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Grimdark Sci fi?
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The Revelation Space trilogy by Alastair Reynolds -- just think "the Borg meet Lovecraft."And then there's Harmony by Project Itoh, a novel that starts off with one of the bleakest dystopias ever imagined, and then gets worse.
I think Spin might qualify. It is a bit of a big idea book, but the earth gets pretty grim, and litterly dark in this. I'm guessing quite a few dystopian scifi books might qualify, that may be a place to start searching as well. Heck a lot of classic scifi didn't have happy endings, would Stranger in a Strange Land or Slaughterhouse-Five count as being dark enough?
I actually thought Stranger had a fairly upbeat ending.
One of the things that makes grimdark work in the fantasy genre is the moving away from stories of kingdoms and nobility and grand magic to get the stories of much lower class people in those settings. The soldiers or the thieves for instance, whose stories are going to be much grimmer and violent.Modern SF stories don't focus on the stories of the upper classes anywhere near as much as fantasy, so that part of the grimdark aesthetic isn't as much of a thing. Where SF tends to do "dark" you get dystopias or post-apocalypse stories and SF horror.
All that being said, in a personal definition of grimdark (ie., likey to give me the polar opposite of warm fuzzies while reading) I heartily recommend Peter Watts.
I always thought grimdark was a term of derision, or a term for works that satirize a certain kind of bad writing, so it's weird to see people actually asking for grimdark recommendations.
I always find cyberpunk to be pretty grim-darkish
See if cyberpunk or Revelation Space or Peter Watts are grimdark then I have no idea what people are talking about when they say grimdark.
I don't think grimdark is derogatory at all, in fact most of the fantasy authors best known for it are among the best working today.
as far as what I define it as, I agree with Lindsay, it is a tale that features the more gritty parts of a world, the more dark and grim stories set in the world or universe it is placed in (hence the name) the term to me means, sure your heroes will try to win, but most likely the world is doomed anyways and you should just take heart in the little wins or battles. not that grimdark books have endings that are ambiguous or the heroes "lose" but they aren't the "epic" that a lot of other fantasy is (or was). usually grimdark also mean a smaller group of characters focused on, instead of sprawling epics.
thanks for all the suggestions so far, I will take my sunday to look them all up!
as far as what I define it as, I agree with Lindsay, it is a tale that features the more gritty parts of a world, the more dark and grim stories set in the world or universe it is placed in (hence the name) the term to me means, sure your heroes will try to win, but most likely the world is doomed anyways and you should just take heart in the little wins or battles. not that grimdark books have endings that are ambiguous or the heroes "lose" but they aren't the "epic" that a lot of other fantasy is (or was). usually grimdark also mean a smaller group of characters focused on, instead of sprawling epics.
thanks for all the suggestions so far, I will take my sunday to look them all up!
well pretty much any of the dystopia/post-apoc stuff is, I suppose, grimdark. I avoid it for the same reason I avoid zombie stories, it's been done to death. Add in that it's not really far future and... You can look at Richard Morgan's Altered Carbon and it's 2 sequels as futuristic SF grimdark I suppose.
I never cut off a genre or story because it's old hat, a good story is a good story, but I understand not everyone has the time to read things or the same loves for different subgenres.
a lot of post-apoc could seem grimdark, but mostly more come off as trials of nature or consequence vs the main character where grimdark to me focuses on a more society seized by depression and oppression, though that is in post-apoc a lot too, must be why I already like that genre.
a lot of post-apoc could seem grimdark, but mostly more come off as trials of nature or consequence vs the main character where grimdark to me focuses on a more society seized by depression and oppression, though that is in post-apoc a lot too, must be why I already like that genre.
Brendan wrote: "See if cyberpunk or Revelation Space or Peter Watts are grimdark then I have no idea what people are talking about when they say grimdark."Try the short story "Dogfight" by Michael Swanwick and William Gibson, found in Gibson's collection Burning Chrome. If that's not grimdark SF then nothing is.
I think "nothing is" is the crux of the discussion. I've read both Gibson and Swanwick and wouldn't describe either using those words.
