The Martians

The Fountains of Paradise

Arthur C. Clarke1979

An engineer in the 22nd century attempts to build a 36,000-kilometer space elevator. He must overcome technical, political, and religious hurdles.

pace0·prose-1·bleak0

Too Like the Lightning

Ada Palmer2016

In a 25th-century utopia, a convict narrates the discovery of a boy who can perform miracles. The prose uses 18th-century styles and gender terms.

meditative → sardonic

pace0·prose+1·bleak+1

Valis

Philip K. Dick1981

A man experiences a beam of pink light that imparts vast information. The narrative explores his mental breakdown and search for God in California.

Same meditative register

pace0·prose+1·bleak+1

Shadow & Claw

Gene Wolfe1983

A torturer travels across a far-future Earth where technology is indistinguishable from magic. He recounts his exile in dense, archaic prose.

Same meditative register

pace0·prose+1·bleak+1

The long earth

Terry Pratchett2012

Humans discover they can 'step' into an infinite series of parallel Earths. The story follows a pioneer and an AI exploring these empty worlds.

Same meditative register, still hard sci-fi

pace0·prose-1·bleak-1

Time Enough for Love

Robert A. Heinlein1973

Lazarus Long, a man over two thousand years old, recounts his various lives and philosophies to his descendants. It is a series of nested stories.

Same meditative register, still hard sci-fi

pace0·prose-1·bleak-1

Mission of gravity

Hal Clement1954

A human crew recruits a tiny, centipede-like alien to retrieve a probe from a planet where gravity is 700 times that of Earth.

meditative → earnest, still hard sci-fi

pace0·prose-1·bleak-1

All Systems Red

Martha Wells2017

A self-aware security android hacks its own governor module to watch soap operas while protecting a team of scientists on a distant planet.

meditative → wry

pace+2·prose-2·bleak-1

Skin Game

Jim Butcher2014

Wizard Harry Dresden joins a team of villains to rob a vault in the Underworld. It is a fast-paced heist set in a modern fantasy Chicago.

meditative → propulsive

pace+2·prose-2·bleak0

The Kaiju Preservation Society

John Scalzi2022

A food delivery driver joins a secret organization that travels to an alternate Earth to care for massive, dinosaur-like creatures.

meditative → playful

pace+2·prose-2·bleak-1

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.

Same meditative register

pace-1·prose+1·bleak0

Beelzebub's tales to his grandson

Georges Ivanovitch Gurdjieff1950

An extraterrestrial being explains the history and strange behaviors of humanity to his grandson during a long space voyage.

Same meditative register

pace-1·prose+1·bleak0

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.

meditative → elegiac

pace-1·prose0·bleak-1

Echopraxia

Peter Watts2014

A biologist is caught on a mission toward the sun alongside a pilot and a group of transhuman monks. It explores consciousness and evolution.

meditative → bleak, still hard sci-fi

pace0·prose+1·bleak+2

Beyond the Aquila Rift

Alastair Reynolds2001

A spaceship crew wakes from cold sleep to find they have overshot their destination by light-years. They must face the reality of their location.

meditative → bleak, still hard sci-fi

pace+1·prose0·bleak+2

The Killing Star

Charles R. Pellegrino1995

Relativistic missiles destroy Earth without warning. The few human survivors in the solar system are hunted by an alien species using logic.

meditative → bleak, still hard sci-fi

pace+1·prose-1·bleak+2