Here are 100 books that Gravity fans have personally recommended if you like
Gravity.
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Why hopepunk, and why me? Look, it’s no surprise that you can look around today and find all sorts of indicators that we are entering Heinlein’s “Crazy Years.” Imagining a dystopian or grimdark future isn’t difficult; all you have to do is read the news. But I think that we are writing the history of the future right now, by the choices we make every day. Writing stories that present that optimistic view of the future is not just the right thing to do but necessary, at least to me. As Heinlein said, “A pessimist is correct oftener than an optimist, but an optimist has more fun…”
Andy Weir has. In my opinion, come to define hopepunk: pushing towards a goal through difficulties, even if the goal doesn’t personally benefit the character.
His depiction of the plight of Mark Watney, the impacts Watney’s plight have on a global scale, and the hard science behind it all combine to create a compelling story. The sacrifices his crewmates and NASA officials make to push his rescue forward exemplify the “community over self” attitude common in hopepunk.
Six days ago, astronaut Mark Watney became one of the first people to walk on Mars.
Now, he's sure he'll be the first person to die there.
After a dust storm nearly kills him and forces his crew to evacuate while thinking him dead, Mark finds himself stranded and completely alone with no way to even signal Earth that he's alive--and even if he could get word out, his supplies would be gone long before a rescue could arrive.
Chances are, though, he won't have time to starve to death. The damaged machinery, unforgiving environment, or plain-old human error are…
When I was at school in 1991, the terrible news came out that Freddie Mercury, lead singer of Queen, had died of HIV/AIDS. At the time, this virus was fatal in nearly everyone it infected. And yet, only 30 years later, we now have drugs that completely prevent the disease. This amazing breakthrough is just one of the many success stories that inspired my passion for infectious diseases, the way our immune system can fight them off, and how science can help us fight infections. The list of books goes from fiction about when infections go wrong and to popular science about how scientists ensure the nightmare scenario never happens.
I read this book as a teenager, and it sparked my fascination with infectious diseases and what can go wrong if they get out of control.
The book combines science with a really tense plotline. It is where I first heard of "interferon," part of the human immune system that fights viruses. This has brought me full circle, my lab researches interferon and viruses, and now I get to write books about it, too!
From the author of Jurassic Park, Timeline, and Sphere comes a captivating thriller about a deadly extraterrestrial microorganism, which threatens to annihilate human life.
Five prominent biophysicists have warned the United States government that sterilization procedures for returning space probes may be inadequate to guarantee uncontaminated re-entry to the atmosphere. Two years later, a probe satellite falls to the earth and lands in a desolate region of northeastern Arizona. Nearby, in the town of Piedmont, bodies lie heaped and flung across the ground, faces locked in frozen surprise. What could cause such shock and fear? The terror has begun, and…
In fifth grade, Sister Eugene had once required us to choose from a collage of Life magazine front covers she pinned to the blackboard. The flaming red sunset shining behind a medieval castle became my fiction-writing assignment: the martyrdom of St. Joan of Arc. Not only did that exercise reveal my joy in writing, but also that my attention was focused on contriving plots based on the feminine strength that influences the course of men. Furthermore, throughout my medical career, I reacted to the complex and often confounding emotions of my patients and their loved ones. It is why I prefer medical thrillers that are heavily character driven.
Anthropology is the science of culture, as much as that of religion. In The Gospel of Judas, Mr. Mawer contrived the discovery of ancient Jewish scrolls that set the morals for this exceptionally intelligent fiction. In this story, the author challenged the protagonist’s need for intimacy with the societal limitations imposed through religion. Beyond the plot, the author’s description of the passions that drove his characters were insightful and beautiful.
Amongst the ancient papyri of the Dead Sea, a remarkable scroll is discovered. Written in the first century AD, it purports to be the true account of the life of Jesus, as told by Youdas the sicarios - Judas Iscariot: the missing Gospel of Judas. If authentic, it will be one of the most incendiary documents in the history of humankind. The task of proving - or disproving - its validity falls to Father Leo Newman, one of the world's leading experts in Koine, the demotic Greek of the Roman Empire, and a man the newspapers like to call a…
I have always been fascinated by medicine and the people who are there to care for us when needed. I have worked as a nurse and midwife, and the thought that someone, anyone, could actively harm those in their care is horrific. But it happens. At first, I read medical thrillers as I would have read any murder mystery, but now, post-Shipman et al., I also want to know why they kill. I think that these books give us some ideas about this, but we can still never really know what goes on in the mind of a murderous doctor or nurse, and that’s what makes these books so thrilling.
Robin Cook is the Grandaddy of medical thriller writers, and I read this not long after it first came out. It is the chilling story of a medical student who investigates why normally fit and healthy patients are suddenly lapsing into coma.
There is a strong and intelligent female protagonist, which is important to me. Yes, she can cry and even fall into the arms of a man, but she needs to be intelligent and stay strong, and Susan does that here. At the time, I was impressed by the level of authenticity but didn’t believe that anyone in the medical profession would ever deliberately hurt or kill their patients. Now, of course, we know better.
