Decent Book Clubs for Sci-Fi Fans?

willyhill writes "I'm a Sci-Fi and Fantasy book nut, but in the last few years I've found it more and more difficult to find the time to read. Contrary to what most people would think, I actually have a hard time finding books, rather than cuddling up with them. In reality, I don't have time to mess around at my local Barnes & Noble and browse books, and I find it dicey and expensive to do the same at Amazon or other online retailers. I was looking at a magazine the other day and I found an advert for the Science Fiction Book Club. While my experience with CD clubs and the like in the past has not been entirely positive, I was prepared to give it a shot given the fact that it would be less expensive than Amazon in the long run. The problem was that their selection is not exactly grand. Having read the Simmons Hyperion Cantos, for example, I was ready to give Ilium a go, but I could only find its sequel. How do other readers get their hands on Sci-Fi books? I tried Googling for book clubs and the like, but there's too much static out there, mostly caused by Oprah. Any suggestions would be appreciated!"

The library.

[Anonymous Coward]

Check your city library. I know, it's not as fancy as a book club or a CD, but that's where most people used to go to find books.

yahoo, orkut

[William Robinson]

Dunno whether it is useful or not, why not join some online groups (yahoo?) or some special communities in Orkut? Orkut there is a community for Sci-Fi book club http://www.orkut.com/Community.aspx?cmm=34191 [orkut.com]

Orkut has recently added some features related to reviews on books and you could find some leads.

BTW, FP?

If you don't mind Audio books

[thermian]

I'd recommend Audible.

They have a decent selection of SF books (including some first rate cast based unabridged versions of the Dune books that I'm currently enjoying).

I've been using it for about eight months, and I like it.

Also, they let you convert the books to mp3. It's a bit long winded, you have to export to cd/virtual cd using a version of nero they supply, then convert them. I use mediamonkey to do that, then mp3 tag tools to sort out the tags/rename the files.

Or you can leave them as .aa files.

Very vague terms

[IICV]

I looked through the website, and they're very, very vague about what you really have to pay. For one thing, it's 5 books for a dollar each (and one free), but you also pay $13.70 in S&H. That's a pretty good price for six hardcover books, but then you're committed to buying four books from them - and it seems like the books they have mostly aren't new. I tried looking some of them up on Amazon for comparison with their "member prices", but most of the ones I chose apparently weren't for sale any more - except Spook Country, which I knew was new. It's about a dollar more expensive there. The one thing I can't seem to find without becoming a member is the S&H on the further books you purchase. I wouldn't be surprised if that's a ripoff. Anyway, it seems like their strategy is to get various interesting-sounding novels for cheap when they stop selling well, and then seed somewhat slightly more popular books in to that.

Re:The library.

[montyzooooma]

I'd second (or third) the library idea and join a SF community forum to ask for book recommendations (eg http://www.sf-fandom.com/ [sf-fandom.com] ).

Look to the british...

[tcdk]

Firstly, let me warn you about the Illum books. The first one is okay, but the last one is really bad. Simmons gets lost in the quantum magic of the story and never really finds his way back again...

I can't tell you about SFBC as they don't do the rest of the world outside of the US...

Amazons recommendation system seems to work okay.

Looking at who wins the Hugo or Nebula, can work, but should be taken without a grain of salt.

Forums and news groups like rec.arts.sf.written can be a really good source of inspiration, but can consume so much time that you will not have time to read books.

But if you are ready for something different I'll recommend you the "new" wave of authors from Britain. People like Charles Stross (he has a few free e-books out), Peter F. Hamilton (Nights Dawns trilogy is not a good place to start), Ken MacLeod.

Read up on them on wikipedia.

Locus Magazine

[jhoug]

Locus Magazine [locusmag.com] is a real magazine put together by Science Fiction Fans (notably Charlie Brown who has received many Hugo awards for it). Contains lots of reviews, you'll learn which reviewers have the same taste as you. Yeah, it's not a book club.
The Young Adult section of the library (don't sneer - the quality of the Science Fiction there is very high) shouldn't be forgotten. Cory's Little Brother [amazon.com] is a must-read, and is a YA novel.

Tor Books

[bball99]

Tor regular sends me free SciFi/Fantasy books for free (you have to register but Tor doesn't spam you)...

kudos to another /. poster for cluing me in on this deal...

