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Sunday, September 30, 2018

Favorite SF Tropes


I was thinking the other day about favorite SF/ fantasy tropes and I thought it would be fun to make a list. Everyone likes a good list, right? So I thought I'd narrow it down and share an example for each one of a favorite book that embraces that trope. Little did I know how many books I would end up looking at- and how many intriguing reads I would find. I may have to do this for fantasy as well, but for now here are my top SF tropes.


Time/ Space Gates 

The Complete Morgaine (Morgaine Saga #1-4)

There are a lot of examples of this trope but my favorite probably has to be this series. A four book series (helpfully collected in this omnibus) about a woman named Morgaine and her loyal companion who must travel from world to world, closing the world gates that are disrupting space/ time. 

Generation Ships

Glow (Sky Chasers, #1)

Across the Universe (Across the Universe, #1)A Million Suns (Across the Universe, #2)Shades of Earth (Across the Universe, #3)Starship

Cloning 

Six Wakes

Vitro (Corpus, #2)The Originals


Cyberpunk 

Blackfish City

Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?

Lost worlds 

The Lost World (Jurassic Park #2)

Star man's sonThe Complete Land that Time Forgot (Caspak, #1-3)

Dystopian/ postapocalyptic

The Hunger Games (The Hunger Games, #1)

Divergent (Divergent, #1)Star man's son

Galactic civilization/ long lost colonies

The Long Way to a Small, Angry Planet (Wayfarers, #1)

Planet of ExileA Closed and Common Orbit (Wayfarers, #2)

Parallel worlds/ alternate realities

Dark Matter

39 comments:

  1. Oh yes, you do like gates/portals. I can't recall if I've ever read a book about that... Wow, you have lots of recs for generation ships! Cloning books can be super thought-provoking if they're written well. Cyberpunk! The genre I keep saying I'm gonna read more of lol. Dystopian and post-apoc are some of my fave SF subgenres too. And one of my absolute fave books was alternate realities, and it was super mind-twisty, and I've yet to find anything quite like it, but I remember you reviewing Dark Matter and thinking I should maybe try that one.

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    1. I do. I'm a total sucker for that concept. :) And generation ships are fun. Especially if you add murder or cloning or whatevs to the mix. Cyberpunk- I feel the same. Love the concept, but some of the cyberpunk stuff I've read has left me cold (and you'll notice I didn't have very many examples either)! Dytopia though rules. :)

      I love alternate realities more and more, and they get so mindf*cky! And you should totally read Dark Matter :)

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  2. Nice post! I really need to explore the science fiction genre more.

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  3. I don't read enough SciFi to be able to come up with so many examples, but at least I recognize the one's you pointed out. I have read quite a few Dystopian's though, because it was one of my daughter's favorite genres during her teens.

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    1. Dystopian is fun. Which sounds weird since it wouldn't really BE fun, of course, but I guess reading about it is :)

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  4. You have me wanting to read the Extinction books, they look so fun and different!

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    1. I highly recommend them, they are fun and fast paced!

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  5. I know I have GLOW in my bookshelf somewhere. You're making me want to pull it out and start reading it.

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    1. I read Glow ages ago, and the sequel but never read the third one??

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  6. There are some great examples here, and you've also reminded me I need to hurry up and read Becky Chambers!

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    1. I would really love to see what you think of chambers!

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  7. I tend to go towards monsters/dinosaurs on planets when I read SF. I love the end of the space journey and the arriving on a planet to find scary things killing the crew! I wouldn't mind a few more set on the ship if there is plenty of action and death!

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    1. Ha ha you would probably like Contagion then! Lots of death and nasties on another world. And I agree- something about arriving somewhere else and being stalked is FUN.

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  8. I love lots of these tropes! Generation ships and far away colonies are what I enjoy writing the most. :)

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  9. Did you try the Rachel Bach series? I'm not a big SF reader but I loved this one so much

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    1. I have not! But they've been recommended to me before, and really I have no excuse for not trying them!

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  10. I'm a sucker for time gates and space portals for some reason, along with cyberpunk. I also tend to go for generational ships or just ships in general? 🤔

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    1. Yes! I love a good time/ space gate! Even in my own writing I gravitate towards those- I just love the concept so much! Also generation ships *nods*

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  11. Parallel worlds/ alternate realities sounds like such a fun twist to a story! I have a book with that concept that's been sitting on my TBR list for SO long. I have no excuse for why it has yet to be read :)

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    1. I love stories like that! Have you read dark Matter? It was a trip.