I re-read it before writing this and can honestly say that this book stands the test of time and is still relevant today.
The blockbuster bestseller that kickstarted a new genre--the medical thriller--is now available in trade paperback for the first time. They called it "minor surgery," but Nancy Greenly, Sean Berman and a dozen others--all admitted to Boston Memorial Hospital for routine procedures--were victims of the same inexplicable, hideous tragedy on the operating table. They never woke up. Susan Wheeler is a third-year medical student working as a trainee at Boston Memorial Hospital. Two patients during her residency mysteriously go into comas immediately after their operations due to complications from anesthesia. Susan begins to investigate the causes behind both of these alarming…
I’ve always loved science fiction. My father was an Asimov junkie, and our house was packed with science fiction novels and stories from Azimov to Heinlein to Wyndham and Wilhelm. I began writing science fiction in high school, yet only recently published my first 4 novels (one of which won a Bookfest award). I hold a bachelor’s degree in computer science (bioinformatics), and I stay on top of science to inform my writing. It’s through this background that I select novels, seeking out new tropes and ideas in technological advancement. Each of these novels I mention exceeded my expectations and then some. Pick one up today—you won’t be disappointed!
Emma Watson firmly places herself in the mind of the protagonist Renata Ghali. Through this semi-reliable narrator, we learn that in this perfect planned society, a lot is happening beneath the still surface. This novel unfolds slowly, layering the pieces on scene by scene until something startling (which I don’t want to ruin for you) happens to the main character. Often in sci-fi, you see the character make some monumental decision, and then they win, and everything’s happy. This book doesn’t do that. Instead, it looks at the very real-feeling impact of said “monumental decision” on those who made it. And despite all of the character depth, Emma Watson manages to deliver a juicy, thick alien world that will leave you salivating for more!
From Emma Newman, the award-nominated author of Between Two Thorns, comes a novel of how one secret withheld to protect humanity's future might be its undoing...
Renata Ghali believed in Lee Suh-Mi's vision of a world far beyond Earth, calling to humanity. A planet promising to reveal the truth about our place in the cosmos, untainted by overpopulation, pollution, and war. Ren believed in that vision enough to give up everything to follow Suh-Mi into the unknown.
More than twenty-two years have passed since Ren and the rest of the faithful braved the starry abyss and established a colony at…
I’ve always loved reading young adult fantasy books with forbidden romance and lush worldbuilding and classic fairytale elements like princesses, dancing, pretty clothes, and delicious food spreads. All these books offer fresh takes and twists, and tug at your heartstrings with the angst, the betrayals, the secrets, and the love. These are all immersive stories that transport you far away, to a different time, to a different land, which is exactly what you need sometimes to get away from this world and its craziness.
Nyx will do anything to save her people, including marrying the terrible Ignifex, the evil ruler of her kingdom. But there is more to Ignifex than she initially imagined, and as Nyx falls in love with him, she fights to find a way to save both her people and her love. This book portrays such fun banter between Nyx and Ignifex and poses a truly difficult riddle that is bound to break your heart.
If you're excited about the upcoming Disney film Beauty and the Beast, starring Emma Watson, don't miss Cruel Beauty. The romance of Beauty and the Beast meets the adventure of Graceling in this dazzling fantasy novel about our deepest desires and their power to change our destiny. Perfect for fans of bestselling An Ember in the Ashes and A Court of Thorns and Roses, this gorgeously written debut infuses the classic fairy tale with glittering magic, a feisty heroine, and a romance sure to take your breath away. Betrothed to the evil ruler of her kingdom, Nyx has always known…
I love history, and it infuses most of my fiction. Since I first picked up a book, I’ve never stopped learning about the past. Now, I listen to college courses and podcasts and read books both popular and academic. Sometimes this is for my writing or personal travel, but those things are often just excuses for the fun of immersion in a subject. I particularly enjoy reading and writing alternate/secret history because it merges creative imagination with factual scholarship. But I’m picky about the use of history in all media—factual sloppiness bumps me out of a story as quickly as bad physics drives a scientist from an SF movie.
Smale is a fantastic award-winning writer of alternate history, and in Hot Moon we get to see that skill combined with his day job as astrophysicist for NASA. But above all this is an action story of the Cold War turning “hot” on the moon.
There are other alternate Apollo tales (e.g., For All Mankind), but I don’t know of any that have this level of space combat. Smale’s sprezzatura with the scientific details is such that I was never pushed out of the story by their complexity or by doubt in their correctness.
And like all of Smale’s work, Hot Moon never loses track of the importance of the “who” experiences technological change versus the change itself.
I’m looking forward to the next book in this series!
