Out of this World Science Fiction and Fantasy

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Out of this World!Science Fiction and Fantasy

• Cathy Belben, Librarian
• Burlington-Edison High School

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Why Read Science Fiction and Fantasy?

• Offers alternative solutions to common problems
• Offers creative way to look at common situations
• Exercises the imagination
• Requires a different set of thinking and reading
  strategies

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What is Science Fiction?

• In science fiction, the author offers a
  scientific explanation of how the extraordinary
  events could happen.
• Characters may be human, but arent always
• Characters encounter problems that involve
  science
• The science involved in SF is often speculative,
  which means it isnt currently possible, but
  could be someday.
• There are many categories, or genres, of science
  fiction.

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What is fantasy literature?

• Involves creatures or beings that are imaginary
• Takes place in imaginary realms
• Often involves magic
• Events occur without scientific basis or
  explanation

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Genres of Science Fiction SPACE STORIES

• Stories take place in, or involve travel to,
  outer space
• May involve creatures or beings from other
  planets
• May involve experimentation in space

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Recommended SPACE Stories
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Enders Game by Orson Scott Card

• Ender, who is the result of genetic
  experimentation, may be the military genius Earth
  needs in its war against an alien enemy. Book 1
  in Ender Wiggin series.

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Gravity by Tess Gerritson

• Emma Watson, a research physician, has been
  training to study living beings in space on the
  International Space Station. Once onboard,
  however, the organism to be studied begins to
  mutate and infect the crew.

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The Sparrow by Mary Doria Russell

• Linguist Emilio Sandoz, a Jesuit priest who
  leads a twenty-first century scientific mission
  to an extraterrestrial culture, is involved in a
  tragic misunderstanding with the alien
  civilization that leaves him physically and
  spiritually maimed.

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Genres of Science FictionALIENS AMONG US

• Stories take place on earth
• Feature aliens living among humans
• Aliens often take human form and may or may not
  be known to be aliens
• Aliens may or not be friendly
• Story often involves a quest to return to home
  planet

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Recommended ALIENS AMONG US STORIES
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Skellig by David Almond

• Unhappy about his baby sister's illness and the
  chaos of moving into a dilapidated old house,
  Michael retreats to the garage and finds a
  mysterious stranger who is something like a bird
  and something like an angel.

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The Angel Factory by Terrence Blacker

• Spurred on by his best friend, twelve-year-old
  Thomas uncovers two major family secrets that he
  was adopted, and that his perfect-seeming family
  is part of an other-worldly organization.

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The Exchange Student by Kate Gilmore

• When her mother arranges to host one of the young
  people coming to Earth from Chela, Daria is both
  pleased and intrigued by the keen interest shown
  by the Chelan in her work breeding endangered
  species.

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The Dark Side of Nowhere by Neal Shusterman

• Fourteen-year-old Jason faces an identity crisis
  after discovering that he is the son of aliens
  who stayed on earth following a botched invasion
  mission.

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I Want to Buy a Vowel by John Welter

• Alfredo Santayana, an illegal immigrant from
  Guatemala, has no money, no job, and the only
  English he knows is "I'd like to buy a vowel,"
  which makes him an easy target for officials in
  Waxahachie, Texas, who are investigating satanic
  practices in the town.

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Genres of Science FictionTIME BENDING

• Stories involve manipulation of time outside the
  realm of what we know is possible
• Characters may travel from the present to the
  past
• Characters may travel to the future
• Story may take place in the future
• Story may somehow involve a different
  understanding of time than we understand

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Recommended Time-Bending Stories
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The Watchby Dennis Danvers

• On his deathbed, the Russian prince Peter
  Kropotkin receives an offer from a man who claims
  to come from the distant future. He will give
  Peter back his youth and health and deposit him
  in America in 1999. Peter comes to suspect that
  his mysterious benefactor is guiding events to a
  particular end, and that he is only a knowing
  pawn in a scheme.

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Timeline by Michael Crichton

• An adventure story in which characters step
  through a "wormhole" in time to enter France in
  the 1300's.

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The Confessions of Max Tivoliby Andrew Sean Greer

• Max, born with the body of a very old man, finds
  his physical body growing younger as his mind
  grows older, giving him multiple chances to win
  the heart of Alice, the neighbor girl he fell in
  love with as a child, and who fails to recognize
  him as they meet again and again throughout their
  lives.