Marc Andreessen

[buccaneer9]

The best list I've seen in the past year was the one published by Marc Andreessen. I've worked my way through almost all of these now and, aside from one or two clunkers, its a stellar list of books and authors I had not heard of. http://blog.pmarca.com/2007/06/top_10_science_.html [pmarca.com]

Mysterious Galaxy

[ShakaUVM]

I love Mysterious Galaxy (http://mysteriousgalaxy.booksense.com/). The staff there are awesome, and can find books for whatever your personal tastes are.

They're great people, and I think F&SF specialty stores like that deserve our support.

Book sale at local libraries?

[Two99Point80]

My wife works at a county library branch, where the vast majority of donated books are sold very cheaply for fundraising (only a few are suitable for adding to the library's collection). She recently snagged two SF anthologies for a total of forty US cents.

Baen

[Anonymous Coward]

Don't forget the Baen Free Library - they also sell ebooks with NO drm.

http://www.baen.com/library/

http://www.webscription.net/

Re:Have someone else pick your books?

[julesh]

If you let someone else select your books, you'll get books that are to someone else's taste.

Yes, but if you find somebody whose taste overlaps yours well enough, this isn't an issue. The problem is finding that person.

That being said, I'd have to agree with bball99 - Tor has sent me about 10 books for free and so far I've read (and liked) the first 3.

From what I've read about the offer, I suspect those books are being picked by Patrick Nielsen Hayden [wikipedia.org]. Just so you know.

Re:Hugo Awards

[halifamous]

I wanted to agree with you, but after checking their list of winners I found they completely missed some of the best books from the last five years: Oryx and Crake, by M Atwood; Never Let Me Go, by K Ishiguro; The Time Traveler's Wife, A Niffenegger; The Book of Dave, by W Self. The Book of Dave is only tangentially sci-fi, I admit. The Nebula Awards overlooked these, too.

I recognize that these are not hard sci-fi/tech driven stories, of course, so I think I want to restate the question: Where do you find good sci-fi that's also a good book?

Why Amazon?

[maceilean]

Once you've found the authors and/or titles you want to read (google 'top 10 SF 2008' or something) head on over to addall.com or bookfinder.com Not only will these sites show you the amazon and b&n books but they will also lead you to the independent book search services like biblio.com and abebooks.com There is no reason why anyone should pay retail for mass market paperbacks. There are also many more out-of-print SF books than in-print.

Free Baen Books Online

[SlashTon]

Baen have put quite a few SF books online ( here [webscriptions.net] and then choose Free Library). Read them online or download them to pretty much any e-reader out there. It certainly allowed me to get into a few authors I might otherwise have 'overlooked'. I prefer the dead-tree variety so after sampling some of them like here, I Amazoned them.

SF Masterworks series

[Herr Brush]

On amazon or similar, search for SF masterworks. This is collection of some of the best sci-fi ever written and you're sure to find a few you haven't heard of. Also if you're buying on the cheap, "The Collected Stories of Arthur C. Clarke" is good value for money (almost 1000 pages of SF goodness by one of the greats for £10). Disclaimer: I am in no way affiliated with amazon except as a customer.

Used book stores

[Anonymous Coward]

I go to a used book store, and buy books for anywhere between $3 and $6. I you buy 10 books for an average price of $4.50, then you can take more chances on authors that you do not know. Even if one of the books is absolutely horrible, and two are so-so, you are still getting your money's worth, considering new books run $12.
Here in Toronto, the BMV stores are great.

Baen books & Webscriptions

[Knightman]

You can always check out http://baen.com/ [baen.com] they have an online library of free books and sample chapters for new books. They also have the webscription site where you can read e-Arc (advance reader copy) books yet to be published and other books for a monthly fee.

Also, check out http://baencd.thefifthimperium.com/ [thefifthimperium.com] which have all the CD's Baen has published. The CD's are free to copy for non-commercial use and contains alot of books in digital format.

None of the books you get in digital format from Baen is encumbered with DRM in any way.

Re:Hugo Awards ... and the Nebulas

[zoward]

The Hugos [wsfs.org] are voted on by SF readers. The Nebulas [sfwa.org] are voted by SF authors. Occasionally the same title will win both honors.

Used book stores. End of Story.

[PontifexMaximus]

I'm am a rabid collector of books, especially Sci-Fi and Fantasy (along with almost everything else EXCEPT romance.) I have over 5K books in my personal library. Finding good books online is nice, but hit the local used book stores. Yeah, I know it requires you to get off your ass and do some walking, but you'll find what you want more often than not there. Hit up library book sales.

Again, it requires actual physical activity, so this may not work for you it seems.

Re:No Time?

