John Scalzi's 6 favorite sci-fi works

The acclaimed author recommends works by Frank Herbert, Ursula K. Le Guin, and more

John Scalzi.
(Image credit: Athena Scalzi)

John Scalzi's latest novel, The Consuming Fire, is the second book in his new series about a human-created intergalactic empire. Below, the acclaimed author and Los Angeles Times critic at large names his six favorite examples of sci-fi worldbuilding.

Dune by Frank Herbert (1965).

Dune is in many ways the gold standard of sci-fi worldbuilding, creating a complex political, cultural, and religious milieu and putting it in service of a story with ecological and economic ramifications for our world. Dune's universe is so complex that no one yet has made a decent visual version of it, though they keep trying. (Hint: Make it a series.)

Subscribe to The Week

Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.

SUBSCRIBE & SAVE
https://cdn.mos.cms.futurecdn.net/flexiimages/jacafc5zvs1692883516.jpg

Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

Sign up

Grass by Sheri S. Tepper (1989).

Though less heralded than Dune, Grass is equally complex in its worldbuilding (here done with a feminist bent) and has a civilization-threatening mystery at its core. By imagining a story that unfolds on a planet whose human population is dominated by hunting-obsessed toffs, Tepper takes on patriarchy, aristocracy, alien moral systems, and the problem of being too good to do good.

Always Coming Home by Ursula K. Le Guin (1985).

This lesser-known but fascinating book by Le Guin imagines a culture of people in a future California and reveals them to the reader not just through story but by describing their rituals, fables, and daily lives. It's less a novel than a travelogue.

Perdido Street Station by China Miéville (2000).

This book started the millennium off with a bang and is a prime example of the "new weird" subgenre of fantasy. Miéville's city of New Crobuzon is filled with shady humans and other strange-yet-intelligent creatures, living in a place that's a cross between fin-de-siècle Paris and an H.P. Lovecraft nightmare. A fascinating place to visit. You probably don't want to live there.

Snow Crash by Neal Stephenson (1992).

Stephenson's vision of a fractured and fragmented United States is both hilariously written and depressing in its accurate depiction of increasing polarization. I don't think Stephenson intended to be a prophet for this crazy age we live in, but he's got the gig anyway.

The Broken Earth series by N.K. Jemisin (2015–17).

Each of the three novels of this trilogy won the prestigious Hugo Award, which is a first and wholly deserved. Jemisin's world is literally shattering, and the characters, human and otherwise, are shaping the future in unexpected ways. The Broken Earth is a monumental achievement, from a voice like no other in the field.

To continue reading this article...
Continue reading this article and get limited website access each month.
Get unlimited website access, exclusive newsletters plus much more.
Cancel or pause at any time.
Already a subscriber to The Week?
Not sure which email you used for your subscription? Contact us