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Einsteins Dreamsby Alan Lightman

• Thirty fables conjure up many different theories
  of time, as they might have been dreamt by Albert
  Eintstein. In one world, time is circular, and
  people repeat trial and triumph endlessly. In
  another, people try to capture time, which
  appears as a nightingale, in a bell jar. In yet
  another, there is no time, only frozen moments.

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Shades of Simon Grayby Joyce MacDonald

• Seventeen-year-old Simon lies in a coma, finding
  his space and time overlapping with that of a man
  who was lynched over 200 years ago, while a
  member of the cheating ring he has been helping
  wonders if their actions have caused the plagues
  assaulting their New Jersey town.

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The Time Travelers Wifeby Audrey Niggenegger

• Clare and Henry, deeply in love, try desperately
  to maintain normal lives even though he has been
  diagnosed with Chrono-Displacement Disorder, a
  condition in which his genetic clock periodically
  resets, pulling him through time to the past or
  future.

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The Sterkarm Handshakeby Susan Price

• Having traveled to a sixteenth century border
  clan in England through a tunnel created by a
  twenty-first century company, Andrea must decide
  in which era she will live.

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To Say Nothing of the Dog by Connie Willis

• Time-travel researcher Ned Henry shuttles back
  and forth between the 21st century and the 1940s
  in order to correct an incongruity brought
  forward from the past.

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Genres of Science FictionAFTERLIFE TRAVEL

• Like time travel, involves characters who leave
  the here and now and encounter situations in
  another realm.
• In afterlife travel characters are either dead
  or have traveled to visit people who are dead.
• May or may not be religious in nature.

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Recommended ReadingAFTERLIFE TRAVEL

• Passage by Connie Willis

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The Great Blue Yonderby Alex Shearer

• Harry, a boy who has died, tries to decide what
  is is like on the "other side," a place known as
  the Other Lands.

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The Lovely Bonesby Alice Sebold

• Fourteen-year-old Susie Salmon, the victim of a
  sexual assault and murder, looks on from the
  afterlife as her family deals with their grief,
  and waits for her killer to be brought to some
  type of justice.

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God Bless You, Dr. Kevorkianby Kurt Vonnegut

• In this fictional adventure, Vonnegut poses as a
  reporter for public radio and slips back and
  forth between the living world and the Afterlife,
  interviewing various well known dead people,
  including Sir Isaac Newton, William Shakespeare,
  Clarence Darrow, James Earl Ray, Eugene Debs,
  John Brown, Adolf Hitler, Mary Shelley, Kilgore
  Trout, and numerous others.

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Passage by Connie Willis

• Dr. Joanna Lander, a psychologist specializing
  in near-death experiences, is recruited to lend
  credibility to the work of young neurologist Dr.
  Richard Wright who has come up with a way to
  manufacture the near-death experience using a
  psychoactive drug, but things go eerily wrong
  when Joanna begins to take the drug herself.

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Genres of Science FictionDREAM TRAVEL

• Characters dreams become reality
• Characters may enter other worlds or just other
  versions of this world (similar to parallel
  reality travel)
• Characters may become trapped in their dream and
  need to escape
• Characters may be able to affect reality through
  their dreams and what they do there

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Calypso Dreaming by Charles Butler

• A strange child named Calypso who lives on the
  peaceful island of Sweetholm has an unsettling
  affect on the people who visit.

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The Number Devil A Mathematical Adventure by
Hans Magnus Enzensberger

• Annoyed with his math teacher who assigns word
  problems and won't let him use a calculator,
  twelve-year-old Robert finds help from the number
  devil in his dreams.

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Stardust by Neil Gaiman

• When Tristran Thorn travels to find the star
  that fell out of the sky to give to his beloved,
  he discovers that what he believes about the
  world is not always so.

