/r/scifi

Photograph via snooOG

Science Fiction, or Speculative Fiction if you prefer. Fantasy too. Asimov, Bradbury, Clarke, Dick, Heinlein and other SF books. SF movies and TV shows. Fantasy stuff like Tolkien and Game of Thrones. Laser guns, space ships, and time travel. etc. Star Trek, Battlestar, Star Wars, etc.

Science Fiction, or Speculative Fiction if you prefer. Fantasy too. Beware of the Leopard.


  • New Rule: This rule was stupid and it's gone.

PLEASE DO NOT POST SPOILERS IN YOUR SUBMISSION TITLE. IT WILL BE REMOVED. If you see a title with a spoiler in it, downvote it as hard as you can and then message the moderators. We will delete it ASAP.

To write spoilers in comments, use the following method: [spoiler](/s "Darth Vader is Yoda's father")

Award Winning SF author Nancy Kress answers questions from the Reddit Scifi Community

Previously interviewed authors in the Ask an SF Author series:



Friends of r/scifi (related subreddits):

Science Fiction

Fantasy

Horror

TV/Movies

Other

Know any others? Message #scifi and let your friendly mods know!


Follow us at

/r/scifi

4,351,579 Subscribers

1

Are there any sci fi ships that can transform into buildings like the castle of lions from voltron?

Do you guys know if there any? I feel like the castle of lions is quite a unique ship compares to other sci fi so i wonder if there's any that is similar to it in this regards, tho i don't really read or watch that many stuff that's why i feel asking here would be approprite, i know of ships that are basically buildings in space like warhammer 40k star forts but i feel they're quite different.

Apologies if this is the wrong subreddit for this question

10 Comments
2025/02/03
14:32 UTC

0

Would you ever recommend Ursula K. Leguin's The Left Hand of Darkness?

I've loved science fiction since I was a kid, Star Wars, Star Trek and space opera and time travel adventures.

I got more into dystopian novels in my teens, 1984, Brave New World, Fatherland.

I had heard of Ursula K. Leguin's work. However I was a bit hesitant to read it for personal reasons.

I had a friend once who was an open fan and followed the ideologies of her work and posted recommendation on his social media.

-

-

-

-

-

Sadly a short time later

-

-

-

-

-

he took his own life.

17 Comments
2025/02/03
14:13 UTC

6

Suggestions of scifi novels where the protagonist or one of the protagonists is an android

Can you give suggestions of scifi novels where the protagonist or one of the protagonists is an android? Basically the title. Thanks in advance to everyone.

16 Comments
2025/02/03
13:10 UTC

68

It never will!...😊

8 Comments
2025/02/03
11:27 UTC

57

My colleague has seen a film in the past about a pirate that goes into a alien ship and get a skin like suit on when sitting in the chair to operate the ship. He then uses the ship to chase other ships and so on... he wants to know the name of this film. It's and old film, end of the 80s

64 Comments
2025/02/03
09:54 UTC

2

Tom Swift

1 Comment
2025/02/03
09:34 UTC

0

How would an erasure paradox play out if u never existed u never did the deed u did??

i was thinkin of an mc who is a paradox he doesnt kill he erases meaning u never existed

How It Works

  • Causal Erasure: If you are touched by his energy, you don’t just die—you were never born. Memories of you vanish, records of your existence disappear, and anything you influenced shifts as if you never were.
  • The Butterfly Effect: Because he erases things at a fundamental level, their absence causes ripple effects throughout time and space. Entire wars may never have happened, civilizations might fall apart or change overnight, and the laws of cause and effect slowly unravel.
  • A Living Paradox: He is both real and unreal. Every time he erases something, the universe struggles to "correct" itself. The more he uses his power, the more unstable reality becomes, making him a cosmic anomaly—a walking contradiction.

how do you form a plot around this paradox

3 Comments
2025/02/03
08:37 UTC

0

Is it normal that I find it easier to sympathize and identify with humanoid characters? English is not my native language

I like nonhumanoid aliens, but its sometimes hard to me to sympathize,identify,and understand them,and while in some examples I can ( animorphs) in others its hard to me(especialy if its comics or too alien values and morality) Did its normal ?

8 Comments
2025/02/03
06:49 UTC

2

THE MATRIX RELOADED (2003) by Sahin Düzgün

0 Comments
2025/02/03
06:21 UTC

0

What unexpected surprise might happen during the Planet Parade 2025?

What's the coolest fact you know about the planets aligning in 2025?

2 Comments
2025/02/03
05:44 UTC

0

Mars Express - Review

0 Comments
2025/02/03
05:38 UTC

0

Rebirth of the Forgotten World

The story revolves around an apocalypse. The people's adventure. How the world gets re established.

Would love to hear some feedback. It is my first time writing in this genre.

Link : https://amzn.in/d/4SGvrgi

Thanks in advance 🥹

0 Comments
2025/02/03
04:02 UTC

2

Trying to remember a story.

So I'm trying to remember a story. An alien species have the genders split. Males live in the wilds hunting and gathering. Females live in cities and have technology. They meet once a year to mate and for fathers to take their sons from their mothers.

Can anyone point me to this story?

3 Comments
2025/02/03
01:50 UTC

69

Why would advanced aliens visit earth?

It's portrayed a lot in sci fi. An advanced alien race invades earth for its resources, possibly enslaving humans to mine said resources. But why would an advanced alien race invade earth for resources when most of the 'stuff' that's on our planet is abundant in the universe? The only thing that I can think of that's rare in enough, and can justify spending a massive amount of resources and time is life. Life is the one thing that science hasn't proven to be abundant in the universe, particularly intelligent life.

