Can you please suggest a blog or resource that will tell me what under-the-radar science fiction movies I should go see?
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posted by rebent
on May 21, 2013 -
6 answers
I'm a graduate student about to propose a college writing class on science fiction and personal identity. The stories need to be short and brand name authors are preferred. I've got a prospective syllabus (see inside), but I bet there's a lot of good stuff that I'm missing that you know about.
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posted by vathek
on Feb 12, 2013 -
50 answers
As a reader of fiction (especially if you're a devotee of
speculative fiction), how much do you like detailed descriptions and/or lists as part of the story? What if the story switches between detail and expediency?
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posted by batmonkey
on Dec 28, 2012 -
12 answers
I'm looking for a sci-fi book about young people who traveled to an alternative universe on multiple occasions. There was something about a power station and the story may also have mentioned a triangular symbol. It turns out that their switching between universes was limited for some reason.
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posted by who squared
on Oct 20, 2012 -
13 answers
Looking for instances, whether fictional, religious or otherwise, of the idea of the "double".
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posted by Lorin
on Sep 30, 2012 -
33 answers
Transfer, the 2010 German movie: questions! (big spoilers inside; avoid if you haven't seen this awesome movie)
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posted by lorimer
on May 25, 2012 -
0 answers
Please recommend novels that deal with Uplifting sentient species, bootstrapping technology, a la David Brin's Upllift novels and Vernor Vinge's Zones of Thought series.
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posted by kittensofthenight
on Apr 18, 2012 -
22 answers
I'm trying to find a science-fiction story that I saw on a webpage once. I can only remember a few odd miscellaneous details: the author was gay and French, he had a page about his graduate-level math research, and I think his name may have had "David" or "Simon" in it. His webpage was in both English and French, and I'm pretty sure it talked about Alan Turing on part of it. The story itself was based on the premise that the ancient Greeks discovered space travel 2000 years ago and spread throughout the galaxy, creating a galaxy-wide Hellenic-style empire. I believe only the first chapter of the story was written, which was mostly the Earthling protagonist discovering the empire, exposition about its history and politics, and him having sex with some Greek-god-lookalike guy from the Empire.
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posted by aurochs
on Dec 1, 2011 -
3 answers
What's the best venue to submit a politically tinged left-leaning science-fiction short story?
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posted by Slap*Happy
on Aug 24, 2011 -
14 answers
Help me construct a typology of fictional (but familiar) technological epochs -- along with the genre-conventions and stock-elements that characterize each.
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posted by foursentences
on Jun 28, 2011 -
7 answers
Give your best examples of the SF/ Survivalist/ Wish Fullfillment sub-genre "libertarian engineers do everything better" or "objectivist superman saves history". More specifically ones where someone is the last man on earth/sendt back in time and constructs a free market utopia through sheer smarts and rationality ( with himself on the top of it, of course).
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posted by The Whelk
on Jun 9, 2011 -
28 answers
[YA book filter] I would like to find some YA or easy-to-read adult sci-fi, speculative fiction, or dystopian fiction. Preferably, about the United States or other earthly country, not deep-space intergalactic stuff.
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posted by lockstitch
on Mar 29, 2011 -
37 answers
What are some details of military life that authors writing for generic military settings often get wrong? What details, if I got them right, would convince you that I had really done my homework? Note that I'm not looking for punctilio like the particular way somebody carries his hat indoors but rather broader things that would be ring true for servicemen of any tradition (e.g., strict rules about exactly how to carry a hat).
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posted by d. z. wang
on Feb 7, 2010 -
21 answers
Sci-Fi Movie Filter: Trying to locate the title of a movie I saw in the late 80's. It was set in the US in the near future. A private eye or cop was trying to track down someone smuggling a deadly drug or chemical that - when it came in contact with the human body - dissolved it in a fantastically gruesome fashion with smoke and screaming.
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posted by ninazer0
on Nov 1, 2009 -
5 answers
Back in the 70's/80's, I remember seeing a series of scifi/fantasy books, where the cover art for all the books had a consistent theme of a red/orange sun that figured prominently. What was it?
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posted by nomisxid
on Oct 6, 2009 -
19 answers
Can you recommend any good stories/books that deal with unobtrusive time travel tourism? Tourists from the future going back in time to view historical events, or catch a glimpse at a historical person, but not interacting or interfering in any way, shape, or form... read-only time travel, if you will.
posted by bjork24
on Sep 14, 2009 -
15 answers
I've just finished reading Let The Galaxy Burn, a collection of Warhammer 40k short stories, and I really liked it. What are some other good Warhammer 40k books?
