Why am I passionate about this?

I’m a novelist and game designer from Bangalore. I’ve been a lifelong reader of science fiction and fantasy. Growing up, I almost never encountered futures that included people like me—brown women, from a country that isn’t the UK/ US, and yet, who are in sync with the rapidly changing global village we belong to. Over the last decade, though, I've found increasing joy in more recent science fiction, in which the future belongs to everyone. The Ten Percent Thief is an expression of my experiences living in dynamic urban India, and represents one of our many possible futures. 


I wrote

The Ten Percent Thief

By Lavanya Lakshminarayan,

Book cover of The Ten Percent Thief

What is my book about?

The Ten Percent Thief is a near-future mosaic novel set in Apex City, formerly Bangalore, India. Everything here is decided…

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The books I picked & why

Book cover of Noor

Lavanya Lakshminarayan Why did I love this book?

This book delves into several themes that scare me about the present, including identity and personhood, surveillance states, and capitalism.

It’s set in futuristic Nigeria, now run by Ultimate Corp, a global corporation that reads like a billionaire tech bro dream-come-true, AKA bad news for everyone else. We follow Anwuli Okwudili, a disabled young woman with cybernetic prosthetics who’s on the run from the law. With a relentless pace, this book effortlessly weaves between the deeply personal struggles of its protagonist and big, world-changing ideas. It forces readers to confront terrifying questions about where we're heading.

By Nnedi Okorafor,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Noor as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

From Africanfuturist luminary Okorafor comes a new science fiction novel of intense action and thoughtful rumination on biotechnology, destiny, and humanity in a near-future Nigeria.

Anwuli Okwudili prefers to be called AO. To her, these initials have always stood for Artificial Organism. AO has never really felt...natural, and that's putting it lightly. Her parents spent most of the days before she was born praying for her peaceful passing because even in-utero she was "wrong". But she lived. Then came the car accident years later that disabled her even further. Yet instead of viewing her strange body the way the world…


Book cover of Infomocracy

Lavanya Lakshminarayan Why did I love this book?

I’m fascinated by the possibilities presented by post-nation futures. Infomocracy looks at a future where ‘centenals’—groups of 100,000 people without historic nationalist borders—elect an international corporate-affiliated body to govern the world.

High-stakes political intrigue fuels the biggest election in a century as multiple factions battle it out to seize power through the vehicle of futuristic democracy. To me, the highlight of this novel is its exploration of democracy—it’s peppered with paradoxical and intense arguments that are rewarding to engage with, and enhance the richness of its world. 

By Malka Older,

Why should I read it?

4 authors picked Infomocracy as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

It's been twenty years and two election cycles since Information, a powerful search engine monopoly, pioneered the switch from warring nation-states to global microdemocracy. The corporate coalition party Heritage has won the last two elections. With another election on the horizon, the Supermajority is in tight contention, and everything's on the line. With power comes corruption. For Ken, this is his chance to do right by the idealistic Policy1st party and get a steady job in the big leagues. For Domaine, the election represents another staging ground in his ongoing struggle against the pax democratica. For Mishima, a dangerous Information…


Book cover of The City Inside

Lavanya Lakshminarayan Why did I love this book?

This book holds a future that’s a mirror to present-day India. Joey is a Reality Controller who manages her ex-boyfriend’s influencer career. Rudra is attempting to escape his family’s shady business. They're both plunged into the deep end of the surveillance-heavy, thought-policed, escapist entertainment-fuelled reality they belong to.

I first read this novel in its South Asian avatar, Chosen Spirits, when it was released the same year as my book. It was exciting to encounter a near-future Delhi that simultaneously both mirrored and contrasted my reimagined near-future Bangalore. Dark, satirical, horrifying, and hopeful all at once—if you’re looking for a book that captures the zeitgeist in modern-day India, this is it.

By Samit Basu,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked The City Inside as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Featured in the Washington Post “The 9 best science fiction and fantasy novels of 2022”!

A highly anticipated 2022 release for Polygon | The Washington Post | The Nerd Daily | BookBub | The Philadelphia Inquirer | The Portalist | Tor.com

The City Inside, a near-future epic by the internationally celebrated Samit Basu, pulls no punches as it comes for your anxieties about society, government, the environment, and our world at large—yet never loses sight of the hopeful potential of the future.

“They'd known the end times were coming but hadn’t known they’d be multiple choice.”

Joey is a Reality…


Book cover of Waste Tide

Lavanya Lakshminarayan Why did I love this book?