161 Comments
2025/02/03
00:11 UTC

0

Weird question but has anyone actually tried taking the test in Harlan Ellison’s “The Deathbird”?

For those who haven't read this story, the basic plot summary is that far into the distant future, a man named Nathan Stack, who is the most recent in a long line of incarnations dating all the way back to Lilith's husband, is woken up by an alien being we humans perceive to be Satan, because the Earth is dying and he is the only who can put it out of its misery. However, this devilish being is actually humanity's friend, as the God of the Abrahamic religions was actually another ET who stole the Earth from Satan's (named Dira in the story) species, Earth's original creators. The story is interspliced with a fictional test meant to reiterate its themes, and it can theoretically be taken (but not for any sort of final grade lol).

8 Comments
2025/02/03
00:04 UTC

1

Welcome T-800

Another villain to the mix. The Thing, the Kurgan, and Roy Batty to go.

8 Comments
2025/02/02
23:59 UTC

58

We need a book series like "Mass Effect"

I remember playing Mass Effect and being so awestruck I wondered why didn't we have a novel series like that.

I read "The Expanse" and loved it but what I really crave is something like that but with non generic aliens.

We need a 6-9 book long series that focuses on a lovable spaceship crew set in a setting with Star Trek like technology and various aliens but yet feels new and refreshing compared to Star Trek.

48 Comments
2025/02/02
22:59 UTC

41

Nobody asked him about his hair

I read a post here in the past or possibly on Goodreads pointing out that Adrian Tchaikovsky takes great pains to point out the state of male character's hairlines or lack thereof. Afterwards, it put my radar up and I've been noticing it since in his writing. It's similar to how Philip K Dick would often take the time to describe female character's breasts. In the case of PKD it was generally in admiration of size, heft, and shape, as well as the overall booby-ness of various young female assistants or secretarial types, iirc. He was a man of his time who liked him some titties, tho it comes off today as a total record-scratch moment in his stories.

Regarding Adrian Tchaikovsky, when he describes a balding or *gasp* a totally bald man it generally contains a note of mockery or derision, like in Shadows of the Apt how General Tynan is "bald like a stone" and needs "a big hat to protect his bald head from the blazing sun" or when Weaponsmaster Tisamon sees War Master Stenwold Maker after many years, he observes that he is even fatter and balder, "and you were never well-haired".

This came to mind when seeing recent photos of Adrian Tchaikovsky and his new, wild mane. He looks kinda cool, like a Renaissance Fair type who can speak some Klingon. Nonetheless, speaking as a baldhead myself, I decry this blatant hair-ism from a man so "well-haired" himself!

Honestly, dude, if you're gonna fixate on a character's physical attributes, consider the Dick-man. For example, I know nothing at all about Spider-hottie Tynisa Maker's tits, tho from all the descriptions of her as a tall, lean, fair-haired heartbreaker I imagine she tended towards the petite and perky.

- Stray Observation: for lack of better, I used that topic title; I was aware that it's a sample in a song, I could hear it my head. I suspected Beastie Boys but after a quick googling I had to smile. It's from a pale-er, grim British cousin of the Beasties, the great Meat Beat Manifesto. Always thought of MBM as the UK's answer to Public Enemy.

Jolly good, carry on and always wear sunscreen, fellow baldheads.

18 Comments
2025/02/02
22:33 UTC

12

What would you eat?

If you could pick one fictional food from any science fiction media to try what would it be and why, what do you think it'd taste like, and if you were to try and make a version of it using real world ingredients what would the recipe be?

54 Comments
2025/02/02
21:49 UTC

0

Companion (2025) Movie Theater Audience Thoughts/Reviews

1 Comment
2025/02/02
21:05 UTC

777

Does anyone recognize those ships? Where are they from?

Saw this work at an exhibition nearby a painting of all Star Trek ships, but I can’t recognize where do these come from. Any ideas?

218 Comments
2025/02/02
20:58 UTC

29

"Strange Science" Illustration (OC)

2 Comments
2025/02/02
20:27 UTC

3

Looking for author/title from the 80’s

In the mid to late 80’s I had a thick anthology of short stories, possibly compiled by Asimov but I’m not sure. I would like to revisit one of the stories but I don’t remember its title or author.

It is about a scientist who is researching forcefields, he has a keen taste for alcohol. Whenever he gets close to a breakthrough, he either passes out, feels ill, or cannot continue for whatever reason. He begins to realize that he is in a Petrie dish controlled by a higher intelligence and that his research, which would prevent humanity from destroying itself, is counter to what this intelligence hopes to achieve in its experiment.

If I remember correctly, he solves the problem by getting shitfaced drunk, thereby bypassing the control mechanism.

Does this ring a bell for anyone?

2 Comments
2025/02/02
19:52 UTC

8

“Epicenter,” oils on canvas, by me.

1 Comment
2025/02/02
19:13 UTC

3

Spider man fan comic cover | Art made by me

0 Comments
2025/02/02
19:04 UTC

163

12 Monkeys (TV series)

So ten years ago the first season premiered. I showed interesed for the series after Star Trek Picard Season 3, also created by Terry Matalas. I binge watched it in 2 months and now after two months I am doing a rewatch. By far the best time travel series and time travel concepts ever on tv.

43 Comments
2025/02/02
19:00 UTC

Back To Top