[Lumpy]

Yup. and if the sticker shock at B&N is what is keeping you away. go to a used book store. there are at least 30 of them in every mid to large town and most better ones will have newer books that are cast off from B&N and Borders and for sale at 50% of the cover price. Honestly if you cant wait a year to read that new book, then you dont have enough books to read. I'm 3 years behind on my reading Que and I consume 1 per month.

Look for Authors

[N8F8]

Aside from searching Amazon.com for highly rated books, I often try to fins the more popular authors and then find their more popular works:

• SciFi Authors [wikipedia.org]
• Fantasy Authors [wikipedia.org]

Re:The library.

[h4rm0ny]

Or you could subscribe to a Science Fiction magazine. They usually have good review sections as well as some good short sci fi for the busy reader. My personal recommendation is Interzone magazine [ttapress.com]. It's pretty good, British but I think you can get it everywhere and it also has the best film reviews I've ever read (albeit always arriving long after I've seen the film). Definitely worth it for people who don't have the time to work their way through a bookshop looking for the occasional good sci fi.

Re:Quality on the decline

[Lord Apathy]

I think I'm going to have to disagree with you on this. The quality of some authors has declined as they got older. If I see one more Ender book I think I'll barf. I'll give you that the quality of Star Trek and Star Wars books has gone down in the last few years. There are some really good authors out there that don't have name recognition though. I just finished John Scalzi Old Man's War and found it to be great. Never heard of him before.

Now here is a strange place to find book recommendations but I Wikipedia. If you type in a few key words you can usually find a list of books and subjects that you are interested in. Then you can look them up on Amazon. Strange but it works for me.

Dozois's "Year's Best Science Fiction"

[elrous0]

Of course, it depends largely on the kind of science fiction you like ("hard" vs. "soft," literary vs. pulp, etc.) but, as a big fan of serious science fiction (no pulp or Star Trek books for me, thanks), I've found that the best place to start is Gardner Dozois's Year's Best Science Fiction [amazon.com] anthology. First of all, if will give you some great reading itself. But, more importantly, it will give you a great introductory essay on some of the year's best science fiction novels, and a great list of quality authors to look for (if you like their short story).

I've been a long-time science fiction fan and this has been THE book for me each year, in filtering out the diamonds from the shit.

Re:When will it stop ?

[malilo]

I think the main problem is that your average book store person, or even Amazon worker classifying the novel would have a hard time classifying some books as one or the other. Even most "hard sci-fi" books that I have read have a LOT of hand-waiving and I think you could be justified in calling that fantasy.

I was at one time (in my teens) very like-minded: I loved sci-fi but I hated ANYTHING in my local library with dragons on it, i.e. fantasy. A lot of these seemed like romance novels to me, just totally ridiculous and childish and most importantly not asking the right questions, which is what makes speculative fiction or sci-fi so interesting. HOWEVER, I found out once I got to college that I was just reading the wrong books. Just as I had discovered, sadly, that about 90% of sci-fi is crap, that same rule applies to fantasy. A few that changed my opinion: Lord of the Rings (obviously), Dune, the Sword of Truth series before it got lame, some of the books by Sheri S. Tepper. These all share the characteristics of creating multi-dimensional, interesting characters, asking questions which could reasonably be relevant to today's society, etc.

Re:Library

[yog]

Libraries are good. Also, used bookstores, the kind where they can afford to stuff the stacks with old books, not just the selective boutiques that need to pay high rents and wages and can't afford to have lots of stuff. I found about 20 old Clifford Simak novels in the basement of this wonderful old (and now closed) used bookstore in Arlington, Mass. Classic and great stuff, cheap, and out of print.

Also, join forces with a fellow science fiction lover. Reviews and fancy cover art are no substitute for the impressions you can get from a trusted friend. A buddy and I used to trade books and it was so wonderful to discuss the stories, their strengths and weaknesses, the author's visions and values.

I think what the OP wants is something along the lines of the Quality Paperback Book Club, which I used to belong to many years ago. They attempted to live up to their name by vetting the books and providing sophisticated reviews, and the books were pretty good, but after a while it got tedious sending the stupid form back every two weeks. New bookstores that have decent sci-fi collections are pretty good, too; you can browse the books before buying.

One problem is that books are becoming a niche item in the U.S. (don't know about Europe). People read on the Web, or watch multimedia/video/TV, and the reading of old fashioned books is getting to be almost a lost art form. Bookstores are dropping away, and browsing at Amazon.com is just not the same. Anyway, I'm glad when someone asks this kind of question because occasionally you can get some useful information. Not that I have enough time to read... :(

Go to Baen.com or Tor.com

[pillageplunder]

Go out to http://www.baen.com./ [www.baen.com] They have the Baen Free Library project, links to many Authors web-sites, a very good online "baens Bar" where you can interact with authors, and the right approach (IMO) on how to deal with free content.