"A nail-biting thriller."−Publishers Weekly "I loved it. Great 'hard' science fiction with convincing space battles. "−Larry Niven "Will delight and enthrall."−Library Journal "A provocative science fiction novel."−Foreword Reviews “A superb mind-expanding sci-fi novel!”−Grady Harp (Amazon Hall of Fame Top100 Reviewer)
From the two-time Sidewise Award-winning author of the acclaimed Clash of Eagles trilogy comes an alternate 1979 where the US and the Soviets have permanent Moon bases, orbiting space stations, and crewed spy satellites supported by frequent rocket launches.
Apollo 32, commanded by career astronaut Vivian Carter, docks at…
As a kid I loved space, and devoured science fiction (Doctor Who was my favorite). Now I’m a grown-up, I write books for kids - 70 so far and counting. (My latest picture book is called Sometimes I Am Furious, illustrated by Joe Berger.) The Book of Blast Off! is my second book about space (the first one was just called Space – not the most imaginative title, it’s true). I love writing non-fiction for kids because, unlike grown-ups, you can’t blind them with science. You have to know what you’re talking about so you can explain things clearly. They’re the best audience and you want to be worthy of them.
This is a children’s version of the book that inspired the movie.
Like everyone else who saw that movie, I was blown away by the story – I was also thoroughly ashamed that I hadn’t heard about these amazing women before.
I’m no math whizz, so making all those impossibly complicated calculations – on which people’s lives would depend – is already completely beyond me. But doing so with such dignity and determination in the face of the daily grind of petty prejudice and poisonous ignorance puts them in the superhero category.
I was in tears in the movie, and once again when reading the book.
Based on the New York Times bestselling book and the Academy Award-nominated movie, author Margot Lee Shetterly and illustrator Laura Freeman bring the incredibly inspiring true story of four black women who helped NASA launch men into space to picture book readers!
Dorothy Vaughan, Mary Jackson, Katherine Johnson, and Christine Darden were good at math...really good.
They participated in some of NASA's greatest successes, like providing the calculations for America's first journeys into space. And they did so during a time when being black and a woman limited what they could do. But they worked hard. They persisted. And they…
I’ve studied space for 60+ years, including spotting Sputnik from atop 30 Rock for Operation Moonwatch; monitoring an exploding star for a PhD at University of Michigan, leading the Remotely Controlled Telescope project at Kitt Peak National Observatory, hunting pulsars from Arizona and Chile, and helping develop scientific instruments for the Hubble Space Telescope. I worked for 5 years at Kitt Peak and 35 years for NASA. As Press Officer (now retired) of the American Astronomical Society, I organized press conferences on many notable cosmic discoveries. Minor Planet 9768 was named Stephenmaran for me, but I haven’t seen it yet. What I have spotted are five exceptional books on space. Enjoy!
Politics, ambition, and science collided when NASA announced that a small rock that fell on Antarctica contained tiny fossils of ancient life on Mars. Advance plans for the public report were kept secret while coordinated all the way up through President Bill Clinton. Aides wondered if the great discovery would help his re-election. But after a televised press conference and the subsequent media circus, many qualified scientists disputed the claimed fossils. NASA is still searching for past or present life on Mars. They will surely take greater care in reaching future conclusions, won’t they? And if you may wonder why an alleged DC sex worker had prior knowledge of the “breakthrough,” read ace Washington Post reporter (now retired) Kathy Sawyer’s brilliant and thorough account.
In this riveting book, acclaimed journalist Kathy Sawyer reveals the deepest mysteries of space and some of the most disturbing truths on Earth. The Rock from Mars is the story of how two planets and the spheres of politics and science all collided at the end of the twentieth century. It began sixteen million years ago. An asteroid crashing into Mars sent fragments flying into space and, eons later, one was pulled by the Earth’s gravity onto an icy wilderness near the southern pole. There, in 1984, a geologist named Roberta Score spotted it, launching it on a roundabout path…
I was trained in astronomy and astrophysics, was a staff observer at the Lick and Yerkes Observatories, and always have had a passion for researching and writing the history of modern astrophysics and space astronomy. I hold a PhD in the history of astronomy from the University of Leicester in England, am now a retired museum curator having been a planetarium lecturer, college professor, research associate for the Center for History of Physics at the American Institute of Physics, and guitar teacher in the early 1960s.
Award-winning, highly authoritative, comprehensive, and accessible history of the long campaign for a large space telescope by astronomers and NASA program officers. One of the most penetrating studies of how NASA constructs and operates major space missions, and how access to space has changed “what it means to be an astronomer.”.
Robert Smith's The Space Telescope sets the fascinating and disturbing history of this massive venture within the context of 'Big Science'. Launched at a cost of no more than $2 billion, the Space Telescope turned out to be seriously flawed by imperfections in the construction of its lenses and by solar panels that caused it to shudder when moving from daylight to darkness. Smith analyses how the processes of Big Science, especially those involving the government's funding process for large-scale projects, contributed to those failures. He reveals the astonishingly complex interactions that took place among the scientific community, government and…
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