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Genres of Science Fiction APOCALYPTIC FICTION

• Stories take place following some sort of
  apocalypse (an end of the world as we know it,
  not necessarily end of all life on planet
• Might be religious in nature
• Apocalypse might be a war or an illness
• Stories involve the survival struggle of an
  individual or group

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Recommended APOCALYPTIC Stories

• How I Spent My Last Night on Earth by Todd
  Strasser
• Welcome to the Ark by Stephanie Tolan

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The Kindling Fire-Us Trilogy 1 by Jennifer
Armstrong

• In 2007, a small band of children have joined
  together in a Florida town, trying to survive in
  a world where it seems that all the adults have
  been killed off by a catastrophic virus.

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Z is for Zachariah by Robert C. OBrien

• Seemingly the only person left alive after the
  holocaust of a war, a young girl is relieved to
  see a man arrive into her valley until she
  realizes that he is a tyrant and she must somehow
  escape.

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Tomorrow, When the War Began by John Marsden

• Seven Australian teenagers return from a camping
  trip in the bush to discover that their country
  has been invaded and they must hide to stay alive.

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The Last Book in the Universe by Rodman
Philbrick

• After an earthquake has destroyed much of the
  planet, an epileptic teenager nicknamed Spaz
  begins the heroic fight to bring human
  intelligence back to the Earth of a distant
  future.

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How I Live Now by Meg Rosoff

• To get away from her pregnant stepmother in New
  York City, fifteen-year-old Daisy goes to England
  to stay with her aunt and cousins, with whom she
  instantly bonds, but soon war breaks out and rips
  apart the family while devastating the land.

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Genres of Science FictionANTHROPOMORPHIC

• Anthropomorphic refers to animals with human
  abilities (walking on hind legs, speaking,
  wearing clothes maybe)
• Stories involve manipulation of animals so that
  they are more like humans
• Often involves animals taking over the humans
  world or waging war

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Recommended ANTHROPOMORPHIC Stories
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Lives of the Monster Dogs by Kirsten Bakis

• A group of wealthy and glamorous monster dogs are
  befriended by human Cleo Pira when they arrive in
  New York in 2008, and though the elegant canines
  appear to lead charmed lives, Cleo soon realizes
  that a strange, incurable illness threatens them
  all with extinction.

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Fire Bringer by David Clement-Davies

• Young buck Rannoch was born on the night his
  father was murdered and into a herd of deer where
  hunger for power has gradually whittled away at
  all that is true and good. He knows he must
  escape to survive. Chased by stags, with their
  fearsome antlers sharpened for the kill, he
  begins a treacherous journey into the unknown,
  and ahead of him lies a shocking and formidable
  search for truth and goodwill in the shadow of
  the Great Mountain. One day he will have to
  return to his home and face his destiny among the
  deer to fulfill the prophecy that has
  persistently given them hope that one day a fawn
  will be born with the mark of an oak leaf on his
  forehead and that fawn's courage will lead all
  the deer to freedom. Filled with passion and a
  darkness that gradually, through Rannoch's
  courage in the face of adversity, lifts to reveal
  an overwhelming feeling of light.

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Dr. Franklins Island by Anne Halam

• When their plane crashes over the Pacific Ocean,
  three science students are left stranded on a
  tropical island and then imprisoned by a doctor
  who is performing horrifying experiments on
  humans involving the transfer of animal genes.

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Empire of the Ants by Bernard Werber

• The story of an ordinary family who accidentally
  threaten the security of a hidden civilization as
  intelligent as our own.

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Genres of Science FictionCYBER SCI FI

• Cyber refers to computers
• Stories involve computers as characters or major
  elements in the characters lives
• Often the computers end up developing an ability
  to think or act independently of their human
  programmers

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Recommended CYBER Stories
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Feed by M.T. Anderson

• In a future where most people have computer
  implants in their heads to control their thinking
  and guide them into making purchases, a boy meets
  an unusual girl who is in serious trouble.

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Virtual Vandals by Tom Clancy (and others in the
NET Force Series)

• The Net Force investigates gunfire at a
  holographic baseball game. Matt Hunter and
  several other Net Force explorers are thrilled
  to see Babe Ruth swing for the fences at a
  holographic baseball game, but when he does his
  famous routine of pointing to the stands, four
  people dressed in 30's style outfits stand up and
  open fire with Tommy guns. Matt and his friends
  know these "virtual vandals" must be stopped. But
  the stadium stunt is just the beginning...

