On Our Radar: Spring 2024 Sci-Fi Highlights!
Can we just take a moment to celebrate that spring is right around the corner? Don't know about you, but we are so ready!
Now, hands up if you read our post a few months back on the sci-fi books we were most looking forward to over winter. We hope that if you did, you found at least a few gems among them. We also hope you're ready for more, because this next list is STACKED with sci-fi reads you do not want to miss. Count your lucky stars they are not all being released at once, or you'd have quite the dilemma on your hands in trying to decide which to read first. For real. As it is, we've picked a few for every month of spring, hopefully enough to keep all of you avid readers satisfied!
Scroll on to get a glimpse of some of our top picks for spring and because sharing is caring, please be sure leave your own top picks in the comments!
Welcome to Forever by Nathan Tavares
Release Date: March 12, 2024
Fox is a memory editor – one of the best – gifted with the skill to create real life in the digital world. When he wakes up in Field of Reeds Center for Memory Reconstruction with no idea how he got there, the therapists tell him he was a victim in a terrorist bombing by Khadija Banks, the pioneer of memory editing technology turned revolutionary. A bombing which shredded the memory archives of all its victims, including his husband Gabe.
Thrust into reconstructions of his memories exploded from the fragments that survived the blast, Fox tries to rebuild his life, his marriage and himself. But he quickly realises his world is changing, unreliable, and echoing around itself over and over.
As he unearths endless cycles of meeting Gabe, falling in love and breaking up, Fox digs deep into his past, his time in the refugee nation of Aaru, and the exact nature of his relationship with Khadija. Because, in a world tearing itself apart to forget all its sadness, saving the man he loves might be the key to saving us all.
Read Welcome to Forever here on Amazon. Also available on audiobook
Dangerous Visions by Harlan Ellison
Release Date: March 26, 2024
Harlan Ellison’s Dangerous Visions made history on its release, receiving a special citation at the World Science Fiction Convention as that year’s “most significant and controversial SF book published.”
A landmark short story collection that put New Wave Science Fiction on the literary map, Dangerous Visions won several prestigious awards and was nominated for many others. This now-classic anthology includes thirty-three stories by thirty-two award-winning authors, over half of whom have won multiple Hugo and Nebula Awards. Contributing authors include: Robert Silverberg, Frederik Pohl, Brian W. Aldiss, Philip K. Dick, Larry Niven, Fritz Leiber, Poul Anderson, Theodore Sturgeon, J.G. Ballard, Samuel R. Delany, and Ellison himself.
As relevant now as it was when first published, Dangerous Visions is a phenomenal collection that deserves a place on every bookshelf.
Read Dangerous Visions here on Amazon. Also available on audiobook.
A View From the Stars by Cixin Liu
Release Date: April 2, 2024
"We’re mysterious aliens in the crowd. We jump like fleas from future to past and back again, and float like clouds of gas between nebulae; in a flash, we can reach the edge of the universe, or tunnel into a quark, or swim within a star-core. . . . We’re as unassuming as fireflies, yet our numbers grow like grass in spring. We sci-fi fans are people from the future."—Cixin Liu, from the essay "Sci-Fi Fans"
A VIEW FROM THE STARS features a range of short works from the past three decades of New York Times bestselling author Cixin Liu's prolific career, putting his nonfiction essays and short stories side-by-side for the first time. This collection includes essays and interviews that shed light on Liu's experiences as a reader, writer, and lover of science fiction throughout his life, as well as short fiction that gives glimpses into the evolution of his imaginative voice over the years.
"Science fiction without guile, without snark, without ironic disaffection and all its exhausting modern baggage. It just asks what would happen? Waits for someone to answer. And then it asks again."—NPR on the works of Cixin Liu
Get your copy of A View From the Stars here on Amazon. Also available on audiobook.
Calypso by Oliver K. Langmead
She travels the ship with the Calypso’s creator, the enigmatic Sigmund, and Catherine, a bioengineered marvel who can commune with the plants, uncovering a new history of humanity forged while she slept.
