20 Best SciFi Books Of 2020 So Far
Updated 6/7/2020
Between Covid-19, techie billionaires running the world and the general decline of western civilization some might argue this is no time to have our head in the clouds with popular SciFi. For whatever reason though we seem to be in a golden era of amazing authors publishing a record number of great novels to choose from. With the flood of great work it can be hard to find your next favorite author. This list is based on my personal opinion as well as pulling from Amazon top sellers and the best reviewed of GoodReads. I’d love any thought or feedback on titles I missed and get more reviews at AudioBookReviews.com. Thanks and on to the list!
TL:DR List
1. The Book of Koli by M.R. Carey
2. Eden by Tim Lebbon
3. The Hidden Girl by Ken Liu
4. The Vanished Birds by Simon Jimenez
5. The Bear by Andrew Krivak
6. Mazes of Power by Juliette Wade
7. The City We Became by N.K. Jemisin
8. Blue Screen by Kyle Benzle
9. Agency by William Gibson
10. The Last Human by Zack Jordan
11. Interior Chinatown by Charles Yu
12. The Light Years by R.W.W. Greene
13. The Resisters by Gish Jen
14. Docile by K.M. Szpara
15. The Last Smile in Sunder City by Luke Arnold
16. Riot Baby by Tochi Onyebuchi
17. Finna by Nino Cipri
18. A Beginning at the End by Mike Chen
19. The Mother Code by Carole Stivers
20. The Lost Book of Adana Moreau by Michael Zapata
1. The Book of Koli
by M.R. Carey
”Weakness is a matter of context, Koli Woodsmith. Until it becomes a matter of logistics.”
Part coming-of-age tale, part survival fiction, The Book of Koli was yet another post-apocalyptic gem from M.R. Carey. Having loved both of his previous end o’ the world books, I didn’t know what to expect from this particular one, but I knew it would have the hallmarks I’ve come to expect from him — phenomenal world-building, incredible, resilient characters, and plenty of heart and in an otherwise heartless landscape. And that’s what I was given, plus several fantastic surprises.
- Kindle Store $11.99
- Amazon
2. Eden
by Tim Lebbon
Eden is an explosive novel, with a lot to say about the current situation that the planet faces. Lebbon employs several smart literary techniques throughout the novel, such as preceding each chapter with accounts from various sources not directly connected the main narrative thrust of the novel. These excerpts from personal accounts of those affected by the rehoming and resultant lockdown of the zones and press releases form those tasked with defending the integrity of the zones, add an extra layer of social commentary to the novel. It allows Lebbon to explore the discontent and frustrations of those who have not fully signed on to the concept. It also allows an insight into the workings of the Zone Defence Zone and the fact that they may not be the white knights in shining armour as they would have us believe.
- Kindle Store $2.99
- Amazon
3. The Hidden Girl and Other Stories
by Ken Liu
3.96/5 · 166 ratings
From award-winning author Ken Liu comes his much anticipated second volume of short stories.
Ken Liu is one of the most lauded short story writers of our time. This collection includes a selection of his science fiction and fantasy stories from the last five years — sixteen of his best — plus a new novelette.
In addition to these seventeen selections, The Hidden Girl and Other Stories also features an excerpt from book three in the Dandelion Dynasty series, The Veiled Throne.
- Kindle Store $13.99
- Amazon
4. The Vanished Birds
4.09/5 · 518 ratings
A mysterious child lands in the care of a solitary woman, changing both of their lives forever in this captivating debut of connection across space and time.
“This is when your life begins.”
Nia Imani is a woman out of place and outside of time. Decades of travel through the stars are condensed into mere months for her, though the years continue to march steadily onward for everyone she has ever known. Her friends and lovers have aged past her; all she has left is work. Alone and adrift, she lives only for the next paycheck, until the day she meets a mysterious boy, fallen from the sky.
A boy, broken by his past.
- Kindle Store $12.99
- Amazon
5. The Bear
3.81/5 · 458 ratings
From National Book Award in Fiction finalist Andrew Krivak comes a gorgeous fable of Earth’s last two human inhabitants and a girl’s journey home.
In an Eden-like future, a girl and her father live close to the land in the shadow of a lone mountain. They own a few remnants of civilization: some books, a pane of glass, a set of flint and steel, a comb. The father teaches his daughter how to fish and hunt and the secrets of the seasons and the stars. He is preparing her for an adulthood in harmony with nature, for they are the last of humankind. But when the girl finds herself alone in an unknown landscape, it is a bear that will lead her back home through a vast wilderness that offers the greatest lessons of all, if she can learn to listen. A cautionary tale of human fragility, of love and loss, The Bear is a stunning tribute to the beauty of nature’s dominion.
