Bad Boys of the Multiverse: An Alternate Universe Reading Guide

Have we gone multiverse crazy? Iain Banks' latest novel, Transition, is just the latest of a long line of sideways-traveling books, and this theme is more prevalent than ever. Here are some of my favorites, with spoilers and foul language. More »

How Do You Get Science Fiction To Have "Book Club Lit"?

One of the frustrating things about science fiction is that everyone's seen the year's biggest movies: Even films like Transformers 2, which most people seemed to dislike. But how many books are there that everyone you know has read? More »

The 10 Greatest Eternally Young Heroes (Who Aren't Vampires)

Everywhere you look nowadays, there are young, fresh-faced vampires. But they're not the only heroes out there who stay eternally young. Some of our favorite science-fiction heroes are blessed (cursed?) with Alphaville's reward. Here are the 10 greatest forever-young heroes. More »

A Web of Footnotes — How We Will Read Books in the Future

The technological development that's going to change the way we read forever isn't ebooks — it's footnotes. For the past few months, if you really wanted to understand DC Comics' big crossover series Final Crisis, you basically had to read each issue alongside Eisner-winning critic Douglas Wolk's blog "Final Annotations." Each time a new issue in the series comes out, Wolk goes through page-by-page, carefully documenting what you need to know. Final Crisis contains such an embarrassment of obscure DC heroes and fannish references that it actually requires a highly-trained reader to give you adequate back story. This practice of exhaustive online footnoting is one of the less-talked about ways that the internet is profoundly changing the way we read books — and not just comic books. More »

12 Coolest Deaths In Science Fiction History

It's never great to watch a beloved science fiction hero die — but sometimes a memorable heroic death can help turn a science fiction story into a real epic. And some science fiction characters are unforgettable and bad-ass precisely because they died in a memorable way. Here's our list of the dozen greatest deaths in the history of science fiction. With some spoilers, natch. More »

Neal Stephenson Talks to io9 About Religion, Aliens, and Spoilers

Today Neal Stephenson's long-awaited new novel Anathem hits the bookstores. We've already told you that this tale of science monks on another planet is cool, action-packed, and thought-provoking — probably one of the best novels of Stephenson's career, which already includes lauded titles like Snow Crash, The Diamond Age, and Cryptonomicon. Though Stephenson usually likes to hole up with his ideas and avoid the spotlight, he's having what the characters in Anathem would call an "Apert," a time that comes every few years when he opens up and talks to the public about his work. We were lucky enough to get a chance to talk to Stephenson during his Apert, and asked about Anathem, as well as a few questions about Earth. (Warning: There are a few spoilers ahead.) More »

Neal Stephenson Explains What's Wrong with Mobile Phones

Neal Stephenson, author of Snow Crash and Cryptonomicon, is one of the most techno-savvy scifi authors of his generation, and yet his new novel Anathem is strongly critical of mobile phones. Anathem, which hits bookstores Tuesday, is set on an alien world that's very much like Earth — right down to its technologies, which include mobile-esque devices called jeejahs. The main characters in the novel are part of a scientifically-advanced group called the "avout" who have rejected jeejahs, as well as most kinds of consumer electronics. And they've done it for some of the same reasons that Stephenson thinks people on Earth should reject them too. More »

Neal Stephenson's Tale of Two Planets

Neal Stephenson's new novel Anathem comes out next week, and there's something very timely about his tale of aliens on a parallel Earth whose inhabitants are locked into an occasionally-catastrophic conflict between scientific and religious institutions. The planet Arbre, which is very much like Earth in some ways, differs from our world one major respect. Its religious and scientific institutions are essentially reversed. Monks called the avout live ascetic lives studying science in gracious, ancient "maths," while the so called "saecular" world is populated with Deolators (god-worshipers) who are obsessed with religion and technology. Stephenson's world-building skills, honed by the exacting work he did on his recent Baroque Cycle trilogy, are at their best here. Anathem is that rarest of things: A stately novel of ideas packed with cool tech, terrific fight scenes, aliens, and even a little ESP. More »