She discovers a legacy of war between botanists and engineers. A war fought for the right to build a new Earth – a technological paradise, or a new Eden in bloom, untouched by mankind’s past.
Lake of Souls by Ann Leckie
Release Date: April 2, 2024
Hugo, Nebula, and Arthur C. Clarke award-winner Ann Leckie is a modern master of the SFF genre, forever changing its landscape with her groundbreaking ideas and powerful voice. Now, available for the first time comes the complete collection of Leckie's short fiction, including a brand new novelette, “Lake of Souls.”
Journey across the stars of the Imperial Radch universe.
Listen to the words of the Old Gods that ruled the Raven Tower.
Learn the secrets of the mysterious Lake of Souls.
And so much more, in this masterfully wide-ranging and immersive short fiction collection from award-winning author Ann Leckie.
Read Lake of Souls here on Amazon. Also available on audiobook.
Toll of Honor by David Weber
Release Date: April 2, 2024
Lieutenant Brandy Bolgeo has come home from the Battle of Hancock station wounded in both body and spirit. She will need months to regenerate her lost leg, but how long will it take to heal her heart?
She’s come home to find that her wounds, her ship’s brutal damage, the deaths of so many friends, were the fault of an arrogant, aristocratic coward who broke and ran in the face of the enemy. Who left her ship to pay the price for his craven desertion under fire. And whose powerful political allies are determined to protect and preserve him at any price.
They have held hostage the declaration of war until Lord Pavel Young escaped the consequences of his cowardice. They didn’t care what it cost the Navy. They didn’t care what it cost the entire Star Kingdom of Manticore. Their tactics have cost the Royal Navy the priceless initiative as revolution and military purges wrack the People’s Republic of Haven, and that lost window of opportunity will cost the Star Kingdom seventeen years of bloody warfare and hundreds of thousands of deaths.
Now Young is free to seek vengeance on the people he feels have “wronged” him. People like Paul Tankersley and Honor Harrington. Paid duelists, smear tactics, hired assassins in public restaurants . . . nothing is beneath Pavel Young. But Captain Harrington can look after herself, and Pavel Young is about to face the fury of the woman the newsies call the “Salamander.” Yet who will save the Star Kingdom from the repercussions of his actions?
Women and men like Brandy Bolgeo are about to pay the toll for the Star Kingdom of Manticore’s honor.
Get your copy of Toll of Honor here on Amazon.
Shadows of the Earth (The Token Book Two) by Nathan Hystad
Release Date: April 9, 2024
The Delta is assembled, but the threat is far from over.
Rory travels to the Moon, encountering her grandfather’s footprints from fifty years ago. She returns to her parent’s home, eager to forget about the last few weeks, but the Shadow persists.
Silas and Cody are covertly led to the Planetae laboratory, but quickly realize there’s more to the tokens than their initial assumptions.
Waylen struggles to maintain peace as the walls between organizations crumbles. When one of his closest allies betrays them, Waylen’s trust is shattered.
Who invented the Delta?
What are the Echoes trying to show them?
Can they prevent an invasion, or has it already begun?
Dive into Shadows of the Earth here on Amazon.
Mal Goes to War by Edward Ashton
Release Date: April 9, 2024
The humans are fighting again. Go figure.
As a free A.I., Mal finds the war between the modded and augmented Federals and the puritanical Humanists about as interesting as a battle between rival anthills. He’s not above scouting the battlefield for salvage, though, and when the Humanists abruptly cut off access to infospace he finds himself trapped in the body of a cyborg mercenary, and responsible for the safety of the modded girl she died protecting.
A dark comedy wrapped in a techno thriller’s skin, Mal Goes to War provides a satirical take on war, artificial intelligence, and what it really means to be human.
Dive into Mal Goes to War here on Amazon. Also available on audiobook.