- Kindle Store $11.99
- Amazon
6. Mazes of Power (The Broken Trust #1)
3.78/5 · 54 ratings
This debut work of sociological science fiction follows a deadly battle for succession, where brother is pitted against brother in a singular chance to win power and influence for their family.
The cavern city of Pelismara has stood for a thousand years. The Great Families of the nobility cling to the myths of their golden age while the city’s technology wanes.
When a fever strikes, and the Eminence dies, seventeen-year-old Tagaret is pushed to represent his Family in the competition for Heir to the Throne. To win would give him the power to rescue his mother from his abusive father, and marry the girl he loves.
- Kindle Store $13.99
- Amazon
7. The City We Became (Great Cities #1)
by N.K. Jemisin
4.08/5 · 146 ratings
Five New Yorkers must come together in order to defend their city in the first book of a stunning new series by Hugo award-winning and NYT bestselling author N. K. Jemisin.
Every city has a soul. Some are as ancient as myths, and others are as new and destructive as children. New York City? She’s got five.
But every city also has a dark side. A roiling, ancient evil stirs beneath the earth, threatening to destroy the city and her five protectors unless they can come together and stop it once and for all.
8. Blue Screen: How Peter Gustafson Defragmented the World
by Kyle Benzle
4.33/5 · 31 ratings
One of the best new SciFi novels and debut author of 2020!
A young computer hacker takes on the greatest AI of all time to try and save the world, but fails.
Congratulations and welcome to the InterEra network!
Your timeline must have just completed your first gravitational wave antenna. For all but a few of you, this will be your first incoming message. For all but a few of you, that means there is still time.
- Amazon
- Kindle Store $2.95
9. Agency (The Peripheral #2)
3.95/5 · 2,149 ratings
“One of the most visionary, original, and quietly influential writers currently working” (The Boston Globe) returns with a brand-new novel.
In William Gibson’s first novel since 2014’s New York Times bestselling The Peripheral, a gifted “app-whisperer,” hired to beta test a mysterious new product, finds her life endangered by her relationship with her surprisingly street-smart and combat-savvy “digital assistant.”
- Kindle Store $14.99
- Amazon
10. The Last Human
by Zack Jordan
3.68/5 · 84 ratings
The last human in the universe is on the run from a godlike intelligence in this rip-roaring debut space opera.
Sarya is the civilized galaxy’s worst nightmare: a Human.
Most days, Sarya doesn’t feel like the most terrifying creature in the galaxy.
Most days, she’s got other things on her mind. Like hiding her identity among the hundreds of alien species roaming the corridors of Watertower Station. Or making sure her adoptive mother doesn’t casually eviscerate one of their neighbors. Again.
11. Interior Chinatown
by Charles Yu
4.14/5 · 771 ratings
From the infinitely inventive author of How to Live Safely in a Science Fictional Universe comes a deeply personal novel about race, pop culture, immigration, assimilation, and escaping the roles we are forced to play.
Willis Wu doesn’t perceive himself as a protagonist even in his own life: he’s merely Generic Asian Man. Every day, he leaves his tiny room in a Chinatown SRO and enters the Golden Palace restaurant, where Black and White, a procedural cop show, is in perpetual production. He’s a bit player here too. . . but he dreams of being Kung Fu Guy — the highest aspiration he can imagine for a Chinatown denizen. Or is it?
- Kindle Store $12.99
- Amazon
12. The Light Years
3.82/5 · 56 ratings
The captain of a family-owned starship arranges a marriage for her son in hopes of achieving faster-than-light travel and maybe, just maybe, marital bliss.
Before Hisako Saski is even born, her parents make a deal on her behalf. In exchange for a first-class education and a boost out of poverty, Hisako will marry Adem Sadiq, a maintenance engineer and self-styled musician who works the trade lanes aboard his family’s sub-light starship, the Hajj.
- Amazon
- Kindle Store $8.99
13. The Resisters
by Gish Jen
3.72/5 · 307 ratings
An audacious marvel of a novel about baseball and a future America, from the always inventive and exciting author of The Love Wife and Who’s Irish
The time: a not-so-distant future. The place: AutoAmerica. The land: half under water. The Internet — the new face of government — is “Aunt Nettie”: a mix of artificial intelligence, surveillance technology, and pesky maxims. The people have been divided, and no one is happy. The angel-fair “Netted” still have jobs and literally occupy the high ground, while the mostly coppertoned “Surplus” live on swampland if they’re lucky, on the water if they’re not.
Kindle Store $13.99
14. Docile
by K.M. Szpara
3.94/5 · 319 ratings
There is no consent under capitalism
Docile is a science fiction parable about love and sex, wealth and debt, abuse and power, a challenging tour de force that at turns seduces and startles.
