“Your utopia is my dystopia." —Gordon Jack
A few weeks ago, we asked you to think about the best utopian science fiction books and series.
Now we're asking: Does such a thing even exist?
This is a question many put forward in response to the various titles that were nominated and considered because, as we noted, many stories centring on utopian themes pose this very same question. And, what we see over and over again is that, indeed, what is a utopian existence for one, is inevitably someone else's dystopian nightmare.
While we'd love to believe that someday, somehow, a utopian world can be found, in literature the tension required to carry a story that is of interest often ends up finding itself in the juxtaposition between the perfect world and what we have to give up in order to achieve it; that or an examination of who still suffers.
As always, these top ten lists are not meant to be all-inclusive or definitive, but give a great finger on the pulse of our communities interests and favorites. Want to see who missed out? Here's the original nomination list from the blog.
Without further ado, based on the combined nominations and votes here on the Discover Sci-Fi blog and the Facebook group, here are your top choices for the best utopian sci-fi books/series.
10. Those Who Walk Away from Omelas by Ursula K. Le Guin
We were thrilled to see this brilliant work nominated and pleased that it garnered enough votes to make the final cut. We’re going to go out on a limb and say that the fact it placed tenth in the final poll may be an indication that it hasn’t been read as widely within in our community as some of the other (excellent) selections. It's a very short read, something you could likely finish over your morning coffee. Perhaps it’s time to pick it up?
The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas is a 1973 work of short philosophical fiction by American writer Ursula K. Le Guin.
With deliberately both vague and vivid descriptions, the narrator depicts a summer festival in the utopian city of Omelas, whose prosperity depends on the perpetual misery of a single child. The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas was nominated for the Locus Award for Best Short Fiction in 1974 and won the Hugo Award for Best Short Story in 1974.
Get The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas here on Amazon
9. The Dispossessed by Ursula K. Le Guin
Ninth on our list is another selection from Ursula K. Le Guin! The Dispossessed: An Ambiguous Utopia is a 1974 utopian science fiction novel set in the fictional universe of the seven novels of the Hainish Cycle, about anarchy and other societal structures, like capitalism and hierarchy.
Over the course of this poll, we’ve heard many a debate about why one title or another doesn’t meet the criteria for exploring the theme of utopias. The Dispossessed, it seems, is beyond reproach in that regard. A true masterpiece, the book that “started as a very bad short story, which I didn’t try to finish, but couldn’t quite let go” was, by Le Guin’s account, the result of a lot of soul-searching and deep thought about “war, peace, politics, how we govern one another and ourselves, the value of failure, and the strength of what is weak” which helped her land on a clear vision of what she wanted to explore with this book: “an anarchist utopia.” It is a wholly original and compelling book.
If you haven’t read this multi award-winning classic yet, take this as your cue to do so.
Read the classic,The Dispossessed here on Amazon.
8. To the Stars by Harry Harrison
Perhaps better known for his Stainless Steel Rat Series, author Harry Harrison’s To The Stars Trilogy opens with Homeworld, which presents a dystopian world some centuries in the future. Like other books on this list, this dystopia is initially presented as a utopia, with an elite class enjoying a life of privilege that comes at great cost.
Jan Kulozik was one of Earth's privileged elite. A brilliant young electronics engineer, he enjoyed all the blessings of a 23rd-century civilization that survived the global collapse and conquered the stars, unaware of the millions who slaved or starved to maintain his way of life.
Then Jan met Sara, a beautiful agent of the rebel underground dedicated to smashing Earth's rigid caste system. Through her he discovered the truth behind the lies he'd been taught. His every move watched by state surveillance, Jan risked his position and his life to restore humanity's heritage.
Get your copy of Homeworld, the first book in the To the Stars Trilogy here on Amazon.
7. The Earthseed Series by Octavia E. Butler
Our seventh place selection, the Earthseed Series, by sci-fi luminary Octavia E. Butler, takes place in (what is now) the very near future, in the United States, which—in the book— has fallen into collapse. The series was meant to be a trilogy, but Butler died before finishing the third book.
Billed as a dystopian novel, the book deals heavily with utopian themes. The first book in the series, Parable of the Sower, takes place in In 2025 where, with the world descending into madness and anarchy, one woman begins a fateful journey toward a better future.
