May SFFKIT: Aliens!

The May SFFKIT is all about meeting the 'other' and what happens when we do.



My personal absolute favorite in the genre is The Many-Colored Land which I re-read often (the whole series).

But you don't have to read only Sci Fi. Fantasy worlds where humans meet elfs, or boggarts, or Hobbits! for the first time count too. So enjoy!

Some ideas: http://www.librarything.com/tag/alien+contact

Don't forget to update the wiki with your reading:
http://www.librarything.com/wiki/index.php/2017_Unofficial_SF/SFFKIT#May:

I am planning on reading The War of the Worlds by H.G. Wells.

I'm going to read either Foreigner or Left Hand of Darkness...or both if I have time :)

Now that the nominees have been announced, I'm starting my Hugo reading. I hope to get to Leviathan Wakes (first book in the Expanse series, nominated for Best Series) and The Dark Forest (the book that precedes Death's End, nominated for Best Novel).

>4 mathgirl40: oh, Leviathan Wakes is excellent!

Having just completed the trilogy quite recently I would say that Dawn the first book of the Xenogenesis (aka Lilith's Brood) series by Octavia E. Butler would fit the bill perfectly. So anyone who has been thinking of giving her work a try (or wanted to read more) then this might be an opportune time.

Here's a suggested read about an alien encounter, with a twist: The Pride of Chanur by the author of Foreigner, CJ Cherryh. In this story, the alien is a human, and several different "alien" species are willing to kill just to get their hands/paws on it!

I was going to skip this CAT thinking that I didn't have any books about aliens. But since we can use books with "others" I had decided to read The Magician's Land by Lev Grossman. Now, thanks to >6 AHS-Wolfy: I realize that I have Dawn by Octavia Butler on my kindle and could read that as well.

>4 mathgirl40: I've been watching The Expanse on SyFy and loving it. I must remember to add the books to my wish list

I think I'll be reading Judas Unchained, the second book in The Commonwealth Saga about an alien invasion.

I so enjoyed Long Way to a Small Angry Planet by Becky Chambers that I am going to read the next one in the series, A Closed and Common Orbit. If time permits, then I'll read Starship Troopers by Robert A. Heinlein. If I can't get to Starship Troopers this month, I'll read it for the awards month.

Hmm, I'll have to think about this one...maybe I'll try to get The Sparrow from the library again, since I couldn't get it in time for March's "SFF and religion" theme.

For those trying to decide, I highly recommend Poul Anderson's The High Crusade, which is a first-contact story that takes place in the year 1345!

I may be stretching it a little but I just started listening to Fledgling: A Novel by Octavia butler. It's about a girl who wakes up with no memory of who or what she is. She 'encounters' a human who unconsciously falls under her vampire power. Does that count as a contact?

>12 mamzel: Feel free to stretch it as much as necessary!

>13 majkia: Merci beaucoup!

I bought Embassytown just yesterday, but I think I'll go with The Scar, also by China Miéville

>15 Robertgreaves:. I really enjoyed Embassytown.

Embassytown was really intriguing! I haven't gotten to The Scar yet, but will.

I'm another fan of Embassytown. It took me a while to get into the book, but once I understood what was going on, I was riveted!

I started Sleeping Giants by Sylvain Neuvel today and hopefully it will last through to May as it is tagged aliens.

I'm actually going to slip in the book I just finished, 172 Hours on the Moon by Johan Harstad. I didn't realize it would fit into this category. Surprise!

My plan for this month is to read A Darkling Sea by James L. Cambias -- first contact on an ice-covered moon.

If I have time, I am also considering something more classic like Footfall by Larry Niven or Asimov's The Gods Themselves. And possibly Calculating God or Healer.

Finished The Left Hand of Darkness by Ursula K. Le Guin; I can't say it's my favorite of Le Guin's works (that I've read so far), but I am glad to have read it. Full review written.

>22 whitewavedarling: that one is on my TBR pile. Do I need to read the first three books first or is it okay as a standalone read?

>23 fuzzi: All of the Hainish cycle can be read independently of each other, apart from some of the short stories.

I've decided to read a Connie Willis novella, All Seated on the Ground, an alien invasion story where the aliens apparently do nothing but stand around and glare disapprovingly.

>23 fuzzi:, I'd probably recommend starting with the others... I had it alone in my TBR also, so I went with it, but I had a really hard time getting into it. It may have been because I was distracted by travel, but it also could have been that I'd have had a better experience if I'd read the others first. I actually didn't realize it wasn't a stand-alone when I took it along on my vacation, or I probably would have waited.

>24 Robertgreaves: >26 whitewavedarling: thanks for the answers! I am pretty particular about reading series books in order, so I'll wait. What's one more paperback languishing for months on my shelves...?? ;)

>27 fuzzi: For me, there is a difference between a series and a set of novels taking place in the same universe that have no characters (or even planets, if I recall correctly) in common.

>28 ronincats:, >27 fuzzi:, I'd agree there's a big difference there, and wouldn't feel a need to read books in order if they simply took place in the same world. And, perhaps I should add... the world of The Left Hand of Darkness was clear enough; it was just the character's voice that I couldn't really connect to and engage with. So if the characters are different in separate books, it wouldn't have made any difference at all on my end either.

