Short takes: Science Fiction

Ken MacLeod: Newton's Wake

Ken MacLeod gets my vote for best writer to come out of the British hard SF revival (hard SF: science fiction where the science isn't fictional).

Newton's Wake is a stand-alone novel featuring all MacLeod's trademarks: utopian politics, artificial intelligence run riot, and a plethora of clever in-jokes.

Humanity has narrowly escaped destruction at the hands of its own sentient war machines.

A far-flung network of colonised planets serves as the battlefield for an ongoing struggle between warring clans of technocrats, Zen physicists and combat archaeologist Glaswegian gangsters (don't ask).

But the sentient war machines are about to make a comeback. This is science fiction for science fiction lovers - witty and erudite while spinning a fabulous yarn.

Orbit, $57.95

Orson Scott Card: First Meetings

Orson Scott Card is a conservative Mormon whose politics and religious views differ almost totally from mine.

He's also one of my favourite writers. A deeply intelligent storyteller, he has a way of embodying his ideas in his characters so that they take on a life of their own.

Twenty years ago he wrote the award-winning Ender's Game, about children tricked into fighting a genocidal war for the sake of ensuring humanity's survival.

Peace groups use this book as a teaching tool; so does the US military. Card has written a slew of sequels, the latest of which is First Meetings, a collection of four novellas.

A fast, compulsive read, and a good introduction to one of the most popular living sci-fi writers.

Orbit, $23

Justina Robson: Natural History

Justina Robson is another of the new crop of British hard SF writers. I'd never come across her before I picked up Natural History, but she quickly had me hooked.

In the far future, new breeds of human have been genetically engineered, with high-functioning minds capable of interfacing directly with the hardware needed to run space craft.

Sent out to search for new planets suitable for colonisation, one of these enhanced humans suffers a catastrophic collision with floating space debris, which turns out to be of alien origin.

A sophisticated, unpredictable first-contact tale. Watch this author.

Pan, $22.95

Lois McMaster Bujold Diplomatic Immunity

If you wander down to your local library and check the catalogue for the writings of Lois McMaster Bujold, you'll discover it has multiple copies of every one of this woman's 17 books.

And, at any given time, most of those copies are out on loan. No one does light space opera better.

Her most popular series is the on-going Vorkosigan Saga, featuring the most interesting character in science fiction, the crippled military genius Miles Vorkosigan.

Diplomatic Immunity is the latest. If you haven't read any of these books, dive right into this one, and enjoy the wealth of backstory, or start at the beginning, with Shards of Honour. Guaranteed fun either way.

Earthlight, $20.95

Lois McMaster Bujold: Paladin of Souls

If you want the difference between science fiction and fantasy enjoyably demonstrated, compare and contrast Lois McMaster Bujold, queen of space opera, with Lois McMaster Bujold, queen of swords and sorcery.

Paladin of Souls is the second book to be set in the land of Chalion, loosely drawn from medieval Spain.

A complex theology involving five gods and a host of demons underpins this story, though Bujold ensures the theology is there to serve the story, rather than swamp it.

The constant factors in both genres are BujoldÕs beautiful writing and believable characters. Light reading raised to the pitch of art.

Voyager, $31.99