To be a Docile is to be kept, body and soul, for the uses of the owner of your contract. To be a Docile is to forget, to disappear, to hide inside your body from the horrors of your service. To be a Docile is to sell yourself to pay your parents’ debts and buy your children’s future.
- Kindle Store $14.99
- Amazon
15. The Last Smile in Sunder City
by Luke Arnold
3.81/5 · 263 ratings
A former soldier turned PI tries to help the fantasy creatures whose lives he ruined in a world that’s lost its magic in a compelling debut fantasy by Black Sails actor Luke Arnold. Welcome to Sunder City. The magic is gone but the monsters remain.I’m Fetch Phillips, just like it says on the window. There are a few things you should know before you hire me:1. Sobriety costs extra.2. My services are confidential.3. I don’t work for humans. It’s nothing personal — I’m human myself. But after what happened, to the magic, it’s not the humans who need my help. Walk the streets of Sunder City and meet Fetch, his magical clients, and a darkly imagined world perfect for readers of Ben Aaronovitch and Jim Butcher.
- Kindle Store $9.99
- Amazon
16. Riot Baby
4.00/5 · 686 ratings
“Riot Baby bursts at the seams of story with so much fire, passion and power that in the end it turns what we call a narrative into something different altogether.” — Marlon James
Rooted in foundational loss and the hope that can live in anger, Riot Baby is both a global dystopian narrative an intimate family story with quietly devastating things to say about love, fury, and the black American experience.
Ella and Kev are brother and sister, both gifted with extraordinary power. Their childhoods are defined and destroyed by structural racism and brutality. Their futures might alter the world. When Kev is incarcerated for the crime of being a young black man in America, Ella — through visits both mundane and supernatural — tries to show him the way to a revolution that could burn it all down.
- Kindle Store $9.99
- Amazon
17. Finna
by Nino Cipri
4.16/5 · 223 ratings
When an elderly customer at a big box furniture store slips through a portal to another dimension, it’s up to two minimum-wage employees to track her across the multiverse and protect their company’s bottom line. Multi-dimensional swashbuckling would be hard enough, but our two unfortunate souls broke up a week ago.
Can friendship blossom from the ashes of a relationship? In infinite dimensions, all things are possible.
- Kindle Store $3.99
- Amazon
18. A Beginning at the End
by Mike Chen
3.63/5 · 534 ratings
How do you start over after the end of the world?
Six years after a global pandemic wiped out most of the planet’s population, the survivors are rebuilding the country, split between self-governing cities, hippie communes and wasteland gangs.
In postapocalyptic San Francisco, former pop star Moira has created a new identity to finally escape her past — until her domineering father launches a sweeping public search to track her down. Desperate for a fresh start herself, jaded event planner Krista navigates the world on behalf of those too traumatized to go outside, determined to help everyone move on — even if they don’t want to. Rob survived the catastrophe with his daughter, Sunny, but lost his wife. When strict government rules threaten to separate parent and child, Rob needs to prove himself worthy in the city’s eyes by connecting with people again.
19. The Mother Code
3.85/5 · 96 ratings
It’s 2049, and the survival of the human race is at risk. The earth’s inhabitants must turn to their last resort, a plan to place genetically engineered children inside the cocoons of large-scale robots — to be incubated, birthed, and raised by machines. But there is yet one hope of preserving the human order: an intelligence programmed into these machines that renders each unique in its own right — the Mother Code.
Kai is born in America’s desert southwest, his only companion his robotic Mother, Rho-Z. Equipped with the knowledge and motivations of a human mother, Rho-Z raises Kai and teaches him how to survive. But as children like Kai come of age, their Mothers transform too — in ways that were never predicted. And when government survivors decide that the Mothers must be destroyed, Kai must make a choice. Will he break the bond he shares with Rho-Z? Or will he fight to save the only parent he has ever known?
20. The Lost Book of Adana Moreau
3.87/5 · 299 ratings
The mesmerizing story of a Latin American science fiction writer and the lives her lost manuscript unites decades later in post-Katrina New Orleans
In 1929 in New Orleans, a Dominican immigrant named Adana Moreau writes a science fiction novel titled Lost City. It is a strange and beautiful novel, set in a near future where a sixteen-year-old Dominican girl, not all that unlike Adana herself, searches for a golden eternal city believed to exist somewhere on a parallel Earth. Lost City earns a modest but enthusiastic readership, and Adana begins a sequel. Then she falls gravely ill. Just before she dies, she and her son, Maxwell, destroy the only copy of the manuscript.
Decades later in Chicago, Saul Drower is cleaning out his dead grandfather’s home when he discovers a mysterious package containing a manuscript titled A Model Earth, written by none other than Adana Moreau.
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