Gateway

Good News From Outer Space

John Kessel1989

A revived reporter searches for evidence of aliens in a 1999 America obsessed with the millennium. The story follows several fringe characters.

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Nova Express

William S. Burroughs1964

An experimental narrative uses the cut-up technique to depict a war between intergalactic criminals and the police. It is a collage of imagery.

Same sardonic register, still science fiction

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Rakesfall

Vajra Chandrasekera2024

Two souls reincarnate across centuries of Sri Lankan history and a distant future. The narrative shifts through different bodies and realities.

sardonic → dreamlike

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Dhalgren

Samuel R. Delany1975

An amnesiac wanderer enters Bellona, a city cut off from the world where time and geography shift. He joins a gang and writes poetry.

sardonic → dreamlike, still unreliable narrator

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The Last Question

Isaac Asimov2007

A short story told in seven vignettes spanning billions of years. Humanity asks a supercomputer if the heat death of the universe can be avoided.

sardonic → meditative, still science fiction

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Dream Park

Steven Barnes1981

A security chief investigates a real death during a high-stakes holographic role-playing game. The story tracks the game mechanics and the murder.

sardonic → propulsive, still science fiction

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Fifty Shades of Grey

E.L. James2000

A college student enters a sexual contract with a wealthy businessman. The story focuses on their power dynamics and BDSM encounters.

sardonic → earnest

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Logan's run

William F. Nolan1967

In a future where everyone is executed at age 21, an enforcer becomes a fugitive. He attempts to reach a rumored sanctuary.

sardonic → tense, still science fiction

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Influx

Daniel Suarez2014

A physicist invents a gravity-reflecting device and is imprisoned by a secret agency that suppresses technology. He plots a high-tech escape.

sardonic → propulsive, still science fiction

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Star Wars Episode VII - The Force Awakens

Alan Dean Foster2001

A scavenger and a defecting soldier join the fight against a new galactic power. They search for a missing hero from the previous generation.

sardonic → propulsive, still science fiction

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Looking Backward, 2000-1887

Edward Bellamy1888

A man falls into a hypnotic sleep in 1887 and wakes up in the year 2000 to find the United States transformed into a socialist utopia.

sardonic → earnest, still science fiction

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Invisible Cities

Italo Calvino1972

Marco Polo describes fifty-five imaginary cities to Kublai Khan. The book is a series of short, prose-poem meditations on urban existence.

sardonic → meditative

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Dandelion Wine

Ray Bradbury1946

A twelve-year-old boy experiences a series of vignettes over one summer in 1928 Illinois. The chapters focus on small-town life and aging.

sardonic → elegiac

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Hellspark

Janet Kagan1988

A linguist travels to a new planet to investigate a murder. She must determine if the local species is sentient while navigating a conspiracy.

sardonic → tense, still science fiction

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The Running Man

Richard Bachman

A man enters a deadly reality show to fund medical care for his daughter. He must survive thirty days while the entire world hunts him for money.

sardonic → propulsive, still science fiction

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Strangers

Gardner Dozois1978

An artist living among the alien Cian on a distant planet falls in love with a local woman and attempts to navigate their incompatible biology.

sardonic → elegiac, still science fiction

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