Lauren Olamina, is the daughter of a Baptist minister who serves their walled-in neighborhood. Because of her mother's addiction to a prescription drug, Olamina suffers from hyperempathy, which causes her to share pain or perceived pain with any living creature she sees. When her community is attacked, burned, and looted, seventeen-year-old Olamina barely escapes with her life. She travels, at great danger, into northern California in search of a haven where she and others can build the first Earthseed community.
Pick up the Earthseed Series here on Amazon.
6. Brave New World by Aldous Huxley
In sixth place, we have Brave New World, a dystopian novel by English author Aldous Huxley, written in 1931 and published in 1932. A dystopian novel.
Did we say it already?
Perspective is everything.
“Brave New World is either a perfect-world utopia or its nasty opposite, a dystopia, depending on your point of view: its inhabitants are beautiful, secure and free from diseases and worries, though in a way we like to think we would find unacceptable." —Margaret Atwood, The Guardian, 2007
Brave New World is a searching vision of an unequal, technologically-advanced future where humans are genetically bred, socially indoctrinated, and pharmaceutically anesthetized to passively uphold an authoritarian ruling order--all at the cost of our freedom, full humanity, and perhaps also our souls. It asks us to consider whether a “perfect” world is possible, or even desirable. It ask us to consider if a utopia is worth the cost.
Huxley followed this book with a reassessment in essay form, Brave New World Revisited (1958), and with his final novel, Island (1962), the utopian counterpart. They are both definitely worth checking out if you've already read Brave New World, and if you haven't, as always, we've got you.
Get Brave New World, here on Amazon.
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5. Logan's Run by William F. Nolan and George Clayton Johnson
We’ve reached the top five! Coming in fifth place is Logan’s Run, the bestselling dystopian novel that inspired the 1970s science-fiction classic starring Michael York, Jenny Agutter, and Richard Jordan. The book, co-written by William F. Nolan and George Clayton Johnson is yet one more that explores the idea that “your utopia is my dystopia,” by presenting a utopian future society on the surface, revealed as a dystopia where the population and the consumption of resources are maintained in equilibrium by killing everyone who reaches the age of thirty. An ageist dystopia, masquerading as a utopia. Nevertheless, an excellent read exploring utopian societies and their price.
It's the 23rd Century and at age 21... your life is over! Logan-6 has been trained to kill; born and bred from conception to be the best of the best. But his time is short and before his life ends he's got one final mission: Find and destroy Sanctuary, a fabled haven for those that chose to defy the system. But when Logan meets and falls in love with Jessica, he begins to question the very system he swore to protect and soon they're both running for their lives. When Last Day comes, will you lie down and die... or run!
Grab your copy of Logan's Run here on Amazon.
4. The Culture Series by Iain M. Banks
The Culture Series is a science fiction series written by Scottish author Iain M. Banks, one he has said will ultimately “form the largest part of [his] life’s work.” So much has been written about the series and the way it explores utopian themes, including some fascinating interviews with the author—such as the one previously quoted—in which he discusses, among other things, why he feels it’s unlikely we humans will ever succeed in establishing a utopia.
The stories in the Culture Series centre on the Culture, a utopian, post-scarcity space society of humanoids, aliens, and advanced artificial intelligences living in socialist habitats spread across the Milky Way galaxy. The main theme of the novels is the dilemmas that an idealistic hyperpower faces in dealing with civilizations that do not share its ideals, and whose behaviour it sometimes finds repulsive.
The series currently stands at ten books written over more than 25 years. While the books work as standalones, the first book, Consider Phlebas, is a great place to start as it gives a different perspective from the other books and provides a great foundation for understanding the world Banks has created.
The war raged across the galaxy. Billions had died, billions more were doomed. Moons, planets, the very stars themselves, faced destruction, cold-blooded, brutal, and worse, random. The Idirans fought for their Faith; the Culture for its moral right to exist. Principles were at stake. There could be no surrender.
Get your copy of Consider Phlebas here on Amazon.
3. Starship Troopers by Robert A. Heinlein
The top three! In third place, is Starship Troopers by sci-fi giant Robert A. Heinlein. As with other selections on the list, the setting of our third place title has been described as dystopian, but it is presented by Heinlein as utopian; its leaders are shown as good and wise, and the population as free and prosperous.
Do a Google search for “misunderstood science fiction book,” and you’ll find plenty of discussion on this one. Is it a criticism of democracy? A celebration of the military? Satire? Of course, some of the confusion comes not from the novel itself, but with how it was adapted to the screen, but it’s fair to say that regardless, this classic gives us plenty to think (and talk) about.
