and harness its power or will it subsume and destroy her? Even from this brief plot teaser you can see that with Polity Agent we are firmly in the realm of high-tech space opera: interstellar travel through U-space, anti-gravity ...

magdadh 22.04.2009 · Read Full Review
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Review of Polity Agent - Neal Asher

After The God Squads

Advantages: convincing world-building, complex plot and thought-provoking ideas
Disadvantages: flat characters

The world post Faith Wars (or Oil Wars, as the fundamentalists are inclined to call them) is both very different and, at the same time - as it should be in relatively close-future s-f - uncannily similar to ours. It's a world of the Second Enlightenment, where, at least in Europe, religion has been truly separated from politics and became a genuinely private and societaly marginalised activity. Terrorism is history and the global warming has been ...
...of churchgoer-bashing God Squads in the aftermath of the Faith wars. But it's all about to change when a priest and then a bishop are killed in what hints at a return of fundamentalist violence. But is it really? Soon the godless join the religious on the list of targets and the plot thickens, connecting Scottish clubs, an Australian creationist theme park and outer space, with new Gnostics, cyber-veterans and Christian fundamentalists figuring prominently. ...

magdadh 28.05.2009 · Read Full Review
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Review of The Night Sessions - Ken MacLeod

It's Brighton, but not as we know it...

Advantages: Completely and utterly bonkers!
Disadvantages: None!

...name is. Luckily for him, The Lad Himself, the Perfect Master, the Magus, the amazing Mr Hugo Rune has taken pity on his plight, plucked him from the veritable jaws of death and given him the chance to embark on what may prove to be the greatest adventure of his life! Or is it? Can he fully trust Mr Rune? A man who, every time he goes to a restaurant, seems to find a suspiciously similar-looking rat bone and thus avoid paying for the meal? A man ...
...12 mysterious symbols etched into the very fabric of Brighton itself, the Brighton Zodiac, featuring the Hangleton Hound and the Bevendean Bat. And why is there a thriving community of pirates living in Brighton? And why is the statue of Queen Victoria crying tears of Earl Grey tea? And what the heck is a Chronovision anyway? ***My ramblings *** All the usual mad-cap antics that I have come to expect from the master of surrealist-anarchic-comedy-sci-fi-far-fetched-fantasy-fiction ...

katgirl 26.10.2005 · Read Full Review
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Review of The Brightonomicon - Robert Rankin