Here are 100 books that True Names fans have personally recommended if you like
True Names.
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As a geek and tech professional, I've worked on software and gadgets in multiple countries and just as many industries. I'm fascinated by work that leads us to a better future built on technology while being fully aware of the dangers involved if we're not vigilant. I've built websites, fitness devices, and even spent some time working on Wikipedia's data structure. But my first tech love was that strange and beautiful blend of art and science we call video games. I’ve played more games than I can count and created a few of my own, but as a novelist and reader I found myself drawn to books about games just as much as the games themselves.
I first read this book back in 2004 when I was spending way too much time with MMO games. This YA novel is certainly a product of a time where the tech of today was within sight but social media and smartphones didn't exist as we know them now. But the story more than makes up for this unfortunate timing with its witty characters, a structure reminiscent of the old Choose Your Own Adventure books and a fantasy game setting that leads this book to cross genres. I’m a big fan of sci-fi stories that follow the “Groundhog Day” structure like Returnal and Edge of Tomorrow. Do-overs are a crucial part of gaming and this novel builds that idea into its core premise while adding a unique twist.
In Heir Apparent there are as many ways to win as there are to get killed. "A stylish tale [that] addresses both fantasy gaming and censorship." (New York Times Book Review)
From Edgar Award–winning author Vivian Vande Velde comes a rollicking story that puts a high-tech twist on the classic medieval fantasy-adventure.
In the virtual reality game Heir Apparent, there are way too many ways to get killed—and Giannine seems to be finding them all. Which is a shame, because unless she can get the magic ring, locate the stolen treasure, answer the dwarf's dumb riddles, impress the head-chopping statue,…
I’m a novelist who draws inspiration from my work experience as both a journalist covering tech platforms and a lawyer advising clients on tech transactions. It fascinates me how the internet has become ubiquitous in our lives, and yet it appears so rarely in popular fiction. My high school English teachers taught me that we don’t read just for escapism but to better understand the full range of human experience. Given how deeply technology shapes today’s moral problems, I believe fiction should address these issues head-on. I’m excited to share this list of books that depict how the internet is affecting us—for better and for worse.
While this book doesn’t depict today’s internet culture directly, it’s easy to imagine a dystopian future where most people spend their lives in a virtual reality world like the Oasis. As the main character navigates the challenges of this massive multiplayer online role-playing game (MMORPG), he encounters dilemmas that resonate with today’s internet users: Can you truly trust someone you’ve only met online? How do you compete when others have far more resources?
Though the book is geared toward a young adult audience, its themes hit home for readers of all ages. I’m glad we have stories showing that tech isn’t always a neutral force in society and that retreating into an online space doesn’t solve the larger systemic problems in the world.
SOON TO BE A MAJOR MOTION PICTURE DIRECTED BY STEVEN SPIELBERG
It's the year 2044, and the real world has become an ugly place. We're out of oil. We've wrecked the climate. Famine, poverty, and disease are widespread.
Like most of humanity, Wade Watts escapes this depressing reality by spending his waking hours jacked into the OASIS, a sprawling virtual utopia where you can be anything you want to be, where you can live and play and fall in love on any of ten thousand planets. And like most of humanity, Wade is obsessed by the ultimate lottery ticket that…
My family moved from America to rural China when I was four. We never stayed in one place for very long. Ever since, I’ve been searching for home in books and countries around the world. The themes of home, belonging, and identity are important ones to me that I explore in my young adult novels. My love of travel, martial arts, and tech also lend themselves well to writing fast-paced adventure books with epic battles and fight scenes. I hope you enjoy the novels on this list as much as I do!
Warcross hooked me from page one and never let go.
First off, the near future American and Japanese settings were super fun to explore. Secondly, there were hackers, dark web bounty hunters, and virtual reality games—I mean, come on!
This book had all the fun tropes that I love in a series.
From #1 New York Times bestselling author Marie Lu - when a game called Warcross takes the world by storm, one girl hacks her way into its dangerous depths.
For the millions who log in every day, Warcross isn't just a game - it's a way of life. Struggling to make ends meet, teenage hacker Emika Chen works as a bounty hunter, tracking down players who bet on the game illegally. Needing to make some quick cash, Emika takes a risk and hacks into the opening game of the international Warcross Championships -…
Fall 2028. Mickey Cooper, an elderly homeless man, receives an incredible proposition from a rogue pharmaceutical company: “Be our secret guinea pig for our new drug, and we’ll pay you life-changing money, which you’ll be able to enjoy because if (cough) when the treatment works, two months from now your…
I am an avid book connoisseur, passionate about reading and supporting the underdogs in literature. As someone who struggled with reading and faced bullying and torment from both peers and teachers, I have a personal connection to these stories. Being an underdog, especially one with literacy challenges, is difficult for anyone, regardless of age. This is why I pursued a degree in English and a master's in creative fiction writing. I aim to inspire and support others who, like me, have faced adversity and have found their solace in the written word. I hope these books featuring underdog stories will inspire resilience and determination in you, just as they did for me.
