Books

40 Science Fiction and Fantasy Books That Will Rock Your World In 2016

2015 was a fantastic year for books, including a lot of titles that did things we’d never seen before. But 2016 looks like it could be just as incredible, including titles from some of our favorite authors. Here are the must-read science fiction and fantasy books of 2016. Midnight Taxi Tango, Daniel Jose Older, January…

Cheeky Cartoonist Reveals the Secret Double Lives of Iconic Characters

We all know that there are archetypes in fiction that seem to pop up again and again. But sometimes, characters seem a little too similar to something else for it to be entirely coincidence. Thus, Alex Solis’ “Icons Unmasked” series, which shows us what lurks beneath. Below are a selection of favorites, but you can…

Can This Scratch-and-Sniff Book Turn You Into a Whiskey Aficionado?

While the clear intentions of vodka and gin were an easy sell for my cocktail glass, I admit it took me a little longer to dabble in the dark liquors. Mostly because I was confused. Was rye like bourbon? But what the hell was scotch? And apparently they’re all whiskey? If only I’d had this…

Raymond Chandler Mocked Science Fiction, But He Also Inspired It

Raymond Chandler was one of the greatest writers to come out of pulp fiction, but he also had some snobbish tendencies of his own. Notably, in a 1953 letter to his agent, he makes fun of science fiction for being kind of ridiculous. But Chandler also inspired tons of science-fiction writers. In the letter from…

A New Novel About a Pandemic of Spontaneous Human Combustion Is Becoming a Movie

At the movies, we’ve seen the world end almost every way imaginable: disease, zombies, meteors, natural disasters, and the list goes on. But author Joe Hill has a new one—and the idea is so hot, pun intended, that Hollywood scooped it up even before his book was published. The title of the book is The…

You Don’t Have to Be a Kid to Want All the New Star Wars Little Golden Books

Following up on the first series that condensed all of the original Star Wars movies into six illustrated children’s books, Random House Kids is releasing five new Star Wars Little Golden Books that now focus on the various characters from that universe. The new series of books includes I Am a Droid, I Am a…

All the Science Fiction and Fantasy Books Everyone Will Be Talking About in January

It’s a whole new year, and already the science fiction and fantasy publishers are hitting the ground running. There are tons of great new books in January, including China Miéville, Amber Benson, and Tim Powers! These are all the science fiction and fantasy books that should be on your radar this month. (Plus in addition…

Get some of last year’s best stories for just $1.99! The Best American Science Fiction and Fantasy 2015 is a Kindle Daily Deal today. Contact the author at [email protected] and follow her on Twitter @CharlieJane

Sorcerer of the Wildeeps Is an Epic Fantasy Unlike Anything You’ve Read Before

We’re living in an exciting era for fantasy literature, with a lot of really interesting approaches to magical worldbuilding. But I’ve still never read anything quite like Kai Ashante Wilson’s novella Sorcerer of the Wildeeps, which was part the first batch of Tor.com’s new line of short novels recently. [Full disclosure: Tor is also my…

Could a Society Develop Advanced Technology WithOUT Written Language?

It’s a fascinating question. Over at Charles Stross’ blog, he responds to a reader question: What would a technological society look like without written language? And could such a thing even happen? Stross’ answer: probably not. After a certain point, a lot of things that we think of as necessary for an advanced technological civilization…

Hermione Shoves Harry Aside: How I Learned To Subvert the “Chosen One” Trope

So I had this idea of Nazi artifact hunters crossed with a Harry Potter-type young hero who inherits one of those artifacts. At the time I was planning on writing a science fiction novel, but when I thought about it… Come on, how could I not write about magicians fighting Nazis? The trouble was that…

Game of Thrones Can’t Really Spoil George R.R. Martin’s Books

It’s now official: George R.R. Martin’s next book in the Song of Ice and Fire series, The Winds of Winter, won’t come out before the next season of Game of Thrones. That means we’re going to be living in a world where the TV show is continuing the story beyond where Martin himself has told…

Help the EFF Save the Future, by Reading Some Brand New Science Fiction!

The Electronic Frontier Foundation is out there fighting for civil liberties and privacy on the Internet and the digital world generally. And now, you can help support them—by reading a brand new science fiction book! The EFF just published a new book Pwning Tomorrow, featuring short fiction by Bruce Sterling, Rudy Rucker, Cory Doctorow, Annalee…

All the Backstory You Desperately Want to Know About The Force Awakens

If there’s one thing that rankles about The Force Awakens, it’s that a lot of its world-building is left to the array of tie-in media that launched with the movie on December 18th. It’s a bummer that there are so many questions left unanswered, but we’ve combed through all these books for all the most…

8 Parts of the Star Wars Expanded Universe That Should Have Stayed Canon

Now that we’ve seen Star Wars: The Force Awakens, we’ve also been seeing how a galaxy far, far away has changed from what had been put together by hundreds of authors over the last two decades. As we’ve learned a little more about the new world that exists post-RotJ, it’s clear that there’s more than…

Holy Crap, We Really Want to Play Some Quidditch Beer Pong

As fans who grew up with the Harry Potter books gets older, ways to enjoy their fandom get more adult. The latest example might be the best yet, a blending of Quidditch and beer pong. A site called unofficialquidditchpong.com has created the rules and also has the necessary materials for purchase. Unfortunately, as of press…

The Three Body Problem by Liu Cixin was one of our favorite books of the past few years. And apparently a lot of influential people agree—it’s being read by President Obama on his vacation. Contact the author at [email protected] and follow her on Twitter @CharlieJane

What Was The Most Tragic Disappointment of 2015?

This was a pretty good year for pop culture, but there were some terrible misfires along the way. Including some stuff that we’d all had high hopes for. But what was the biggest pop-culture letdown of the year for you? Please include a picture, poster, clip, book cover, comics panel or other illustration for your…

The Books About Artificial Intelligence That You MUST Read, According to Ex Machina‘s Alex Garland

Ex Machina remains a strong contender for the best science fiction film of 2015. It’s jam-packed with ideas along with all that psychosexual weirdness. And now at last, writer-director Alex Garland has unpacked where some of those ideas come from. In case you missed it, Ex Machina is a film where Poe Dameron invites General…

Biggest Book Trends: Print Is Back, and Everyone’s Reading Science Fiction

Rumors of the death of the print book were massively exaggerated, it turns out. According to the L.A. Times, 571 million print books were sold in 2015, 17 million more than in 2014. And ebooks, which had been forecast to hit 50 to 60 percent of book sales, were stuck around 25 percent. The L.A.…