Discussion on:

Know your science-fiction subgenres

William Gibson, I believe, was the first to use the term "cyberpunk" and his books were the central hub for all things involved with that genre for me as I grew up.

Matrix was interesting for having cyberpunk elements, but I'd point to Blade Runner (based on Philip K. Dick's Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep) as the definitive example for movies.

And yes, I played the Shadowrun RPG for a while too, since it drew amply from cyberpunk elements.

The style has always drawn me in - perhaps because it was more realistic and near our own time period when compared to other SF styles.

Besides steampunk having a place in my heart as well, if only for the retrofuturism it can open up, the top spot remains the superhero genre for me.

...which might explain how come I have all the movies of the style (yes, even the bad ones) and have been playing City of Heroes for over 6 years.

For some reason I always think of the phrase, "The way the future was." The future keeps becoming the present, this is the reason that steampunk will last.

Back in 1984, I was moved to ask, "If this is the future, why doesn't my car fly?"

Actually, the government in general doesn't want civilians flying cars. They have a hard enough time with private pilot licenses. Washington D.C. is already a no-fly zone for most aircraft; so flying cars won't do you any good there unless owned and used by Uncle Sam, i.e. the political elites, the police, and the military.

Not without reason. Imagine John Doe deciding to fly home after a night of drinking with his buddies and plowing into the local hospital at 200 mph with a 2000 pound car and a half-filled tank of fuel.

Worse, can you imagine a flying car filled with explosives with a terrorist at the wheel/stick/yoke?

Multiverse: Similiar to alternate world history; however, often distibguished by multiple universes existing parallel to one another which characters can access, eitehr intentionally or otherwise. Multiple universes sometimes feature wildly divergent histories and or physical laws. Zelany's Princes of Amber is an example of multiverse novels. The term multiverse is generally attribited to Michael Moorcock, originally in reference to his works, especially the Elric series of high fantasy.

First Contact: Distinguished by Earth discovering advanced life forms not from Earth, generally of a technologically similiar or advanced race. Often distinguished by mankind's reactions to the dsicovery. Rendevaus with Rama is a good start.

Secret History: Generally distinguished by the revelation that the generally accepted version of reality is not the truth. Often features characters that are under threat due to this newly dsicovered information from individuals and secret societies which wish the information to not be known. The comic Planetary would be an excellent example of this type of science fiction.

Those are some of the ones I thought of in the few minutes I had to spare.

Excellent and thoughtful article!

Amber is a great series, you also might like Farmer's World of Tiers series.

My favorite first contact stories are Murray Leinster's "First Contact" and Anne McCaffery's Decision at Doona. The twists in both stories make them worth reading.

Culture shock

Might be more of a meta-genre than a sub, but to me the real interest in sci-fi isn't that the alien is small and green, but the impact of no longer being alone....

If anyone does this better than CJ Cherryh, someone let me know.

Mentioning Cherryh made me think of another, if rare, sub-genre: alien cultures. Not a whole lot of stories about aliens interacting with aliens... but they can be very interesting. And again, if anyone does this better than Cherryh, let me know...

I think Douglas Adams deserves his own subgenre, Adams Fiction. I have never read science fiction novels that were funnier than the Hitchhiker's Guide To The Galaxy or The Salmon of Doubt.

with throwing Lois McMaster Bujold's Miles Vorkosigan stories in as excellent examples of comic space opera. tears of laughter will drip when reading.

Pol Anderson's MUTE is a good example of Metahuman.

Ringworld cause any bells to chime for you?

You might find David Drake's work a good fit for the military Science Fiction Genre, most of the mindset he portrays in ALL his works stems from his own experiences in Vietnam.
He tends to focus more on the human aspect than the technology, but gives enough about the technology to support the storyline.

and you missed the Environmental sub genre entirely.
Herbet's DUNE being the best known work that fits it.
but Kim Stanley Robinson's Red Mars, Blue Mars, Green Mars trilogy is a far better example of the subgenre.

Fits into a few.
Mind you given the size and scope it's not too surprising.

If you haven't picked it up, Antartica is well worth a read.

Ka !

While we're on Robinson, has anyone else read the 40 Days... series? I'd almost qualify it as not-science fiction, more like Michael Crichton with carefully researched science and more believable characters...

