Books like 'On the Future: Prospects for Humanity'
Readers who enjoyed On the Future: Prospects for Humanity by Martin J. Rees & Maarten van der Werf also liked the following books featuring the same tropes, story themes, relationship dynamics and character types.
sc-fi space technology politics pollution-climate-change ai disaster
-
SADEs by S.H. Jucha
Rated: 4.50 of 5 stars · 10 ratingsDangerous forces are at work across galactic space that the Omnians are attempting to stabilize, but their resources are severely strained. The SADEs, self-aware digital entities, express to Alex Racine and Renée de Guirnon their desire to know the method of their creation. Alex and Renée, the Omnian co-leaders, want to obtain the knowledge for the SADEs, who are humans’ closest allies... -
Captain Caveman by Jerry Boyd
Rated: 4.59 of 5 stars · 17 ratingsBob and the crew are off to deliver a shipload of lost property to its rightful owners. What dangers, seen and unseen, will they find at this lost colony? Will there be new crew members, waiting to be found? Find out in Bob and Nikki’s latest adventure... -
Rising Force by Ken Lozito
Rated: 4.42 of 5 stars · 12 ratingsEight months have passed since the Star Shroud barrier was engaged to protect the Earth, but it won’t last, and humanity is scrambling to build a fleet. Cut off from home, the crew of the Athena has taken refuge on the Boxan colony world, a last safe haven for the creators of the Star Shroud... -
Owner's Share by Nathan Lowell
Rated: 4.35 of 5 stars · 30 ratingsEverything in the universe comes with a price. When Diurnia Salvage and Transport undergoes a change in management, Captain Ishmael Horatio Wang finds himself adrift in a sea of red ink, and intrigue. He dives in only to find that he is over his head in a universe where cut-throat competition takes on an all new meaning... -
-
Star Alliance by Ken Lozito, Jeff Hays
Rated: 4.33 of 5 stars · 12 ratingsA daring rescue resulted in one of their own being captured. A soldier desperate to prevent the enslavement of humanity. Held prisoner by a vicious alien whose race is determined to conquer the galaxy, Zack wakes to find that he is cut off from everything. Zack must figure out a way to escape his captors and a prison full of dangerous aliens to get back to his ship... -
Bear Head by Adrian Tchaikovsky
Rated: 4.29 of 5 stars · 14 ratingsMars. The red planet. A new frontier for humanity, a civilization where humans can live in peace, lord and master of all they survey.But this isn't Space City from those old science-fiction books. We live in Hell City, built into and from a huge subcontinent-sized crater. There's a big silk canopy over it, feeding out atmosphere as we generate it, little by little, until we can breathe the air... -
Company by Hugh Howey
Rated: 4.29 of 5 stars · 14 ratingsOut here on the edge of sector eight, I can be alone with my thoughts. Sometimes, this isn't a good thing... -
Visitor by Hugh Howey
Rated: 4.29 of 5 stars · 14 ratingsThe worst part about having it all, is having it all taken away... -
Defiance by Joel Shepherd
Rated: 4.37 of 5 stars · 23 ratingsThe UFS Phoenix is hunting for the long-lost drysine data-core. Within it lie the secrets to saving humanity from the resurgent deepynine machine-race. To recover it, Captain Erik Debogande must work together with the man who holds his sister hostage — the power-hungry parren leader Aristan. Aristan has sworn he will return Lisbeth Debogande once Phoenix grants him equal access to its prize... -
The Toll by Neal Shusterman
Rated: 4.18 of 5 stars · 66 ratingsIt’s been three years since Rowan and Citra disappeared; since Scythe Goddard came into power; since the Thunderhead closed itself off to everyone but Grayson Tolliver.In this pulse-pounding conclusion to New York Times bestselling author Neal Shusterman’s Arc of a Scythe trilogy, constitutions are tested and old friends are brought back from the dead... -
Rando Splicer by Joel Shepherd
Rated: 4.46 of 5 stars · 17 ratingsSeparated from her ship, Major Trace Thakur is stranded on the reeh-occupied world of Rando. The native corbi have suffered beneath reeh tyranny for 800 years, and many have given up hope... -
Changeling by Sharon Lee, Steve Miller
Rated: 4.50 of 5 stars · 6 ratingsThis novella set in the Liaden Universe first appeared in Absolute Magnitude #14, Summer 2000. It was then re-issued in chapbook form. It tells the story of Ren Zel dea'Judan, Clan Obrelt, who becomes first (space) pilot in an obscure clan of shopkeepers. Not all the other clans, however, are happy that Obrelt should field a pilot... -
A Liaden Universe Constellation: Volume 3 by Sharon Lee, Steve Miller