>29 whitewavedarling: The Hainish books aren't strictly a series. They are set in the same general universe but on different worlds with different characters and often take place thousands of years apart. I don't think even Le Guin is clear as to their proper chronological order. The only difference it makes is that in some books they have certain technologies that weren't invented or were just being invented in other books.

>30 sturlington:, thanks :) That makes me feel better about hitting this one first! I'd gotten the other/wrong impression from a few reviews (though that may be due to my being on cold medicine when I was reading them this week...)

>30 sturlington: thanks for the explanation. LibraryThing has the books listed as a series, so I thought they had the same characters and needed to be read in order.

>25 christina_reads: Oh, thank you, Christina! That's one of Willis' short works I hadn't read and I grabbed it on my Kindle. It's absolutely delightful! Keep in mind that I love her sense of humor and realize that it's going to be about communication and lack thereof and a touch of romance too. At least the lack of communication is not due to a lack of cell phones in this story--and it had more resonance because I had recently read Rebecca Solnit's Men Explain Things to Me, so it seemed perfectly possible to me. So, my first story with aliens this month is All Seated on the Ground.

Finished The Martian Chronicles by Ray Bradbury which is about Martians and other things.

>33 ronincats: Yay, glad you liked it! I've checked it out of the library but haven't gotten to it yet. Sounds like I'm in for a treat!

I got off to a really slow start with my SFF-reading, but I have finally read a book that fits the challenge, Winter Tide by Ruthanna Emrys. It's a revisionist Lovecraft retelling that has characters meeting Yith for the first time, as well as fully "changed" Innsmouth-ians. Unfortunately, it feels a bit like the second novel in a trilogy: all lead up and little action. Hopefully the actually second book will be better.

Finished 2001:a space odyssey today, old book/movie developed in conjunction with Stanley Kubrick in 1968. Watched the movie and finally read the book. Aliens play a key role as does technology, artificial intelligence, space travel and evolution.

I have completed War of the Worlds by H. G. Wells. Originally published in 1897, this is one of the first books written about conflict between Humans and Aliens. Although the stiff prose it is written in definitely dates this book, it is still a fantastic story.

The Three-Body Problem by Cixin Liu (400 pp.)

This book won the Hugo, but I struggled with the dry and to me unemotional laying out of an alien culture and their planned invasion of earth. This is only the first book of the trilogy, and there are no boots on the ground yet, but it moved very slowly for me. Original, lots of hard science, Chinese culture and history, but still not one I enjoyed.

Fledgling by Octavia E. Butler is about a vampiric species which somehow came to Earth a long time ago and has been living amongst us.

>39 ronincats:, I've had my eye on this one, guess I will wait a bit longer.

I have started Conflict of Honors, one of the Liaden Universe series.

I'm a bit more than half way through Reap the Wild Wind which has lots of aliens. It started out really slow for me, but I'm liking it better now, so hopefully I'll read it faster.

I reread War of the Worlds, and glad that I did. Great book. Now rereading Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy. I am liking it much more than the first time I read it.

I just finished Reap the Wild Wind which was a very different than the usual aliens meet the locals story. A bit slow at the start, but got interesting about a third of the way in.

I finished Rendezvous with Rama where a spaceship team explores a foreign spaceship of alien origin. I thought there would be alien critters, but we are left wondering who built the ship and why. A bit dated, but a solid read.

>39 ronincats: I too had found The Three-Body Problem somewhat of a challenge to read, but I had persevered and liked it well enough. I must be a real glutton for punishment because I'm now attempting to read the second volume, which is supposedly even more of a slog. I might put it off until later, as I'd just downloaded the Hugo Voter Packet which contains a lot of other great stuff in it.

I finished Leviathan Wakes earlier and loved it. I will definitely read more in this series.

I also picked up The Long Way to a Small, Angry Planet for 99 cents during a Kobo sale and I have its sequel in my Hugo Voter Packet, so that's next up for me.

ETA: I forgot to mention that I've almost finished A Woman of the Iron People by Eleanor Arnason, a novel published in 1991 about an anthropologist from Earth, who, with a team of researchers, makes first contact with an alien race. She arrives on their planet and lives among them for several months, studying their language and customs.

>47 mathgirl40: Actually, The Dark Forest was my favourite in the trilogy. If you like your SF fizzing with ideas you'll enjoy it.

On Tuesday night / Wednesday morning I finished Caliban's War, the 2nd of the expanse series by James S. A. Corey. I'll get around to writing a review at some point but I'm having 'puter problems at home so might not be too soon. I did like it though and can now happily be able to watch series 2 of the TV show.

>48 Robertgreaves: That's good to know. I'll persevere with the book.

>49 AHS-Wolfy: My library hold on Caliban's War came in a couple of days ago, so this is now at the top of my reading list. I'm working through season 1 of the Expanse and enjoying it very much. My husband and I particularly like spotting the Toronto landmarks where the episodes have been filmed.