In Robert A. Heinlein’s controversial Hugo Award-winning bestseller, a recruit of the future goes through the toughest boot camp in the Universe—and into battle against mankind’s most alarming enemy...
Get your copy of Starship Troopers here on Amazon.
2. Childhood's End by Arthur C. Clarke
“No utopia can ever give satisfaction to everyone, all the time. As their material conditions improve, men raise their sights and become discontented with power and possessions that once would have seemed beyond their wildest dreams. And even when the external world has granted all it can, there still remain the searchings of the mind and the longings of the heart.”—Arthur C. Clarke, Childhood's End
We were not surprised to see this incredible entry near the top of the list. Childhood's End is a true classic written in 1953 by the British author Arthur C. Clarke. The story follows the peaceful alien invasion of Earth by the mysterious Overlords, whose arrival begins decades of apparent utopia under indirect alien rule, at the cost of human identity and culture. If you’ve missed this classic, consider this your invitation to pick it up! You won’t be disappointed.
The Overlords appeared suddenly over every city - intellectually, technologically, and militarily superior to humankind. Benevolent, they made few demands: unify earth, eliminate poverty, and end war. With little rebellion, humankind agreed, and a golden age began.
But at what cost? With the advent of peace, man ceases to strive for creative greatness, and a malaise settles over the human race. To those who resist, it becomes evident that the Overlords have an agenda of their own. As civilization approaches the crossroads, will the Overlords spell the end for humankind . . . or the beginning?
Start Childhood's End, here on Amazon.
1. The Lazurus Long Series by Robert A. Heinlein
We've reached the top! The number one entry in our poll—the Lazarus Long Series by Robert A. Heinlein—won by a hearty margin.
“At the time I wrote Methuselah’s Children I was still politically quite naive and still had hopes that various libertarian notions could be put over by political processes…”—Robert A. Heinlein
Lazarus Long is a fictional character featured in a number of science fiction novels by Robert A. Heinlein. The first book in which he appears is Heinlein’s Methuselah’s Children and given it won the Prometheus Hall of Fame Award for "Best Classic Libertarian Sci-Fi Novel” in 1997, you can safely assume it explores the virtues of Libertarianism. Given the series’ first place standing in a poll on books exploring utopian themes in science fiction, is it safe to say that many among us feel a society that maximizes political freedom and autonomy is a utopian one? Or, at the very least, that the notion is an enticing one?
No one may seize or harm the person or property of another, or invade his privacy, or force him to do his bidding. Americans are fiercely proud of their re-won liberties and the blood it cost them: nothing could make them forswear those truths they hold self-evident. Nothing except the promise of immortality...
Lazarus Long, member of a select group bred for generations to live far beyond normal human lifespans, helps his kind escape persecution after word leaks out and angry crowds accuse them of withholding the “secret” of longevity. Lazarus and his companions set out on an interstellar journey and face many trials and strange cultures, like a futuristic Odysseus and his crew, before returning to Earth.
Start the journey with Methuselah's Children here on Amazon.
"Someday we'll find it, the Rainbow Connection, the lovers, the dreamers and me..."
Frogs singing their hearts out about a utopian dream? Definitely the stuff of science fiction, right? We all can dream, but as Margaret Atwood pointed out in the Guardian article we quoted earlier, "Utopia" is sometimes said to mean "no place", from the Greek ou-topos; others derive it from eu, as in "eugenics", in which case it would mean "healthy place" or "good place". Sir Thomas More, in his own 16th-century Utopia, may have been punning: "utopia is the good place that doesn't exist…"
But whether or not a utopian society could ever be possible is beside the point, and we think it's safe to say, at the very least, it's something none of us will ever live to see. However, we sure hope science fiction authors continue to explore the possibility in their work, even if it doesn't look quite as rosy as we'd like because one thing these books offer that their purely dystopian counterparts don't always manage, is a little bit of hope.
What do you think of the books on our final list, and do you think it's possible for a author to write a compelling, yet purely utopian work? One that captures readers without the tension of a dystopian threat being introduced at some point? We'd love to hear your thoughts! Visit us here in our Facebook group to chime in on the debate, and then check out our most recent poll while you're there. Don't have Facebook? Feel free to add to the comments below.
*All book-related copy in this post was pulled from Amazon, Goodreads & Wikipedia, unless otherwise credited.