Rated: 4.38 of 5 stars · 8 ratingsBOOK 3 in the multivolume Liaden Universe ® short fiction collection. Tales of the Liaden Universe® brought together for the first time. Space opera and romance on a grand scale in a galaxy full of interstellar trading clans... -
Bounty by Hugh Howey
Rated: 4.21 of 5 stars · 14 ratingsI live in a tin can out on the edge of sector eight. Not much is supposed to happen here. Ships are supposed to fly by at twenty times the speed of light. My beacon is supposed to keep them safe. Things don't always go like they're supposed to... -
-
Brass Man by Neal Asher
Rated: 4.17 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsIan Cormac, a legendary Earth Central Security agent, the James Bond of a wealthy future, is hunting an interstellar dragon, little knowing that, far away, his competition has resurrected an horrific killing machine named "Mr. Crane" to assist in a similar hunt, ecompassing whole star systems. Mr... -
To Catch a Falling Leaf by J.P. Valentine
Rated: 4.50 of 5 stars · 12 ratingsTraining is over. The hunt is on.With Fyrion a distant speck behind us and the resources of the Dragon’s Right Eye out of reach, there’s only one place in the system we can go to gather the materials we need to advance to bronze.Ilirian beckons... -
Against a Dark Background by Iain M. Banks
Rated: 4.13 of 5 stars · 24 ratingsShe came from one of the more disreputable aristocratic families.Sharrow was once the leader of a personality-attuned combat team in one of the sporadic little commercial wars in the civilization based around the planet Golter... -
Winter World by A.G. Riddle
Rated: 4.11 of 5 stars · 27 ratingsA new ice age... and a shocking discovery...will change humanity forever.In the near future, a new ice age has begun.Humanity stands on the brink of extinction.Desperate for answers, scientists send probes into the solar system to take readings. Near Mars, a probe spots a mysterious object drifting toward the Sun... -
Citadel by John Ringo
Rated: 4.20 of 5 stars · 30 ratingsOf all the hosts of Eurotas the Troias were the most fell. For they were born of Winter.Between the Solar Array Pumped Laser and Troy, the two trillion ton nickel-iron battlestation created by eccentric billionaire Tyler Vernon, Earth has managed to recapture the Sol system from their Horvath conquerors and begin entering the galactic millieu... -
Eidolon by Sharon Lee, Steve Miller
Rated: 4.33 of 5 stars · 6 ratingsThis chapbook contains two original stories: "Shadow Partner," and "Persistence." Each story features a well-known member of Clan Korval, portrayed as others see them... -
Misfits by Sharon Lee, Steve Miller
Rated: 4.33 of 5 stars · 6 ratingsBefore Miri Robertson met Val Con yos'Phelium she was an acclaimed mercenary soldier. Before she was an acclaimed mercenary soldier with the Gyrfalks, she was "Redhead," a young recruit in Lizardi's Lunatics. Meanwhile, there was a weatherman, Ichliad Brunner. A weatherman's job is to observe and predict... -
Two Tales of Korval by Sharon Lee
Rated: 4.33 of 5 stars · 6 ratingsChapbook with two short stories:To Cut an Edge: Val Con, a rookie scout, meets Edger the knife-making Clutch Turtle.A Day at the Races: Young Val Con and Shan run rings around prim and proper Kareen... -
Courier Run by Sharon Lee, Steve Miller
Rated: 4.33 of 5 stars · 6 ratingsTwo new Liaden Universe® adventures! Novelette "Kin Ties" explores the ties that bind beloved kin -- and desperate enemies. Short story "Guaranteed Delivery" is a tale of love, leadership, and insurance fraud. Both stories appeared in slightly altered form on the authors' Splinter Universe website... -
Duty Bound by Sharon Lee, Steve Miller
Rated: 4.33 of 5 stars · 6 ratingsPilot of Korval and Breath's Duty, two stories featuring Daav yos Phelium and including Er Thom, Clonak, and Shadia. Answers several Liaden Universe mysteries... -
-
Certain Symmetry by Sharon Lee, Steve Miller
Rated: 4.33 of 5 stars · 6 ratingsThis chapbook contains two short stories set in the Liaden Universe."The Wine of Memory" features Moonshadow and Lute as they come off a rough road into a surprising visit to an old friend.In "Certain Symmetry," Pat Rin yos'Phelium, cousin to Val Con, becomes involved in a matter of Balance that takes him to unexpected places... -
Causes of Separation by Travis J.I. Corcoran
Rated: 4.33 of 5 stars · 6 ratingsEarth in 2064 is politically corrupt and in economic decline. The Long Depression has dragged on for 56 years, and the Bureau of Sustainable Research is hard at work making sure that no new technologies disrupt the planned economy... -
The Secret Life of Bots by Suzanne Palmer
Rated: 4.33 of 5 stars · 6 ratingsAutonomous maintenance robots take on a much larger role in saving a spaceship from aliens than the ship's human crew could have ever suspected.A science fiction story first published in Clarkesworld, Issue 132, September 2017... -
