While we are seeing incredible technological advances in the present day, sometimes that just isn't enough. These science fiction reads will speak to that innate sense of curiosity that drives us to new futures. Who knows, maybe the future is really written in one of these tomes...or just as likely, a relevant cautionary tale. Recent notable Sci-fi novels for adults, selected by SJPL Librarians. Don't forget your towel, after all, it is about the most massively useful thing an interstellar hitchhiker can have.
"Save one world. Doom her own.
From the acclaimed author of The Deep Sky comes a thrilling anti-colonial space heist to save an alien civilization.
Maya Hoshimoto was once the best art thief in the galaxy. For ten years, she returned…
"After Earth is destroyed, Jason Graham finds himself—along with tens of thousands of others—offered a second chance on a planet on the far side of the galaxy. For one man, it's a chance at the life he never led—and this time he'll get it…
"Earth, 2180
Genetically engineered with partly alien DNA, Lieutenant Selene Genji is different from ordinary humans. And they hate her for it. Still, she’s spent her life trying to overcome society’s prejudice by serving in the Unified…
""Can the University be a place of both training and transformation?"
The boy was raised as one of the Chained, condemned to toil in the bowels of a mining ship out amongst the stars.
His whole world changes―literally―when he is yanked…
"Raffi works in an observational cosmology lab, searching for dark matter and trying to hide how little they understand their own research. Every chance they get, they escape to see Britt, a queer sculptor who fascinates them for reasons…
"Ocean Yoon has never felt like much of a Korean, even if she is descended from a long line of haenyeo, Jeju Island's beloved female divers. She's also persona non grata at the Alliance, Korea's solar system-dominating space agency, since…
"The humans are fighting again. Go figure.
As a free A.I., Mal finds the war between the modded and augmented Federals and the puritanical Humanists about as interesting as a battle between rival anthills. He’s not above scouting the…
"There are only three real powers in the universe: the corporate power of the Trust versus the Union's labor's leverage. And between them, the Guild tries to keep everyone's hands above the table. It ain't easy.
Branded a Guild deserter,…
"In the wake of environmental catastrophe, January, once a principal in London’s Royal Ballet, has become a refugee on Tharsis, the terraformed colony on Mars. In Tharsis, January’s life is dictated by his status as an Earthstronger—a…
"Annie Bot was created to be the perfect girlfriend for her human owner, Doug. Designed to satisfy his emotional and physical needs, she has dinner ready for him every night, wears the cute outfits he orders for her, and adjusts her libido…
"Sixteen-year-old Odile is an awkward, quiet girl vying for a coveted seat on the Conseil. If she earns the position, she’ll decide who may cross her town’s heavily guarded borders. On the other side, it’s the same valley, the same…
"When her digitized consciousness is downloaded into the mind of a mammoth, which have been resurrected, Dr. Damira Khismatullina, who was brutally murdered trying to defend the world’s last elephants, must teach them how to be mammoths to…
"The accident came quickly. With no warning. In the dead of night, a precipitous plunge into a freezing river trapped everyone inside the bus. It was then that Army veteran John Reiff’s life came to an end. Extinguished in the sudden rush…
"There's a saying in Barstow, California, a decaying city in the scorching Mojave desert . . .
The Interstate here only goes in one direction: Away.
But it's the only place where ex-LAPD detective Beth McDade, after a staggering fall…
"When Martha Einkorn fled her father’s isolated compound in Oregon, she never expected to find herself working for a powerful social media mogul hell-bent on controlling everything. Now, she’s surrounded by mega-rich companies designing…
"When physics graduate Annie Fisk, a NASA secretary during the Apollo 11 mission, identifies an engineer's mistaken calculations, she is propelled into a new position where she's torn between her ambitions, her heart and a mysterious…
"At the edge an isolated star system, Kel Gardavros, once a member of an Order whose military arm was disbanded and scattered across the galaxy, finds her past intruding in the form of a long-dormant Pale war machine that is suddenly…
"They left Earth to save humanity. They’ll have to save themselves first.
It is the eve of Earth’s environmental collapse. A single ship carries humanity’s last hope: eighty elite graduates of a competitive program, who will give birth to…
"When Enae's grandmaman passes away, Enae inherits something entirely unexpected: a diplomatic assignment to track down a fugitive who has been missing for over 200 years. No one actually expects Enae to succeed; it's an empty assignment…
"Paradise-1. Earth’s first deep space colony. For thousands of people, it was an opportunity for a new life. Until it went dark. No communication has been received from the colony for months. And it falls to Firewatch inspector Alexandra…