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  12. Some great examples here of the tropes that work really well!

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  13. I love galactic civilizations. But honestly if you say scifi I will probably read it.

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  14. Oh good choices. I think spaceships are my fave trope. I haven't had much luck with cloning but perhaps I will have to try your suggestions.

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  15. I love spacestation settings because you get a lot of social mingling between alien races and they are on neutral ground. Space colonies and generational ships are my second favorite. I still have to read that last Glow book! 🚀

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  16. Generation ships isn't a category I would have thought of, but I definitely love them. Great list!

    Nicole @ Feed Your Fiction Addiction

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  17. From your list, my favorite would be parallel worlds/alternate realities. Of course, that's only because of Justice League.

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  18. Generation ships is the one that gets me all the time! Anything to do with space colonization is fascinating to me!

    ~Mogsy @ BiblioSanctum

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  19. I'm a total sucker for lost worlds!!

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  20. These are great, and I pretty much agree with all of them! Except maybe cyberpunk? I can't tell if it's something I don't love, OR if I just haven't found a good one yet. I think my favorites are the post-apocalyptic (of COURSE) and dystopian, and the generation ship. I always seem to end up enjoying those! OR even better, combinations of those! (Ah hem, The 100 hahha)

    Also, glad that dinosaurs and space zombies made the list! Hahah those are pretty unique for sure!

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  21. I really enjoy dystopian and parrallel universes. Of course, I wouldn't turn down any of these categories :)

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  22. Great post Greg! I love dystopian/ postapocalyptic stories. My absolute favorite is The Deathland series. I have almost all of the series. I love the cast of characters and the situations they find themselves in. I am intrigued by The Complete Morgaine series. Love the idea of gates to other worlds. Awesome list! ❤️❤️

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  23. Some of these are more subgenres than tropes in my mind (cyberpunk and dystopian, specifically), but I love the post! Some of my favorite SFF tropes or themes are intelligent animal companions (Naomi Novik's Temeraire series, McCaffrey's Pern books, Lackey's Valdemar books); psychic gifts (Zenna Henderson's The People, McCaffrey's Talents series, Katherine Kurtz's Deryni books, and the aforementioned Valdemar series, among many others); meeting or clash of cultures, especially when the protagonist is thrust into an unfamiliar culture (Restoree by Anne McCaffrey, quite a few of Zimmer Bradley's Darkover books, The Practice Effect by David Brin, and any number of other books by a myriad of authors); fairy-tale retellings (Mayer's Lunar Chronicles, Robin McKinley's Beauty, Rose Daughter, and Spindle's End, Naomi Novik's Uprooted); and the ubiquitous but usually entertaining coming-of-age-while-battling-the-ultimate-evil stories (Harry Potter, Star Wars, the Belgariad by David Eddings, and even The Lord of the Rings, in a sense.)

    Great post!

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  24. Generation Ships are so interesting. I need to read more on that. To be fair, I need to read more sci-fi in general haha. Are you participating in sci-fi month again this year?

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  25. Love this post as I love the sci-fi genre. I really liked reading Blackfish City even though I had some problems with it too as well. I really like reading about alternate worlds (I'm reading one right now like that!), with lost civilisations and also time gates. I love basically all the tropes you've mentioned although I haven't read any good books with generation ships yet :/

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  26. This is Star Trek Day..so I think that was the first show I watched where there were portals & gates. It is an interesting concept. And I know as a kid I would have a dream about going through a full-length mirror (which was the back of the bedroom door at my grandmother's. Naturally, everything was spotless on the other side of the mirror. Later I wrote a slacker story where a girl and her wayward teen boyfriend whent through a mirror at a motel they were staying in..and of course, it was a warped world.

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  27. Great list! I haven't read any scifi in a long time, but for a while I was really addicted to dystopian stories. I never read The Hunger Games, but when the series comes up I always think of the Manga Battle Royale which was published long before the Hunger Games. Have you ever read it? I'm not even sure where anyone could find it anymore, but the whole series was an amazing read. Quite violent though, as it being Manga it's kind of "illustrated".

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  28. I been wanting to read The Morgaine Cycle but, can never find the first book. It always the second or the third. Have you read Where Late the Sweet Birds Sang by Kate Wilhelm? Its a book that has cloning in it.

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