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posted by thewittyname
on Jun 9, 2009 -
11 answers
Is there any first contact science fiction (or other types of scifi, more generally) where the characters have actually READ first contact science fiction before?
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posted by OmieWise
on Mar 24, 2009 -
23 answers
Short Story Filter. I remember a short story that I read in a sci-fi story anthology back in the mid 90's that I haven't been able to find since.
There are a group of three boys, one of them substantially younger, who play out in a big field. One of the older boys tells the younger boy, as a joke, that if you look through the hole in the middle of a stone, you can see into another world of some kind. Mysterious circumstances then occur.
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posted by lockle
on Oct 23, 2008 -
2 answers
Short Story Askme: I read a short dystopian story many years ago set in a run-down, post apocalyptic future. A queue of people line up on a street to spit at a painting. The painting represents all the problems of the past. It is implied that the painting is The Mona Lisa. What is the story?
posted by bollockovnikov
on Sep 25, 2008 -
2 answers
Please-help-me-identify-a-book-filter. Trying to track down a young adults hardish sci-fi book from the mid 80s in the UK about a space medic in trouble.
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posted by ArkhanJG
on Jul 1, 2008 -
3 answers
WhatWasThatBookFilter: a friend of mine needs help tracking down a fantasy/sci-fi paperback she read back in 1997. Full description below.
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posted by bettafish
on Jun 11, 2008 -
5 answers
I am trying to find a SciFi book that I read the first couple of chapters of. It involved two companies racing to come up with some kind of genetic cure and in the process creating a monster or something.
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posted by rbs
on Feb 23, 2008 -
6 answers
I'm looking for a series of hardback science fiction anthologies I dimly remember from childhood (sometime in the mid 80s). I think it had a one word title with a number, and the series went up to at least number five. I remember two stories in particular...
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posted by Artw
on Jan 13, 2008 -
11 answers
Is there any time travel fiction based on the idea of only sending signals/information into the past?
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posted by clockworkjoe
on Dec 9, 2007 -
41 answers
Looking for a short story I read online, where technological advances eliminate middle management and then junior employees, with a fast food restaurant used as an example...
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posted by so_necessary
on May 29, 2007 -
8 answers
Trying to remember a sci-fi short story - I used to read Nebula Award collections when I was a kid and this one was in one years collection, but I am pretty sure it did not win. I've been trying to figure out what it was for years now. I'll tell you what I remember from it inside here...
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posted by darkpony
on May 2, 2007 -
12 answers
[StoryFilter] About a year ago, I read a piece of sci-fi on the internet. I can't remember the web address, author or title.
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posted by pollystark
on Mar 12, 2007 -
11 answers
SciFiFilter: Trying to track down a story about a professor and several students who travel to alternate dimensions through the power of hypnosis.
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posted by RobotHero
on Jun 7, 2006 -
5 answers
This should be an easy one. I'm trying to remember the title, and author, of a sci fi / cyberpunk novel I read a few years back. The book started in Galveston, Texas, then moved on to guys in the Caribbean running ecosystems on ships. I think it also involved an escape from Hong Kong on a ship, and later, jail in Mali. Oh and while you're at it, reccomend some lesser known books with a similar vibe, if you can.
posted by Jimbob
on Mar 27, 2006 -
10 answers
Once I read a story about people who could give a disease to computers. Or possibly they could catch this disease through the keyboard. Citizens with this disease, I vaguely recall, were not allowed to use computers without rubber gloves. If you had AIDS or HIV you were protected and allowed unrestricted access to computer keyboards. Does this ring a bell for anyone?
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posted by dual_action
on Sep 14, 2005 -
1 answer
Are there any precursors to the science-fiction genre that appear earlier than
Frankenstein? Essentially, I want to know: what is the first ever appearance of science-fiction?
posted by monsterhero
on Apr 26, 2005 -
30 answers
Suggestions for a friend on a speculative fiction / early Sci-Fi kick (stuff along the lines of H.G. Wells' "The War in the Air" and John Jacob Astor's "A Journey in Other Worlds")?
posted by Polonius
on Mar 4, 2005 -
14 answers
I'm looking for a fiction anthology, and only vaguely remember the title or what the book looked like. [more inside]
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posted by FunkyHelix
on Nov 28, 2004 -
4 answers