A Name Among The Stars by Mark Henwick
Rated: 4.33 of 5 stars · 6 ratings"Heiress? They've already stolen the estates. I'm heir to nothing." When disgraced aristocrat Zara Aguirre barely escapes with her life from her home world, she hopes that she's found safety on the planet Kernow. She wants nothing more than to be left in peace, hidden away in a remote town on the wild and untamed western coast... -
Dragon Tide by Sharon Lee, Steve Miller
Rated: 4.33 of 5 stars · 6 ratingsKareen yos'Phelium Clan Korval has always done everything that was proper, rising by study and by example to become the foremost scholar of the Liaden Code of Proper Conduct on Liad - and perhaps in the galaxy. Indeed, it seems that the only people she cannot influence to seemly action are the members of her own Clan. Now, wit Plan B in effect, Kareen must act... -
Body Suit by Suzanne Hagelin
Rated: 4.29 of 5 stars · 7 ratingsA riches to rags adventure of a clever woman in a high-tech suit versus a hostile AIExiled to the mines of Mars...Silvariah Frandelle, a clever business woman, falls from wealth and success into exile and poverty, indentured--barely one step above slavery--as an off-world laborer to escape prison... -
Phantom Orbit: A Thriller by David Ignatius
Rated: 4.25 of 5 stars · 8 ratingsA subtle and masterful novel from a prescient voice on the cutting edge of spy literature.David Ignatius is known for his uncanny ability, in novel after novel, to predict the next great national security headline. In Phantom Orbit, he presents a story both searing and topical, with stakes as far-reaching as outer space... -
Three Worlds Collide by Eliezer Yudkowsky
Rated: 4.17 of 5 stars · 12 ratingsThree Worlds Collide is a story I wrote to illustrate some points on naturalistic metaethics and diverse other issues of rational conduct. It grew, as such things do, into a small novella. On publication, it proved widely popular and widely criticized. Be warned that the story, as it wrote itself, ended up containing some profanity and PG-13 content... -
Pet Rocks by Hugh Howey
Rated: 4.14 of 5 stars · 14 ratingsIt's been a week since the cargo ship was lost on my watch. A week with very little sleep and not much appetite. Now the bio scanner is picking up some sign of life out there in the wreckage, and it's my duty to go see what it is. Maybe I'm not as alone out here as I thought. And maybe I don't want to be... -
Robot Dreams by Isaac Asimov
Rated: 4.08 of 5 stars · 26 ratingsRobot Dreams collects 21 of Isaac Asimov's short stories spanning the body of his fiction from the 1940s to the 1980s----exploring not only the future of technology, but the future of humanity's maturity and growth... -
-
A Liaden Universe Constellation: Volume 2 by Sharon Lee, Steve Miller
Rated: 4.44 of 5 stars · 10 ratingsBOOK 2 in The First Liaden Universe ® Collection. Seventeen short tales of the Liaden Universe® were brought together for the first time. Space opera and romance on a grand scale in a galaxy full of interstellar trading clans... -
System Collapse by Martha Wells
Rated: 4.57 of 5 stars · 7 ratingsThe million-copy, New York Times bestselling Murderbot series is back in another full-length novel adventure!Am I making it worse? I think I'm making it worse.Everyone's favorite lethal SecUnit is back.Following the events in Network Effect, the Barish-Estranza corporation has sent rescue ships to a newly-colonized planet in peril, as well as additional SecUnits... -
Progeny by Dan Worth
Rated: 4.17 of 5 stars · 6 ratingsThe Commonwealth stands on the brink. As war engulfs the worlds of man, the Shapers are poised to strike at the very heart of human civilisation. The men and women of the Commonwealth Navy now find themselves at the forefront of a desperate battle for the very survival of the species against an enemy whose weapons and technology far exceed their own... -
Chimera by N.J. Tanger, Rachael Tanger
Rated: 4.13 of 5 stars · 8 ratingsOn the verge of extinction, the Stephen’s Point colony must take desperate measures to save themselves. Without communication or resupply from Earth for the last fifteen years, the colony has but one chance to survive: restore the ancient starship Chimera and train a young crew to pilot her... -
Healer by F. Paul Wilson
Rated: 4.13 of 5 stars · 8 ratingsHealer (Book 3 of the LaNague Series) is the stunning conclusion of the LaNague Federation Trilogy. The Outworld Imperium began as a rebellion by colonials seeking independence. Two centuries later it is a bloated bureaucratic "business" - a business that produces nothing. Its income is not derived from a free exchange for goods or services, but from taxation... -
The Turing Exception by William Hertling