I picked this novel because, for lack of a better phrase, it’s too real. In an entirely believable and horrifying future lies Silicon Isle, an island made of trash. It’s where the world dumps all its electronic waste, for generations of poor, marginalized people to sort through, while pollutants make the tiny world they call home uninhabitable and hostile.

It also happens to be where a powerful biological weapon is hidden, unknowingly discovered by Mimi, one of the novel’s protagonists. It transforms her. Class disparities come to the fore, leading to revolution. This is classic cyberpunk, refreshingly set in a future outside the UK/ US, translated from the original Chinese by Ken Liu.

By Chen Qiufan, Ken Liu (translator),

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Waste Tide as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

A Guardian Science Fiction Book of the Year.

Mimi is drowning in the world's trash.

She's a 'waste girl', a scavenger picking through towering heaps of hazardous electronic detritus. Along with thousands of other migrant workers, she was lured to Silicon Isle, off the southern coast of China, by the promise of steady work and a better life.

But Silicon Isle is where the rotten fruits of capitalism and consumer culture come to their toxic end. The land is hopelessly polluted, the workers utterly at the mercy of those in power. And now a storm is gathering, as ruthless local…


Book cover of Machinehood

Lavanya Lakshminarayan Why did I love this book?

The year is 2095, and human beings must take performance enhancement pills to compete with automated systems. The future in Machinehood could be ours tomorrow.

Welga and Nithya, the novel’s protagonists, are constantly on the verge of burnout while pushing themselves to perform. A mysterious terrorist organization called the Machinehood turns up to demand equal rights for AI, and that humans put an end to pill manufacturing, triggering events around the world. Parts of the novel are set in Chennai, India, and despite all its futuristic advances, the city retains its present day identity. Machinehood also portrays women in technologically-driven spaces, which is something I'm always rooting for.

By S.B. Divya,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Machinehood as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

From the Hugo Award nominee S.B. Divya, Zero Dark Thirty meets The Social Network in this science fiction thriller about artificial intelligence, sentience, and labor rights in a near future dominated by the gig economy.

Welga Ramirez, executive bodyguard and ex-special forces, is about to retire early when her client is killed in front of her. It's 2095 and people don't usually die from violence. Humanity is entirely dependent on pills that not only help them stay alive, but allow them to compete with artificial intelligence in an increasingly competitive gig economy. Daily doses protect against designer diseases, flow enhances…


Explore my book 😀

The Ten Percent Thief

By Lavanya Lakshminarayan,

Book cover of The Ten Percent Thief

What is my book about?

The Ten Percent Thief is a near-future mosaic novel set in Apex City, formerly Bangalore, India. Everything here is decided by the mathematically perfect Bell Curve. With the right image, values, and opinions, you can ascend to the glittering heights of the Twenty Percent – the Virtual elite – and have the world at your feet. Otherwise, you risk falling to the precarious Ten Percent, faced with deportation to the ranks of the Analogs, with no access to electricity, running water, or even humanity.

The system has no flaws. Nothing has happened. Not yet, anyway. Until the elusive Ten Percent Thief steals a single jacaranda seed from the Virtual city and plants a revolution in the barren soil of the Analog world.

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The Stark Beauty of Last Things

By Céline Keating,

Book cover of The Stark Beauty of Last Things

Céline Keating Author Of The Stark Beauty of Last Things

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Why am I passionate about this?

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Céline's 3 favorite reads in 2023

What is my book about?

This book is set in Montauk, under looming threat from a warming climate and overdevelopment. Now outsider Clancy, a thirty-six-year-old claims adjuster scarred by his orphan childhood, has inherited an unexpected legacy: the power to decide the fate of Montauk’s last parcel of undeveloped land. Everyone in town has a stake in the outcome, among them Julienne, an environmentalist and painter fighting to save the landscape that inspires her art; Theresa, a bartender whose trailer park home is jeopardized by coastal erosion; and Molly and Billy, who are struggling to hold onto their property against pressure to sell. When Clancy…

The Stark Beauty of Last Things

By Céline Keating,

What is this book about?

The Stark Beauty of Last Things is set in Montauk, the far reaches of the famed Hamptons, an area under looming threat from a warming climate and overdevelopment. Now outsider Clancy, a thirty-six-year-old claims adjuster scarred by his orphan childhood, has inherited an unexpected legacy: the power to decide the fate of Montauk's last parcel of undeveloped land.

Everyone in town has a stake in the outcome, among them Julienne, an environmentalist and painter fighting to save the landscape that inspires her art; Theresa, a bartender whose trailer park home is jeopardized by coastal erosion; and Molly and Billy, who…


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