I highly recommend this book. It is a compelling and thought-provoking novel that delves deeply into themes of identity, gaming culture, and social justice. The story follows Kiera Johnson, a high school student who secretly develops a virtual reality game called SLAY, designed to celebrate Black culture.
The writing is exceptionally well-crafted, and the characters are richly developed, making it a gripping read that resonates on multiple levels. This book is a must-read for anyone interested in contemporary young adult fiction with a strong, empowering message.
4
authors picked
Slay
as one of their favorite books, and they share
why you should read it.
This book is for kids age
13,
14,
15, and
16.
What is this book about?
'We are different ages, genders and traditions ... but tonight we all SLAY'
Black Panther meets Ready Player One. A fierce teen game developer battles a real-life troll intent on ruining the Black Panther-inspired video game she created and the safe community it represents for black gamers.
By day, seventeen-year-old Kiera Johnson is a college student, and one of the only black kids at Jefferson Academy. By night, she joins hundreds of thousands of black gamers who duel worldwide in the secret online role-playing card game, SLAY.
No one knows Kiera is the game developer - not even her boyfriend,…
In my various professional roles, I help people prepare for a world that does not yet exist. I often talk with students, scholars, politicians, industry leaders, community advocates, and others about how emerging, digital technology changes the world. And yet, technology doesn’t come from nowhere—we make it! And use it! And misuse it! We also sometimes forget that something as simple as fire can be understood as technology or that our imaginations and care for others are the most important technology. The books on this list encourage us to explore building a world that serves all of us—not just some of us.
This book has one of my favorite lines ever written: “My mother was a computer, but she never learned to drive.” This line is so iconic that it was “appropriated” in another fabulous book, My Mother Was a Computer, by N. Katherine Hayles. I love both of these books because they offer (among other things) a social history of technology.
They remind us that technology is a human construction, and we tend to build our biases into tech. Balsamo’s case studies include virtual reality, television programs, public health policies, and bodybuilding. It’s fascinating to return to as the technologies Balsamo writes about advance and adapt over time.
This book takes the process of "reading the body" into the fields at the forefront of culture-the vast spaces mapped by science and technology-to show that the body in high-tech is as gendered as ever. From female body building to virtual reality, from cosmetic surgery to cyberpunk, from reproductive medicine to public health policies to TV science programs, Anne Balsamo articulates the key issues concerning the status of the body for feminist cultural studies in a postmodern world. Technologies of the Gendered Body combines close readings of popular texts-such as Margaret Atwood's novel The Handmaid's Tale, the movie Pumping Iron…
I was lucky enough to land a job teaching English at the University of Montevallo, a small public liberal arts college where I have had the opportunity to explore my strange academic interests and teach classes with titles like “Am I Human?” and “Southern Neogothic II: Disability, Hicksploitation, Meat.” When I got tenure, I also had the time and freedom to try my hand at writing the kind of Southern Gothic, Bizarro, and Horror tales that I have always adored. From Mad Magazine to MaddAddam, I have always craved dark satire, body horror, and the grotesque. It’s in my blood.
I love this novel because it mixes Southern Gothic with speculative fiction in a hilarious epic struggle between man and hog. When middle-aged taxidermist Romie Futch becomes a research subject in the shady Center for Cybernetic Neuroscience, he becomes both super genius and guinea pig, his middle-aged brain now brilliant beyond comprehension. Troubled by errant downloads that track his thoughts and actions, Romie turns taxidermy into pop art as he hunts down the legendary super pig “Hogzilla.” This is the funniest, wittiest book I’ve read in a long time.
From the author of The Wilds, which Publishers Weekly called “a brilliant combination of emotion and grime, wit and horror,” comes a debut novel that is part dystopian satire, part Southern Gothic tall tale: a disturbing yet hilarious romp through a surreal New South where newfangled medical technologies change the structure of the human brain and genetically modified feral animals ravage the blighted landscape.
Down on his luck and still pining for his ex-wife, South Carolina taxidermist Romie Futch spends his evenings drunkenly surfing the Internet before passing out on his couch. In a last-ditch attempt to pay his mortgage,…
I fell in love with cyberpunk when I saw Ghost in the Shell for the first time. It quickly became my favorite genre, to read, watch and write. Meanwhile, I’m one of the most renowned cyberpunk indie authors. My series Behind Blue Eyes has quickly become a favorite among readers and bloggers and I’m planning to publish many more books in the series and the genre. Besides, I’m also one of the editors of the Neo Cyberpunk anthology series, a collection of short stories contributed by contemporary cyberpunk indie authors. I hope you enjoy my list and if you want more, check out the Cyberpunk Books group on Facebook!
Agent G is like James Bond with cyborgs. It’s an action-driven spy thriller with cyberpunk elements that become stronger in the later books of the series. I love James Bond, the older movies in particular, and I love cyberpunk, so this book grabbed me from the first page. Although it’s more of a technothriller than a classic cyberpunk story I still recommend this book because I think it’s such an interesting and fun read. Definitely worth checking out if you like stories about high-tech spies saving the world!
