need list help

[Kylarium]

Hi I need help making a list of Sci-fi books that focus on science, exploration and colonization preferably first time colonization, hard sci-fi and outside of our solar system.

Thanks :)

[Nokomis.FL]

Kim Stanley Robinson Aurora

Allen Steele - Arkwright & Coyote series

James S.A. Corey - Leviathan Wakes - they get to exploring in later books

Andy Weir - The Martian

Larry Niven - Ringworld

Larry Niven & Jerry Pournelle - The Mote in God's Eye

Michael McCollum - Gibralter Earth

Peter F. Hamilton - Commonwealth series

If you need more, let me know.

[Nokomis.FL]

From another post of mine:

Ryk Brown's 'Frontiers Saga.' 15 books (shortish) in the first part, part 2 just starting.

http://www.frontierssaga.com/

John Hemry's 'The Lost Fleet' series is also very good, especially if you like realistic space fleet battles.

http://www.jack-campbell.com/_series/...

[Terence]

The colonization of space is a theme I've always found attractive and it turns up in a variety of guises. A couple of works by Robert Heinlein: Farmer In The Sky and Tunnel in the Sky - focus on colonization. Heinlein dwells on this in other works such as Orphans of the Sky a generational spaceship is headed to local stars for the purpose of... colonization. The theme underpins much of his Future History sequence. Many novels use colonization as a backdrop, and a quick run through my study (1940s through to the 1980s) shows all sorts of treatment.

• James Blish's Cities in Flight series looks at colonization of space via spindizzy tech
• Ray Bradbury: The Martian Chronicles (The Silver Locusts in the UK) - man colonizes Mars after fouling up the Earth
David Brin - Uplift series - an entirely differnt take on colonizing - uplifting local species
• CJ Cherryh: Alliance-Union vision of the future - more focussed on space politics than colonization but Downbelow Station and Forty Thousand in Gehenna (not read this) worth checking out.
• Arthur C Clarke: although not explicitly colonozation, Rendezvous with Rama and 2001: A Space Odyssey are conceptually valuable
Michael G Coney: Syzygy - Man upsets the ecology of a planet he's ettled on.
• Philip K Dick: The Three Stigmata of Palmer Eldritch - having colonised the Solar system, an arduous task, the colonies need entertainment - enter, stage left, Perky Pat and Can D
• Harry Harrison: Deathworld - action takes place on the deadliest planet ever colonised. 'Deadliest' is explored with relish.
• Ursula K Le Guin: the backstory to her Hainish cyle is worlds seeded with human colonies several kiloyears in the past - there's an anti-colonial overtone in The Word For World Is Forest
• Larry Niven: delightful and sometimes maverick tales in which colonisation themes are well represented, especially A Gift from Earth
Frederik Pohl - like Clarke's work, Pohl's Heechee sequence is conceptually valuable
• Robert Silverberg: Hawksbill Station - a penal colony... in the past!
• Brian Stableford: The Paradise Game, part 4 of the Hooded Swan series is indirectly a comment the mega-rich who, on a whim, can damage planetary ecosystems
• James White's Sector General - a series of novels and short fiction about a multi-species hospital space station - good descriptions of ecospheric requirements of aliens
• Roger Zelazny: Lord Of Light - stylized mythic fantasy set on a colonized planet

It's fair to say, that colonization tech is pretty much a prerequisite for a galactic empire. Galactic empires (another great theme) is an ever expanding area. Notable exponents of the galactic empire:
• Isaac Asimov: Foundation - recurring motif: collapse of empire (humans pretty much everywhere so colonization is taken for granted).
• Poul Anderson: Polesotechnic League, Terran Empire.
• Andre Norton: Central Control - recurring motif: respect of indigenous cultures - the process of colonization drifts in and out of focus.
• Jack Vance: Gaean Reach.

Trivia
Jack Williamson first coined the term terraform, sometime back in the 1920s so he's probably worth a checkout.
My second novel has a terraforming take - humans join an interstellar society but are explicitly barred from colonizing. They come up with a cunning plan: steal planetary seeding tech from the aliens. The Tau Device.

[Heidi]

Is this for school? Is there an age range you are looking to appeal to?

My teen boys just started reading The Ender series by Orson Scott Card, the best one for what you are looking for is probablySpeaker for the Dead

He also has Pathfinder which is about colonizing a new world.

[Sparrow Knight]

Terence wrote: "The colonization of space is a theme I've always found attractive and it turns up in a variety of guises. A couple of works by Robert Heinlein: Farmer In The Sky and Tunnel in ..."

I've recently been reading some of the older works in sci fi/fan, largely because I'm getting tired of unfinished trilogies & run-on series, but also because...roots. So this is a great list for that!

I just finished reading a short story, "The Chapter Ends" by Poul Anderson in a 1950's collection Novelets of Science Fiction that I found at a thrift store. Really enjoyed it! I haven't read Anderson before. I'll definitely be checking out more of his work.

I also picked up a copy of Heinlein's Starship Troopers at the same thrift store. I recently finished the expanded edition of Stranger in a Strange Land, a book I loved as a teen (so many decades ago) & was surprised by how much I disliked it, way too much pontification for my taste. However, in a discussion of space opera & its history, Troopers came up & there it was for 50¢, so I'll give that one a try.

Anyway, thanks for a great list!

[Kylarium]

nah not gor school just wanted a list to go down since i was having trouble deciding.
Thanks everyone for the help should keep me for awhile :)

[Heidi]

You're welcome!

[Trike]

The Hard SF Renaissance - excellent group of short stories, which can lead you to longer works.

[Terence]

:-)

[Krazykiwi]

The Expanse (eventually) gets outside our solar system, although the first few books are primarily inside it. Leviathan Wakes. Interesting mix of quite fairly sci-fi (re adaptation of humans to living in low G environments, resource dynamics esp.water, the space stations and ships) and some much more fantastical moments. (Oh I see they were mentioned above) (view spoiler)[One of my favourite ongoing sub-plots there is that the Mormons are building a generation ship to take them out of the solar system the slow way in order to have religious freedom. (hide spoiler)]

Kim Stanley Robinson's books are all (very) hard sci-fi and primarily about new planet colonisation, but are solar system bound. I'd look at the Mars trilogy Red Mars and my personal favourite 2312 although that's a "marmite" book, people either love it to bits or detest it.

[Били]

If you have heard of GRRM's A Thousand Worlds, there's this great story about a group of religious inquisitors colonizing the world of a peaceful, less advanced raced called the Jaenshi. And Seven Times Never Kill Man. It's one of my favorite short stories!

I don't know if you'll consider H.P. Lovecraft's In the Walls of Eryx to be about colonizing but it's also real good!