Brendan wrote: "I think "nothing is" is the crux of the discussion. I've read both Gibson and Swanwick and wouldn't describe either using those words."I actually agree with you, but for purposes of the discussion, what qualifies something to be grimdark other than being grim and dark? :)
I mean, speaking only for myself, I wouldn't use it to describe any work i liked. Authors dont seem to like the term, even the authors that are supposedly at the forefront of it, so I'd try not to use it at all.
But what about Joe Abercrombie, whose Twitter handle is "Lord Grimadark"?
I've heard Joe Abercrombie describing his stuff that way. Not sure how tongue in cheek he was though.
Or, as I mentioned upthread, Grimdark Magazine (http://grimdarkmagazine.com/), which takes both science fiction and fantasy.
Lindsay wrote: "I've heard Joe Abercrombie describing his stuff that way. Not sure how tongue in cheek he was though."See it is specifically him I was thinking of that tends to reject it. Yeah he uses Lord Grimdark as a twitter handle but I'm pretty sure that's a sort of English humour ironic joke kind of deal. He seems to prefer the term "gritty fantasy", as shown in this discussion here: http://mark---lawrence.blogspot.ca/20...
EDIT: The First Law does have some things in common with the original "grimdark", Warhammer, in that they are a) British and b) satirizing fantasy conventions, so in that sense I can agree on grimdark being a valid descriptor. But for works that are not satirical or self aware? Not sure I can get behind it.
Brendan wrote: "I think "nothing is" is the crux of the discussion. I've read both Gibson and Swanwick and wouldn't describe either using those words."I mean that story specifically. It's about as grim as you can get.
Brendan wrote: "I mean, speaking only for myself, I wouldn't use it to describe any work i liked."So if you like it, it can't be grimdark? That makes zero sense.
Sounds like this:
"If I like it, it's not Fantasy."
"But you like Lord of the Rings."
"Right."
"That's Fantasy."
"Not it's not."
Trike wrote: "Brendan wrote: "I mean, speaking only for myself, I wouldn't use it to describe any work i liked."So if you like it, it can't be grimdark? That makes zero sense.
Sounds like this:
"If I like it..."
More like the term "pulp" except that's had 50 or so more years to get people used to it than grimdark.
It makes sense if you think grimdark is a pejorative rather than a genre description.
Since I don't put any stock in what other people think of the things I like, this attitude is literally unfathomable to me.So I can't understand what he means by this at all. It reads like Margaret Atwood constantly claiming her Science Fiction novels are not, in fact, Science Fiction. Because she doesn't like SF.
It sounds like crazy people talking.
Grimdark exists regardless of your opinion of it.
"I don't watch TV."
"But you were just watching TV."
"No, it wasn't TV, because I enjoyed what I was watching."
0.o
Trike, did you know that JK Rowling said Harry Potter wasn't Fantasy? I am still cleaning up around the house from my head exploding when I read that.
Grimdark is pretty clearly genre/subgenre whatever. While I'm sure I have used it as a derogatory before to describe something, I do actually enjoy some books that would be called grimdark. Normally I just put over emphasis on Edgy and or Deep when something falls into that kind of truly awful grimdark. John (Taloni) wrote: "Trike, did you know that JK Rowling said Harry Potter wasn't Fantasy? I am still cleaning up around the house from my head exploding when I read that."
Clearly that's because Harry isn't a Wizard he was put in a coma in the same car accident that killed his parents. The rest of the story is the hallucinations he encounters due to interaction with the outside world. His early trauma and pain with his step parents represent how his extended family doesn't want to deal with his life and how he is a burden on their medical bills..............etc.
*One of my friends is basically convinced that this is what Harry Potter is actually about and tried explaining to me in detail for hours, he tends to have weird theories whenever magic is involved because "magic can't exist", explaining that a book is fictional doesn't seem to resolve this confusion.
John (Taloni) wrote: "Trike, did you know that JK Rowling said Harry Potter wasn't Fantasy? I am still cleaning up around the house from my head exploding when I read that."The author is not always correct. Anne McCaffrey said Dragonriders of Pern was SF; it's not. In a recent S&L podcast, Rachel Aaron said there aren't any genres. Come on. "Quacks like a duck" and etc.
Trike wrote: "John (Taloni) wrote: "Trike, did you know that JK Rowling said Harry Potter wasn't Fantasy? I am still cleaning up around the house from my head exploding when I read that."The author is not alwa..."