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Virtual War by Gloria Skurzynski

• In a future world where global contamination has
  necessitated limited human contact, three young
  people with unique genetically engineered
  abilities are teamed up to wage a war in virtual
  reality.

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Genres of Science Fiction ROBOTS and CYBORGS

• A robot is a mechanical human or other being
• A cyborg is part human, part machine

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Recommended Reading ROBOTS and CYBORGS
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Robot Adept by Piers Anthony

• Mach, a brave and sensitive robot from Proton,
  and his alternate self, magical Bane from Phaze,
  hold the power to link the two warring
  systems--or destroy them.

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Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? by Philip
K. Dick

• In January 2021, years after World War Terminus
  has destroyed the planet, bounty hunter Rick
  Deckard remains on the Earth pursuing his
  vocation of hunting down and killing rogue
  androids.
• (This book is the basis of the movie Blade
  Runner).

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Genres of Science FictionUTOPIAS and DYSTOPIAS

• A utopia is a perfect world, usually designed by
  a person or group often religious
• A dystopia is a utopia that has strayed so far
  from its original plan that it is unpleasant or
  even dangerous for its residents

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Recommended UPTOPIA/DYSTOPIA Stories
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The Handmaids Tale by Margaret Atwood

• Set in the near future, America has become a
  puritanical theocracy and Offered tells her story
  as a Handmaid under the new social order.

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Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury

• A bookburner official in a future fascist state
  finds out books are a vital part of a culture he
  never knew. He clandestinely pursues reading,
  until he is betrayed.

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A Clockwork Orange by Anthony Burgess

• In the Slav-oriented state of the future, the
  Lower Orders are in ascendence and happy
  hooligans roam the London streets, bashing senior
  citizens in the eyes with bicycle chains.

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Shades Children by Neil Gaiman

• In a savage post-nuclear world, four young
  fugitives attempt to overthrow the bloodthirsty
  rule of the Overlords with the help of Shade,
  their mysterious mentor.

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The Giverby Lois Lowry

• Given his lifetime assignment at the Ceremony of
  Twelve, Jonas becomes the receiver of memories
  shared by only one other in his community and
  discovers the terrible truth about the society in
  which he lives. Winner of the Newbery Award in
  1994.

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Genres of Science FictionPARALLEL REALITIES

• Parallel realities are stories in which the
  events occur in the present, but the reality in
  which the characters live is very different
• Characters may step across an invisible boundary
  into another world that exists alongside our own,
  but which is unseen to the naked eye.
• The parallel reality may be a mirror of our own,
  in which things are backwards, or it may be
  extremely different.

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Recommended ReadingPARALLEL REALITIES
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Everworld (series) by K.A. Applegate

• David and his friends are transported to a
  fantastic world where they search for their
  friend Senna.

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Abarat by Clive Barker

• Candy Quackenbush of Chickentown, Minnesota, one
  day finds herself on the edge of a foreign world
  that is populated by strange creatures, and her
  life is forever changed. As she travels from one
  amazing place to another within the world, she
  realizes a striking thing she has been here
  before.

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Crusader by Edward Bloor

• After a violent virtual-reality game arrives at
  the mall arcade where she works, fifteen-year-old
  Roberta finds the courage to search out the
  person who murdered her mother.

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Neverwhere by Neil Gaiman

• Richard Mayhew, a young businessman living in
  London, helps an injured girl and finds his life
  changed when he leaves reality and enters the
  city's underground world of sewers and abandoned
  subway stations--a world in which the girl he
  helped is someone of power and nobility.

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Genres of Science FictionMEDICAL MUTATIONS

• Stories that deal with bizarre and currently
  impossible or illegal medical procedures
• Often involve an unethical or insane doctor or
  medical professional
• May involve cloning, organ harvesting, gene
  manipulation, or replacement of human parts with
  mechanical or animal parts

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Recommended MEDICAL MUTATION Stories
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Fade by Robert Cormier

• Paul Moreaux, the thirteen-year-old son of
  French-Canadian immigrants, inherits the ability
  to become invisible, but this power soon leads to
  death and destruction.

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Eva by Peter Dickinson

• After a terrible accident, a young girl wakes up
  to discover that her brainwhich was not
  injuredhas been transplanted into another
  bodyof an animal.