Rated: 4.07 of 5 stars · 14 ratingsIn the year 2043, humans and AI coexist in a precarious balance of power enforced by a rigid caste reputation system designed to ensure that only those AI who are trustworthy and contribute to human society increase in power. Everything changes when a runaway nanotech event destroys Miami... -
Echogenesis by Gary Gibson
Rated: 4.07 of 5 stars · 14 ratingsAn alien world teeming with deadly life. And fifteen strangers with no memory of how they came to be there.From the moment Sam Newman and fourteen others awaken inside metal coffins next to the burning wreckage of a spacecraft, they face a constant struggle to stay alive on a seemingly uninhabited planet light-years from home...Categorized as:
pollution-climate-change disaster sci-fi fiction aliens survival action-adventure space -
The Voyage of the Sable Keech by Neal Asher
Rated: 4.06 of 5 stars · 16 ratingsSable Keech is a walking dead man, and the only one to have been resurrected by nanochanger. Did he succeed because he was infected by the Spatterjay virus, or because he came late to resurrection in a tank of seawater? An ancient hive mind, almost incomprehensible to the human race, has sent an agent to this uncertain world... -
Return of the Jedi by James Kahn, George Lucas
Rated: 4.05 of 5 stars · 20 ratingsIt was a dark time for the Rebel Alliance...Han Solo, frozen in carbonite, has been delivered into the hands of the vile gangster Jabba the Hutt. Determined to rescue him, Luke Skywalker, Princess Leia and Lando Calrissian launch a hazardous mission against Jabba's Tatooine stronghold... -
Crystal Deception by Doug J. Cooper
Rated: 4.38 of 5 stars · 8 ratingsCriss lives in a special kind of prison. He can see and hear everything around the world, yet a mesh restrains his reach, forcing his cooperation. His creator, Dr. Jessica Tallette, believes his special abilities offer great promise for humanity... -
-
Atlas Alone by Emma Newman
Rated: 4.10 of 5 stars · 24 ratingsHugo Award winner Emma Newman returns to the captivating Planetfall universe with a novel about vengeance, and a woman deciding if she can become a murderer to save the future of humanity.Six months after she left Earth, Dee is struggling to manage her rage toward the people who ordered the nuclear strike that destroyed the world... -
Emergency Skin by N.K. Jemisin
Rated: 4.05 of 5 stars · 39 ratingsWhat will become of our self-destructed planet? The answer shatters all expectations in this subversive speculation from the Hugo Award–winning author of the Broken Earth trilogy.An explorer returns to gather information from a climate-ravaged Earth that his ancestors, and others among the planet’s finest, fled centuries ago. The mission comes with a warning: a graveyard world awaits him...Categorized as:
ai disaster politics pollution-climate-change 21st-century action-adventure adult afrofuturism -
On the Steel Breeze by Alastair Reynolds
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsIt is a thousand years in the future. Mankind is making its way out into the universe on massive generation ships.On the Steel Breeze is the follow-up to Blue Remembered Earth. It is both a sequel and a standalone novel, which just happens to be set in the same universe and revolves around members of the Akinya family... -
The Martian Way and Other Stories by Isaac Asimov
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsThis collection of four famous science fiction tales masterfully exemplifies author Isaac Asimov's ability to create quickly a believable human milieu in the midst of alien circumstances. Each of the long stores also shows his considerable skill in fully fleshing out a speculative scientific or social possibility... -
The Road to Damascus by John Ringo, Linda Evans
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars · 14 ratingsKeith Laumer's Bolos are Back-and New York Times Best-Selling Author John Ringo has Signed on with the Bolo Brigade! First Time in Paperback.When a ruthless political regime seizes power on a world struggling to recover from alien invasion, a former war hero finds herself leading a desperate band of freedom fighters... -
The Engineer ReConditioned by Neal Asher
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars · 12 ratingsBritish author Asher is rapidly becoming one of the major figures in 21st-century SF, as shown by the 10 powerful and entertaining stories in this collection. In "The Engineer," an interstellar research vessel picks up an escape pod that has been drifting for millions of years. The alien it contains turns out to be the last of a long-extinct race of genetic engineers with terrifying capabilities...
Or - use our amazing romance book finder to get recommendations based on your favorite content tropes and themes. Mix and match at will.