Book recommendations

Last updated Jan 1, 2023

see also Sci-fi short stories

• The Player of Games - Iain M. Banks
  Excellent plot, excellent worldbuilding, set in a socialist future. Apparently Elon likes this one.
• The Moon is a Harsh Mistress - Robert Heinlein
  If the moon was a penal colony. Libertarian and anarcho-capitalist.
• Neuromancer - William Gibson
  This book effectively invented the cyberpunk genre.
• Dune - Frank Herbert
  “Because we cannot imagine a thing, that does not exclude it from reality…”
  see also Calvin and Muad’Dib for some laughs
• I, Robot - Asimov
  Collection of short stories about the Three Laws of Robotics. Very thought-provoking.

• Norwegian Wood - Haruki Murakami
  Wistful and weird. Don’t read it if you’re sad already.

• Into Thin Air - Jon Krakauer
  A narrative of the 1996 Everest disaster from Krakauer, who was actually a member of one of the expeditions. Powerful and tragic.
• Touching the Void - Joe Simpson
  Joe fell hundreds of feet into a crevasse in a remote glacier in Peru and crawled out over three excruciating days.
• The Summit - Pat Falvey & Pemba Gyalje Sherpa
  The story of the 2008 K2 disaster.

• Ignition - John D. Clark
  Excellent overview of the development of modern rocket propellants. Really funny.
  “As I had suffered from mercury poisoning on two previous occasions and didn’t care to take a chance on doing it again, I thought that it would be an excellent idea to have somebody else make the compound…”
• Superintelligence - Nick Bostrom
  Absurdly tedious book. I managed to finish it after two months of reading a few pages each day. It’s on this list because being aware of the AI safety terminology helps one sound intelligent during disagreements.
• The Emperor of All Maladies - Siddhartha Mukherjee
  An exposition of cancer: history, treatments, and science. Indispensable. The author is a powerful writer.
• The Gene - Siddhartha Mukherjee
  A thorough exploration of the central idea of 20th-century biology.
• Last Chance to See - Douglas Adams
  Adams’ lesser-known book about his travels to remote areas in search of endangered animals. Written in his characteristic humorous style. Very moving.