Do some leg-work! As others have pointed out, go visit a local book-store, and not just one of the chains. Find a used book-store, or two.

Re:Quality on the decline

[inactionman2]

Richard Morgan is really good, start with Altered Carbon, but avoid Market Forces.

Charles Stross has already been suggested, and you'd be best starting with Halting State, particularly if you are into MMO's.

Tried David Brin? His uplift stuff is particularly good.

Two Blogs

[Anonymous Coward]

Try out these blogs:

http://fantasybookcritic.blogspot.com/

http://fantasyhotlist.blogspot.com/

Re:Private Library Development...[and LibraryThing

[pretygrrl]

p.s. You should also check out the SF comm. at www.librarything.com.

I was about to write that, but here it is already!
I agree, of the many websites that organize/recommend content, I think the librarything.com does a great, great job! excellent use of tags, you can input several of your favourite titles and see who else picked them and what their OTHER favourite titles are. I personally am not into fantasy, more sci fi, but thelibrarything.com helped me discover asher, and also Ian Banks.
enjoy!

Ebay!

[Antifuse]

Seriously... Ebay is a FANTASTIC place to pick up used books on the cheap. I'll usually just buy a "lot" of like 20-30 books... with Media Mail (if you're in the States), it is MEGA cheap to get them shipped to you. You usually average around 2 bucks a book if you do it this way... often times even cheaper.

Re:Very vague terms

[Anonymous Coward]

I've been a member of SFBC for seven years. They tend to have a decent selection of new books, but they typically won't have them on the day of release. They will never automatically send you any books, but will notify you by email when new "featured selections" are available. You can also sign up to get email notices of promotions (often free shipping, reduced shipping, or BOGO deals.) S&H is $3.99 per book regardless of size or weight sent via USPS and you can elect to pay on receipt. You can send back books you don't like, but I think the review period is only a week or two.

I really like their 2-in-1 or 3-in-1 omnibus collections which saves space on my overcrowded shelves.

Re:The library.

[budcub]

My local library (Fairfax County, VA) allows you to search for books on their website, even reserve them for pickup. You can even renew your books online too. They have a decent selection of scifi/fantasy books, graphic novels, and other things.

They use a library software package called Sirsi, that other libraries may use too. You (I'm talking to the person who posted the question) might want to look into it.

Re:The library.

[bob_herrick]

I apologize that I don't have time to read the rest of the comments to see if this is redundant or not, but I recommend www.locusmag.com as a source of reviews and inspiration for new SF to read.

Re:Real SF Problem

[ppanon]

I'll second GospelHead821's opinion. I find Sawyer almost to be the hard SF Piers Anthony. He'll take an idea or two that's good for a novelette and pad it out into a novel. The result feels drawn out with little life.

For more recent SF writers, I quite like Vernor Vinge, John Varley, and Wil McCarthy. Currently, I think they would be my personal candidates for future grandmasters, although other people would probably argue in favour of Kim Stanley Robinson.

David R. Palmer has finally (after a 25 year hiatus) written the sequel to Emergence - Tracking is first coming out in serialized version in Analog. Unlike the somewhat disappointing (and unrelated) Threshold from 1985, so far Tracking's mostly up to the level of Emergence. This week, my wife has been chortling her way through my pb copy of Emergence when she saw how enthused I was to see DRP's name on the July/August Analog cover. I hope I'll see more coming from DRP after this novel.

I quite enjoyed Kathleen Goonan's musical cities series but not everyone does. I think the closest description I can think of for her writing style is Impressionistic with a hint of Surrealism, and it's not for everyone but I really like it. I haven't checked out her In War Times yet. I love Kingbury's stuff but he doesn't write anywhere near enough, though he is keeping ahead of DRP so far.

I think an interesting thing is that, for most of the above authors, writing is a sideline and not the day job, so they'll never have the output of Heinlein, Clarke, or any of the other great SF writers from the 40s-60s.

Actually, I quite recommend subscribing to Analog. Or if you prefer your SF a little more mushy, IASFM. It's a good way to evaluate a number of different (and new) writers, although some of them are short story specialists who don't write novels. It's also quite nice, in a busy schedule, to have standalone stories you can read completely in an hour or less. You sometimes can get a good discount on three-year subscriptions at their booths during Worldcons.