Among the washtubs of science fiction that gets recycled each year there are a few vital authors who can explain our world to us, or have done a remarkable job of predicting their near future. Not all of these authors here are necessarily "new", but their works are still fresh and relevant as the century turns. Read these books, and you will be ready for tomorrow.

Be sure to click through to amazon.com for up-to-date pricing-- most of these are inexpensive paperbacks.

Neal Stephenson:

The Diamond Age
Neal Stephenson
Bantam Books (Reprint) March 1996
(Oddly enough, Amazon says the hardback edition is out of print. Check with them about special ordering it.)
Snow Crash
Neal Stephenson
Spectra, May 1993
Rei Edition, Paper
Zodiac: the Eco-Thriller
Neal Stephenson
Spectra (Reprint) July 1995

Philip K. Dick:

The Man in the High Castle
Philip K. Dick
Vintage (Reissue) July 1992
Ubik
Philip K. Dick
Vintage (Reissue) December 1991
Safe when taken as directed.

Thomas Pynchon:

The Crying of Lot 49
Thomas Pynchon
Harper Collins (Reprint) February 1990

Report all obscene mail to your potsmaster.

  Gravity's Rainbow
Thomas Pynchon
Penguin Twentieth Century Classics (Reprint) June 1995

Robert A. Heinlein:

The Moon is a Harsh Mistress
Robert A. Heinlein
St Martins Press (Reissue) July 1997

Blueprint for revolution! Freethinking, freewheeling lunar colonists declare independence from Earth's bureaucracies with the help of a newly self-aware computer. Originally published in 1966, it's even more relevant today.

Also available in hardback from Tor Books, August 1996.

John Brunner:

The Shockwave Rider
John Brunner
Ballantine Books (Reissue) May 1990
  Stand on Zanzibar
John Brunner
Ballantine Books (Reissue) April 1988

William Gibson:

Neuromancer
William Gibson
Ace Books (Reissue) May 1995

Also available in hardback from Ace Books, reissue July 1994.

Count Zero
William Gibson
Ace Books (Reissue) May 1987
Mona Lisa Overdrive
William Gibson
Bantam Books (Reissue) September 1996
Burning Chrome
William Gibson
Ace Books, September 1994
The Difference Engine
William Gibson and Bruce Sterling
Spectra, February 1992
 
Virtual Light
William Gibson
Spectra (Reprint) August 1994
Idoru
William Gibson
Berkley (Reprint) September 1997

Also available in hardback from Putnam, and as an audiocassette.

Check out the other Cyber shelves:

New Media

New Science


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