The Practice, the Horizon, and the Chain by Sofia Samatar
Release Date: April 14, 2024
The boy was raised as one of the Chained, condemned to toil in the bowels of a mining ship out among the stars. His whole world changes—literally—when he is yanked “upstairs” and informed he has been given an opportunity to be educated at the ship’s university alongside the elite.
Overwhelmed and alone, the boy forms a bond with the woman he comes to know as “the professor,” a weary idealist and descendent of the Chained who has spent her career striving for validation from her more senior colleagues, only to fall short at every turn.
Together, the boy and the woman will embark on a transformative journey to grasp the design of the chains that fetter them both—and are the key to breaking free.
Get your copy of The Practice, the Horizon, and the Chain here on Amazon.
After the Tide: Defiant by Anthony J. Melchiorri
Release Date: April 17, 2024
Book 2 in the After the Tide post-apocalyptic thriller series. The end of the world has never really ended in this suspense-filled story of survival, conspiracy, and action.
Start reading In the After the Tide: Defiant here on Amazon.
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Extinction by Douglas Preston
Release Date: April 23, 2024
Erebus Resort, occupying a magnificent, hundred-thousand acre valley deep in the Colorado Rockies, offers guests the experience of viewing woolly mammoths, Irish Elk, and giant ground sloths in their native habitat, brought back from extinction through the magic of genetic manipulation. When a billionaire's son and his new wife are kidnapped and murdered in the Erebus back country by what is assumed to be a gang of eco-terrorists, Colorado Bureau of Investigation Agent Frances Cash partners with county sheriff James Colcord to track down the perpetrators.
As killings mount and the valley is evacuated, Cash and Colcord must confront an ancient, intelligent, and malevolent presence at Erebus, bent not on resurrection—but extinction.
Grab Extinction here on Amazon. Also available on audiobok.
Beyond the Ranges by John Ringo and James Aidee
Release Date: May 7, 2024
For Jason Graham, the world ends not with a bang, not even with much of a whimper.
One second, he's sitting in a restaurant in Mobile, Alabama, chatting with a server, the next he finds himself in a strange room, rescued by mysterious alien benefactors. Seems the world did end, though how and why are something of a mystery.
Now, Jason—and five hundred million other humans—are in orbit around an Earthlike world that is abundant in natural resources and totally untamed. For the newly awakened humans, this is a chance to start society with a clean slate and a bright future. For Jason, who has knocked about aimlessly in several different careers in his Earth life, it’s an opportunity to unleash his creativity and ambition and see what he can really do
Grab Beyond the Ranges here on Amazon.
The Frozen Outpost (The Forever Word Book Three) by Ethan Rhodes
Release Date: May 7, 2024
A son and his father are finally reunited.
Zane’s robot is in possession of a famous explorer’s memories, and Julia Rossi won’t let it go. They hastily depart the comforts of Earth to learn of Edward Boone’s fate from two centuries earlier.
The Colonies narrowly avoided a second Gral invasion, but there is no time for celebration when danger is looming. At the helm, Calista and Audrey must reestablish a military presence that’s unprecedented in strength and honor.
Liam Lucas has been given a second chance at life, and begins searching for his sister after she vanishes from The Forever World.
All paths align as Zane discovers the truth behind an age-old mystery in The Frozen Outpost.
Grab The Frozen Outpost here on Amazon.
Loneliness & Company by Charlee Dyroff
Release Date: May 7, 2024
A timely, beautifully observed debut novel set in near future New York about a young woman who finds herself tangled in a secret Government project combating loneliness.
Lee knows she's the best. A professor favorite and fellowship winner, there's no doubt she'll land one of the coveted jobs at a Big Five corporation. So when, upon graduating, Lee is instead assigned to an unknown company in the dead city of New York, her life goals are completely upended.
In this new role, Lee's task is to gather enough research to train an AI how to be a friend. She begins online and by studying the social circle of her clueless, outgoing roommate Veronika. But when the company reveals it's part of a classified government mission to solve loneliness-an emotion erased from society's lexicon decades ago-Lee's determination to prove herself kicks into overdrive, and she begins chasing bolder and more dangerous experiences to provide data for the AI.