Hey I can forgive Pern almost with the whole making the backstory sci-fi, then proceeding to write fantasy. But Perns premise basically feels written just to start arguments.
Trike wrote: "Since I don't put any stock in what other people think of the things I like, this attitude is literally unfathomable to me....Grimdark exists regardless of your opinion of it.."
Eh. I think you have to be able to define it and part of that is defining what it isn't. For example, Morgan's Takeshi Kovacs novels starting with Altered Carbon - are they grimdark? Noir SF? Does anything gritty automatically become grimdark? Some of Jaine Fenn's stuff is dark and from the viewpoint of the lower,common classes. Is that grimdark?
Or... is grimdark just a marketing category that people use to describe the bandwagon of lazy fantasy authors who followed Abercrombie, Cook and others who actually had something original to say?
Cory wrote: "I don't think grimdark is derogatory at all, in fact most of the fantasy authors best known for it are among the best working today.as far as what I define it as, I agree with Lindsay, it is a ta..."
You can't get much grimmer and darker then the Gap Cycle by Stephen R. Donaldson (https://www.goodreads.com/series/4056...). It might actually be overqualified based on your definition.
Does Heroes Die count. I mean it's clearly sci-fi...but also fantasy. Regardless it's a pretty great book.
Scott wrote: "You can't get much grimmer and darker then the Gap Cycle by Stephen R. Donaldson (https://www.goodreads.com/series/4056...). It might actually be overqualified based on your definition."Oh, god, yes.
Some of C.J. Cherryh's books got pretty grim and claustrophobic -- Heavy Time springs to mind, as do Rimrunners and Voyager in Night (which is an entirely different kind of beast).
I haven't read Adam Christopher's SF series (beginning with The Burning Dark) yet, but it might also qualify.
The future is already here — it's just not very evenly distributed. -- William Gibson
A couple books I would recommend have already been suggested, Blindsight and The Gap Into Conflict (Book 1 of Donaldson's Gap Cycle).In addition, Neuropath by R. Scott Bakker might be of interest. This novel is a thriller with sci-fi elements (real world findings from cognitive science extropolated to a near future setting). It is about a psychologist who helps FBI investigate a neurosurgeon who abudcts people, perfoms neursurgery on them and then uses his altered victims as evidence to support his theory about the nature of consciousness.
Brendan wrote: "I always thought grimdark was a term of derision, or a term for works that satirize a certain kind of bad writing, so it's weird to see people actually asking for grimdark recommendations."It's both! It's fun with equivocation! Fans of said works think it means (e.g.) "bringing a welcome grittiness and maturity to a genre that's been too shiny and happy playing in Grandpa Tolkien's sandbox for too long", and people critical of such works think it means (e.g.) "the injection of adolescent sex and violence fantasies and grittiness into the fantasy genre in a misguided attempt at maturity".
Lindsay wrote: "One of the things that makes grimdark work in the fantasy genre is the moving away from stories of kingdoms and nobility and grand magic to get the stories of much lower class people in those settings. The soldiers or the thieves for instance, whose stories are going to be much grimmer and violent."
That's an interesting observation, considering that a) before A Song of Ice and Fire, a common complaint among fantasy readers was that every other hero was a farmboy or street urchin, and b) given that most "grimdark" is more concerned with politics and armies over globe-trotting epic quests to slay evil gods, they're actually more concerned with nobles and kingdoms than most Tolkien-esque fantasy.
What you're describing is sword and sorcery, or low fantasy, and it's older than Tolkien.
The Sword and Laser
Books mentioned in this topic
The Gap Into Conflict: The Real Story (other topics)Blindsight (other topics)
Neuropath (other topics)
Rimrunners (other topics)
Heavy Time (other topics)
More...
Authors mentioned in this topic
C.J. Cherryh (other topics)Adam Christopher (other topics)
Stephen R. Donaldson (other topics)
Jaine Fenn (other topics)
Peter Watts (other topics)
not that I don't like games workshop or warhammer40k, but I know about those books, I am wondering if there are books out there in the same vein as grimdark fantasy but with a future edge to them? anyone have some good suggestions?
thanks
-cory