“Black Technology has made murder a billion dollar industry.” The International Refugee Society has twenty-six cybernetically enhanced “Letters,” and for the right price, they’ll eliminate anyone. They’ve given up their families and their memories for ten years of service with the promise of a life of luxury awaiting them. Agent G is one of these “Letters,” but clues to his past are starting to emerge while he’s on a dangerous mission to infiltrate the Society’s most dangerous competitor. In the midst of all the violence, subterfuge, and deceit, he’ll need to keep his wits about him and trust sparingly. After…
Hello. My name’s Austin Dragon, and I’m the author of over 30 books in science fiction, fantasy, and classic horror. My works include the sci-fi noir detective Liquid Cool series, the epic fantasy Fabled Quest Chronicles, the international futuristic epic After Eden series, the classic Sleepy Hollow Horrors, and the upcoming military sci-fi Planet Tamers series. Sci-fi and mystery thrillers drew me into writing and I’m passionate about creating great stories with amazing characters in many my different worlds of fantastic fiction.
Anna is another fellow author I’ve worked with in the past.
In her futuristic novel about warring mega-corporations, cyborg Nephilim and her elite cyborg squad are sent on the most dangerous missions to protect the interests of their company at any cost. But then one of her implants malfunctions, and she’s freed from the controlling grid. She learns that everything she has believed in all her life is a lie. To defend her newfound freedom, she must run from the elite killer squads she once belonged to.
In a future world ruled by warring Mega-Corporations, cyborg Nephilim believed she was fighting a righteous cause.
As a powerful, genetically and cybernetically enhanced ‘Angel,’ her brutal and violent life is not truly her own – until one day, a simple glitch separates her from the grid.
For the first time in her young life, she is free…and she has doubts. Doubts that bury deeper into her psyche when she meets Jake, a mysterious, 100% bio-human.
He opens her neon-blue eyes to the lies she had been exposed to all her life. Questioning everything she has ever known, Nephilim resolves…
I grew up in Texas during a time when girls still had to wear poofy dresses and pantyhose, and boys got to have all the fun. The whole idea of traditional womanhood never fit me. It took a long time, but I finally reconciled with the fact that being able to run in heels and pop a grackle off the birdfeeder from thirty yards out are not mutually exclusive: a skill is a skill, and the injection of some femininity into a traditionally masculine feat can be wildly refreshing. We’ve only just begun to explore the genre of the fierce warrior woman—mine is merely one of infinite definitions.
There are actually two undeniably kickass women in this book: one is the perfect hybrid of humanity and technology created to pilot gargantuan killing machines, while the other is a foul-mouthed outlaw who routinely climbs inside these machines and blows them the heck up. You can imagine the chaos that ensues when these women finally join forces and set their sights on destroying the oppressive supercity of Godolia—along with its vast army of terrifying mecha gods. I was delighted by this book for a number of reasons, not the least of which being its many bloody battle scenes and its cast of endearing characters. The tenuous relationship between Sona the Pilot and Eris the Gearbreaker kept me on edge until the very end. This is an impressive debut novel from a talented young writer, and I am looking forward to the next installment.
Two girls on opposite sides of a war discover they're fighting for a common purpose—and falling for each other—in Zoe Hana Mikuta's high-octane debut Gearbreakers, perfect for fans of Pacific Rim, Pierce Brown's Red Rising Saga, and Marie Lu's Legend series.
We went past praying to deities and started to build them instead...
The shadow of Godolia's tyrannical rule is spreading, aided by their giant mechanized weapons known as Windups. War and oppression are everyday constants for the people of the Badlands, who live under the thumb of their cruel Godolia overlords.
Five days before the end of humanity, five unlikely heroes find themselves on an impossible quest to outlive the apocalypse.
5 Stars is the survival story of a mother and her baby facing impossible odds amidst a global apocalypse. Set in a dying world overseen by “The Neon God,” the…
My primary interest is in brain function. Because the principal job of
the brain is to process information, it is necessary to define exactly
what information is. For that, there is no substitute for Claude
Shannon’s theory of information. This theory is not only quite
remarkable in its own right, but it is essential for telecoms,
computers, machine learning (and understanding brain function).
I have written ten "tutorial introduction" books, on topics which vary
from quantum mechanics to AI.
In a parallel universe, I am still an Associate Professor at the
University of Sheffield, England.
Pierce was a contemporary of Claude Shannon (inventor of information theory), so he learned information theory shortly after it was published in 1949. Pierce writes in an informal style, but does not flinch from presenting the fundamental theorems of information theory. Some would say his style is too wordy, and the ratio of words/equations is certainly very high. Nevertheless, this book provides a solid introduction to information theory. It was originally published in 1961, so it is a little dated in terms of topics covered. However, because it was re-published by Dover in 1981, it is also fairly cheap. Overall, this is a sensible first book to read on information theory.
"Uncommonly good...the most satisfying discussion to be found." — Scientific American. Behind the familiar surfaces of the telephone, radio, and television lies a sophisticated and intriguing body of knowledge known as information theory. This is the theory that has permitted the rapid development of all sorts of communication, from color television to the clear transmission of photographs from the vicinity of Jupiter. Even more revolutionary progress is expected in the future. To give a solid introduction to this burgeoning field, J. R. Pierce has revised his well-received 1961 study of information theory for a second edition. Beginning with the origins…