Both the movie and the series also fit squarely in the steampunk category.

Or a blend of genres? Fe. as I have tried different ways to forward my grounding ideas for the new paradigm of science-in vain so far (due to "repressive tolerance"?).Possibly a novel-in a form of sci-fi biography,description of history in social path of my creator work (to change the world with deeper,better,more abstract paradigm of science since openings 1974,in the 1.thesis version in Theoretical Philosophy,Univ.of Uppsala,Sweden after which the boundaries became manifested for me),take up new theories (my solution(?)for Einstein?s problem how to unite the 4 basic forces+ my 5.conc.the mental energy;new theory of universe (how to explain the empirical data of parapsychology-various-;make Dunne?s time-travelling sensible with a new concept of Time-within space-time world,sp-ti w systemtime,between formers);life-death data and question of re-incarnation explained with my new theory of causality,abave said new,many-dimensional universum th.,my basic function th. in ontology).
What do you think? Could this kind of ebook sell?
Comments,good links,etc.
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What about "sword and sorcery"?

one could make an arguement that a number of the sub-genres are fantasy, not SF

Of all the genres, alternate history (S.M. Sterling's "Dies the Fire" series) and space operas (especially David Weber's "Honor Harrington" series) have hooked me over the last few years.

If you like alt history, Harry Turtledove is excellent. Well-researched. He also does fantasy works, but he's so prolific with alt-history, I never get around to the fantasy works ...

There's not one spec of science behind it.
One electron goes left instead of right and the confederacy wins the war, yeah right...

Got to say I really enjoyed the world war series though.

In which white supremacists time traveling back to the Confederacy and supplying them with AK 47's and the Confederate states win the war.

That one is defintely science fiction.

but the title makes me think of the Weapon Shops of Isher.

The John Esten Cooke Award for Southern Fiction. Strangely, the organization that makes that award doesn't seem to view the award as so important they should keep the history of it posted.

edit: Nor is the award deemed so important as to be included in Wikipedia's list of awards for American literarature.

but one the AKs was used to shoot the forebear of the guy who went back, so he never existed to do so.

Time travel is bollocks, even if the past exists which is a dubious proposition, where was it?

I loathe time travel, it's a literary device for the lazy...

You used both "is" and "exist" twice in your complaint without having first asked and answered how "is" and "exist" are, skipping straight to their what of the past.

Don't quit your day job, Tony, to become a literary critic, or philosopher of the existential.

starts with an initial and usually unquestioned assumption, usually that one in some form or another.
After all without some assertion of existence even nihilism falls into posturing.

If I was to give up my day job, I'd want to be a landscape gardner, too much self respect to bother with your other two professions.

How can you NOT mention David Drake in reference to the genre

David Weber and John Ringo

Hear one from a guy that has been associated with SF (at occasions professionally) for almost 40 years. An attempt to categorise the sub-genres of SF to those that are in contact with it just sparingly is a laudable one but it also requires some knowledge from the theory of literature, and some customs of the SF-fan world and the SF-professional one. The mayor categories (not sub-genres) of SF are: Hard (core) science fiction (well defined in this post), Soft (core) science fiction, referred to as Science Fantasy by some oldies, but the two are not quite identical (rather well defined too) and Space opera (not well defined since definition just by example can not be considered a rigorous one) - that would be a story that has nothing to do with any scientific concept, proven or not, but is a usually heroic one just set in a scenography generally associated with SF (the last one is a professional term for the physical world description of where the plot goes on - the set in theatre, TV and movies). Some hard-nosed scholars (and fans) do not consider this last one to really be SF.
From the bona-fide sub-genres the ones listed here are: Alternate history, Apocalyptic, Cyberpunk, Time travel; we could also squeeze: Alien invasion, Steampunk and Superhero. Horror, Mystery, Military (science fiction) and Western are genres in their own right and by definition can not be sub-genres of anything else - it is similar to the Space opera thing: a mere setting or way of presenting the plot does not qualify something to be a specific sub-genre inside the SF just because it associates to the aforementioned genres. Overlapping was always present in literature and to determine the (sub)genre the core element must be identified.
There are other standard sub-genres and good new ones can added - good luck, go for it.

I'm just amazed at the number of Hugo and Nebula award-winning authors who were NOT mentioned.