Science-fiction changes as much as the world it leaves behind; it's hard to keep up with the trending sci-fi books. Luckily, Barnes & Noble makes it easy with bookseller reviews and recommendations—like the 10 here that are perfect for summer.
1. Project Hail Mary by Andy Weir
The same author who gave the world the sass and sound science of The Martian is behind this unique story of human struggle. The narrative follows Ryland Grace, a junior high school teacher who wakes up from a coma aboard a spaceship and is quickly enlisted to save the world. Weir is a prolific author of many short stories and full-length novels, but comparisons to The Martian are natural because it and Project Hail Mary have in common a groundwork in critical reasoning and science put into an extreme setting.
2. Network Effect by Martha Wells
The 5th book in the Murderbot Diaries series, which follows the life of a security robot that broke free of its programming and promptly began enjoying good TV and feeling frustrated by social relations. The series that Wells has crafted is introspective and distant from the world we know, and through this, she manages to make an engaging and consistently entertaining statement as only science-fiction books can.
3. Leviathan Falls by James S. A. Corey
George R. R. Martin, famed author of Game of Thrones, called this series “interplanetary adventure the way it ought to be written,” and this novel earns that description by capping the Expanse series with one last fantastic entry. Blending the thrills of adventure and the joys of a good space opera, the last book in the series gives a satisfying ending that will make you want to read the first eight books over again.
4. First Sister by Linden A. Lewis
First Sister is the book of a trilogy that blends the best parts of a space epic with the best parts of social commentary. With a large cast of compelling queer characters, First Sister is a powerful entry point into the trilogy, which will have its second title, Second Rebel, coming out in late August of 2021.
5. Black Sun by Rebecca Roanhorse
A science-fiction story about pre-Columbian America written by a Hugo Award–winning indigenous author, Black Sun starts a trilogy that will be as fascinating to watch unfold as it is rewarding. Roanhorse looks at a time period little explored in popular science-fiction and gives us a stunning story of magic that is worthwhile to watch develop.
6. City We Became by N. K. Jemisin
This urban fantasy by the four-time Hugo Award–winning author N. K. Jemisin follows three disparate characters who each manifest a connection to the beating life of their city. City We Became is a brilliant exploration into identity and place while also providing just a fantastic story.
A captivating mystery about a mysterious game that carried high stakes even before the fate of the universe was on the line. This story pulls together the distant threads of gaming fiction and universal destruction and throws them down an endless rabbit hole that you won’t want to dig your way out of.
8. House in the Cerulean Sea by TJ Klune
The best sci-fi, speculative fiction, and fantasy writing knows that it doesn’t have to be bleak to make a statement. House in the Cerulean Sea follows a straight-edge magical caseworker who has to investigate an orphanage of enchanted children, and what follows is a message of kindness and empathy. Heartwarming and endlessly creative, this relatively new story will age well.
9. Greater Good (Thrawn) by Timothy Zahn
Thrawn, one of the best-loved characters in Star Wars, is back in this second entry into the Thrawn Ascendancy Trilogy. Continue following the brilliant path this beloved character takes in this novel by Timothy Zahn in a Barnes & Noble Exclusive.
Dune is one of those books that will never not be one of the most important novels in science-fiction because it perfected many of the archetypes that built the genre. Frank Herbert’s masterpiece follows Paul Atreides, among many other characters, and the complex interplanetary politics of a universe that is at once massive and manageable through Herbert’s detailed and engaging prose. It’s a classic for a reason.
You can find Dune by Frank Herbert as well as all books featured above at Barnes & Noble now.