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Frankenstein by Mary Shelley

• Hysteria ensues when Dr. Victor Frankenstein
  creates a monster and subsequently casts it out
  into a horrified community.

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Genres of Science FictionALTERNATE HISTORIES

• Focuses on turning points in history and/or
  major historical events
• Stories revolve around what might have happened
  if certain events in history had occurred
  differently than they actually did
• Answers the question What if (what if Hitler
  had never been born, for example)

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Recommended ReadingALTERNATE HISTORIES

• Pastwatch The Redemption of Christopher Columbus
  by Orson Scott Card
• Seventh Son by Orson Scott Card
• Making History by Stephen Frye
• Black Cross by Greg Iles
• I Was Amelia Earhart by Jane Mendelsohn

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Genres of Science FictionSUPERNATURAL POWERS

• Supernatural refers to things that are above and
  beyond the natural or normal abilities humans
  possess
• Characters are often normal humans in almost
  every respect
• Characters possess at least one supernatural
  ability
• Supernatural abilities can include being able to
  see the future, being able to read minds, being
  able to move objects with ones mind, etc.

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Recommended ReadingSUPERNATURAL POWERS

• Midget by Tim Bowler
• Gallows Hill by Lois Duncan
• A Gift of Magic by Lois Duncan
• The Third Eye by Lois Duncan
• Daughters of the Moon series by Lynn Ewing
• The Fingerprints series by Melinda Metz
• The Fearless series by Francine Pascal
• Into the Dream by William Sleator
• Psion by Joan D. Vinge
• The Hero by Patricia Windsor

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Looking for Science Fiction and Fantasy in the
BEHS Library?

• We dont separate the science fiction and fantasy
  from the regular fiction, so the best way to find
  it is to use OPAC.
• Using OPAC, type in science fiction or
  fantasy and press the SUBJECT key. OR
• Ask the librarian for a copy of the recommended
  science fiction booklist.

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Genres of Science FictionFANTASY

• Fantasy refers to stories that revolve around the
  impossibleno explanation is given for how they
  could realistically occur.
• Often occurs in other (often made-up) worlds
• Often involves characters who are not human, such
  as trolls, centaurs, Hobbits, fairies, etc.

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Recommended Reading Imaginary CreaturesFAIRIES,
TROLLS, UNICORNS, ETC.

• Through the Ice by Piers Anthony (trolls, etc.)
• Echo by Francesca Lia Block
• I Was a Teenage Fairy by Francesca Lia Block
• The Trolls Grindstone by Elizabeth Boyer
• The Elf Queen of Shannara by Terry Brooks
• Artemis Fowl by Eoin Colfer (fairies)
• Artemis Fowl and the Arctic Incident by Eoin
  Colfer (fairies)
• Jack of Kinrowan by Charles deLint
• Spindles End by Robin McKinley (fairies)
• Black Unicorn by Tanith Lee (fairies)

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Genres of FantasyRE-TOLD FAIRY TALES

• Core story remains the same as the original fairy
  tale
• Time and place may be different
• Story may be the same except for some key
  elements which have been altered

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Recommended ReadingRE-TOLD FAIRY TALES

• Confessions of an Ugly Stepsister by Gregory
  Maguire
• Wicked by Gregory Maguire
• Roses Daughter by Robin McKinley
• Spindles End by Robin McKinley
• Beast by Donna Jo Napoli
• Crazy Jack by Donna Jo Napoli
• Zel by Donna Jo Napoli
• The Rumpelstiltskin Problem by Vivian Vande Velde
• Briar Rose by Jane Yolen

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Genres of FantasyWIZARDS and WIZARDRY

• Main characters may have to do battle with common
  fantasy creatures, such as dragons
• Use of magic powers is a main feature
• Often features characteristics common in fairy
  tales, Greek mythology, and Arthurian legends

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Recommended ReadingWIZARDS and WIZARDRY

• A Sudden Wild Magic by Diana Wynne Jones
• Dragonsong by Anne McCaffrey
• The Darkangel by Meredith Ann Pierce
• A Gathering of Gargoyles by Meredith Ann Pierce
• Searching for Dragons by Patricia C. Wrede
• Talking to Dragons by Patricia C. Wrede
• Pit Dragons (series) by Jane Yolen