Grab Loneliness & Company here on Amazon.
Grand Theft AI by James Cox
Release Date: May 14, 2024
San Francisco, 2051. Rising like neo-Shanghai over the Bay, a labyrinth of quantum accelerators, hologram dreams, and fiercely regulated androids. Forget powder, pills, or bud—kids get high slotting wafers of data under the ear, and they’ll pay fat ¢rypto for the best. At the hottest nightclub in the city … the Fang.
Baz Covane is a battle-scarred thief who sticks to small-time bots. Ria Rose is the underworld “fixer” with a big-time score that could easily get ’em both killed. ’Cuz the Fang’s psychotic kingpin Otto Rex has a vault with more security than a fusion reactor. And the glass inside is priceless—enough to set up Baz, Ria, and their crack team of cyber-misfits on the white sands of Tahiti forever.
But this crime doesn’t just carry infinite VR-Prison time—it’s Baz and Ria’s last shot at redemption. Forced to confess every last secret on their neurals, they’ll have to trust each other completely if they stand any chance of infiltrating Otto’s lair, raiding its spiraling rings of physical and virtual firewalls, to finally hack into his mind and crack his deepest layer of security, before the Blackhawks touch down with federal warrants—for Grand Theft AI.
Grab Grand Theft AI here on Amazon. Also available on audiobook.
Lost Ark Dreaming by Suyi Davies Okungbowa
Release Date: May 21, 2024
The brutally engineered class divisions of Snowpiercer meets Rivers Solomon’s The Deep in this high-octane post-climate disaster novella written by Nommo Award-winning author Suyi Davies Okungbowa.
Off the coast of West Africa, decades after the dangerous rise of the Atlantic Ocean, the region’s survivors live inside five partially submerged, kilometers-high towers originally created as a playground for the wealthy. Now the towers’ most affluent rule from their lofty perch at the top while the rest are crammed into the dark, fetid floors below sea level.
There are also those who were left for dead in the Atlantic, only to be reawakened by an ancient power, and who seek vengeance on those who offered them up to the waves.
Three lives within the towers are pulled to the fore of this conflict: Yekini, an earnest, mid-level rookie analyst; Tuoyo, an undersea mechanic mourning a tremendous loss; and Ngozi, an egotistical bureaucrat from the highest levels of governance. They will need to work together if there is to be any hope of a future that is worth living—for everyone.
Grab Lost Ark Dreaming here on Amazon.
Shores of Eternity (A Prayer for Earthrise Book 4)
Release Date: May 22, 2024
This is our darkest hour.
The storm is here. The winds of war howl. The aliens swarm.
They are everywhere.
The hydrians, squids from another galaxy, topple our forests, fill our oceans, storm our cities. Years of civil war have weakened Earth. As the aliens attack, we fall fast.
But some still stand. A group of heroes rises. The legendary Einav Ben-Ari, the Golden Lioness, leads the resistance.
We are a young species. New to space travel. We dipped our toes into the cosmic ocean, and in its waters, we found venomous squids. Now we stand upon the shores of eternity. If we can defeat the monsters in the depths, the stars are ours. Yet if we fail… we all drown.
Grab Shores of Eternity here on Amazon.
Ghostdrift by Suzanne Palmer
Release Date: May 28, 2024
The fourth and final installment of the Finder Chronicles, a hopepunk sci-fi caper described as Macgyver meets Firefly, by Hugo Award-winner Suzanne Palmer.
Fergus Ferguson, professional finder, always knew his semi-voluntary exile wouldn’t last, but he isn't expecting a friend to betray him. One of the galaxy’s most dangerous space pirates, Bas Belos, wants him, and what Belos wants, he gets. Belos needs help finding out what happened to his twin sister, who mysteriously disappeared at the edges of space years ago, and he makes Fergus an offer he can't refuse.
