It’s been almost two hundred years ago now when Mary Shelly wrote what would become considered the first science-fiction novel in the history of all literature: Frankenstein. Sprouting from a mad scientist’s desire to animate a creature cobbled from different body parts, the genre has evolved far and wide in the couple of centuries since.
Today, the horizons of science-fiction have been opened far and wide, even reaching into the vast and infinite beyond of the cosmos; it’s a genre with a potential limited only by our imagination.
For most people, science-fiction is generally about technology beyond our current understanding, generally alongside depictions of a futuristic society, inevitably criticizing our own in some fashion.
To me, however, science-fiction is about the exploration of ideas, philosophies and moral questions made possible by inserting relatable, grounded and realistic humans into scenarios which, for now, are imaginary, but might one day be made possible with our penchant for what we call progress.
In this section you will find the science-fiction books which I believe go beyond the surface of shiny gadgets and space ships, telling the kinds of stories which push us to think about and observe our very own reality.
Newest Reviews
“Piranesi” by Susanna Clarke – Life in the Endless House
Susanna Clarke may have taken a long time to publish her second novel, Piranesi, but it was very much worth the wait for the unique premise it carries.
The story follows a young man living in a seemingly endless, ever-shifting labyrinthine house, and the immensely profound journey of discovery he ends up on when a seemingly evil entity finds its way into the home.
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“To The Center Of The Earth” by Greig Beck – The Dwellers in the Core
Greig Beck has visibly grown as an author since his first arrival on the scene, and most recently he found the motivation to tackle an ambitious project, re-telling a classic with his latest novel, To The Center Of The Earth.
Following a team of cave explorers diving deep below the earth in the former Soviet Union, we witness their incredible journey following the instructions of a madwoman locked in a Russian asylum, after having travelled there herself fifty years ago.
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“Rise of the Mystics” by Ted Dekker – The Final Seal
Ted Dekker introduced us to a world of countless unimaginable wonders in his Beyond the Circle series, and with Rise of the Mystics he brings the grand adventure to a close.
With three of five seals in her possession, Rachelle Matthews, the dreamer who turned out to be the prophesied 49th mystic, forges onwards to find the remaining two and hopefully prevent both worlds from plunging into total darkness.
“The 49th Mystic” by Ted Dekker – Prophecy for the Blind
Ted Dekker has always sought to push his novels far beyond the confines of the ordinary and expected, something he has once again achieved with his standalone book, The 49 th Mystic.
Our main character is a blind little girl whose life takes a turn for the strange after a botched operation to restore her eyesight; dreams of another world begin to fill her reality. It becomes unclear to her to which of the two worlds is in fact real, but she does know a prophecy awaits her in the dream, one which will plunge both worlds into eternal darkness should she fail to fulfil it.
“Awakening: Event Horizon” by Stan I. S. Law – A Utopia at the World’s End
The apocalypse preoccupies our mind more than most other topics, and while some see it as the end of the world, there are those who take a somewhat different approach, and see it as a chance to rebuild. Stan I. S. Law explores this way of thinking in the third book of the Avatar Trilogy, titled Awakening: Event Horizon.
The story of Anne, Peter and company continues as a drastic shift in the world occurs: a new ice age that kills over 90% of the Earth’s population and tears massive land chunks asunder. A new dawn awaits mankind, but what will the people to rise out of it look like?
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“The Winter Over” by Matthew Iden – Into the Freezing Inferno
Cold and isolation are enough to drive anyone mad, and in Matthew Iden’s “The Winter Over” forty-four engineers and researchers are faced with nine months of it on a research facility on the South Pole, isolated from the world.
Cass Jennings is one of the engineers, and her efforts to rebuild a shattered life are put on hold as someone in the crew is found murdered. From there on, tensions could only rise…
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