Mysterious disappearances and impossible answers are Fergus’ specialties. After he reluctantly joins Belos and his crew aboard the pirate ship Sidewider, he discovers that Belos is being tracked by the Alliance. Seeking to stay one step ahead of the Alliance, Fergus and Belos find themselves marooned in the middle of the Gap between spiral arms of our galaxy, dangerously near hostile alien territory, and with an Alliance ship in hot pursuit.
That’s just the beginning of the complications for Fergus’ newest—and possibly last—job. The puzzle is much bigger than just Belos's lost sister, and the question of his future, retirement or not, depends on his ability to negotiate a path between aliens, criminals, and the most powerful military force he's ever encountered. The future of entire planets hangs in the balance, and it remains to be seen if it's too big for one determined man and his cranky cat.
Grab Ghostdrift here on Amazon. Also available on audiobook.
Necrotek by Jonathan Mayberry
Release Date: May 28, 2024
Neither cosmic philosopher Lars Soren, hotshot pilot Bianca Petrescu, nor the high priestess Jessica McHugh—Lady Death herself—can say quite where in the galaxy they are. But after an experiment gone horribly wrong, one thing is clear: Asphodel Station isn’t in orbit around Jupiter any longer. Worse, the monsters that live out here—ancient eldritch beings thought only to exist in stories and nightmares—have now been alerted to Earth’s existence.
Their army of Shoggoths is coming for us next.
Humanity’s only hope for survival lies on the surface of the alien world of Shadderal, where a ghost named Lost, the last of an ancient race, still haunts the vast plains of the Field of Dead Birds. But hope has a cost. Lost tells Soren about ancient derelict spacecraft awaiting on Shadderal, shapeshifting machines that blend ultra-advanced technology with the dark powers of necromancy. These ships might just be nimble enough to defend mankind against the coming invasion.
But there’s a catch: they can only be piloted by the dead.
As human starfighters fall in battle, their spirits can be called back from death to pilot these ghost ships of a fallen race. But will this new necromantic technology—NecroTek—allow humanity to stand against the vast armies of the Shoggoths? And even if it can, is the war to save the human race worth the cost of its pilots’ immortal souls?
Grab Necrotek here on Amazon. Also available on audiobook.
Service Model by Adrian Tchaikovsky
Release Date: June 4, 2024
To fix the world they must first break it, further.
Humanity is a dying breed, utterly reliant on artificial labor and service.
When a domesticated robot gets a nasty little idea downloaded into its core programming, they murder their owner. The robot discovers they can also do something else they never did before: They can run away.
Fleeing the household they enter a wider world they never knew existed, where the age-old hierarchy of humans at the top is disintegrating into ruins and an entire robot ecosystem devoted to human wellbeing is having to find a new purpose
Sometimes all it takes is a nudge to overcome the limits of your programming.
Pick up Service Model here on Amazon. Also available on audiobook.
Echo of Worlds by M.R. Carey
Release Date: June 25, 2024
Two mighty empires are at war - and both will lose, with thousands of planets falling to the extinction event called the Scour. At least that's what the artificial intelligence known as Rupshe believes.
But somewhere in the multiverse there exists a force - the Mother Mass - that could end the war in an instant, and Rupshe has assembled a team to find it. Essien Nkanika, a soldier trying desperately to atone for past sins; the cat-woman Moon, a conscienceless killer; the digitally recorded mind of physicist Hadiz Tambuwal; Paz, an idealistic child and the renegade robot spy Dulcimer Coronal.
Start Reading Echo of Worlds here on Amazon. Also available on audiobook.
Which of these spring 2024 releases will make their way into your (e)bookshelf or into your ears? Which ones are you most excited for? Any you're stoked about that we missed? Let us know here in the comments, or over in the Discover Sci-Fi Facebook group!
*All book-related copy in this post was pulled from Amazon, Goodreads & Wikipedia, unless otherwise credited.