The Fantasy Review’s list of 8 Science Fiction Books Better Than Neuromancer by William Gibson, According to Goodreads.
Neuromancer by William Gibson is a classic of the cyberpunk genre, and book one of Gibson’s Sprawl trilogy. It has a rating of 3.90, so here is a list of similar books with a higher rating on Goodreads.
Hardwired by Walter Jon Williams (3.91)
From the blurb:
Earth lies prostrate beneath the lash of the Orbital powers, and Earth’s Balkanized nations have no choice but to let the Orbitals plunder their remaining wealth. Below the zone of Orbital control, buttonheads, panzerjocks, dirtgirls, and hustlers scramble for their ticket out of the gravity well. But now, if the criminal underworld and the guerrilla underground can join forces, there is a chance to shift the balance of power— in a war fought on the ground by hardwired commandos, in the air by high-flying deltajocks, and by genius hackers in the neural interface.
Altered Carbon (Takeshi Kovacs, #1) by Richard K. Morgan (4.02)
From the blurb:
Four hundred years from now mankind is strung out across a region of interstellar space inherited from an ancient civilization discovered on Mars. The colonies are linked together by the occasional sublight colony ship voyages and hyperspatial data-casting. Human consciousness is digitally freighted between the stars and downloaded into bodies as a matter of course.…
Snow Crash by Neal Stephenson (4.03)
From the blurb:
Hiro lives in a Los Angeles where franchises line the freeway as far as the eye can see. The only relief from the sea of logos is within the autonomous city-states, where law-abiding citizens don’t dare leave their mansions.
Hiro delivers pizza to the mansions for a living, defending his pies from marauders when necessary with a matched set of samurai swords. His home is a shared 20 X 30 U-Stor-It. He spends most of his time goggled in to the Metaverse, where his avatar is legendary.…
The Forever War (The Forever War, #1) by Joe Haldeman (4.15)
Check out our review of The Forever War by Joe Haldeman, and our Beginner’s Guide to The Forever War before you jump into this classic!
From the blurb:
The Earth’s leaders have drawn a line in the interstellar sand–despite the fact that the fierce alien enemy they would oppose is inscrutable, unconquerable, and very far away. A reluctant conscript drafted into an elite Military unit, Private William Mandella has been propelled through space and time to fight in the distant thousand-year conflict; to perform his duties and do whatever it takes to survive the ordeal and return home.…
Ghost in the Shell (Ghost in the Shell, #1) by Masamune Shirow (4.16)
From the blurb:
Deep into the twenty-first century, the line between man and machine has been blurred as humans rely on the enhancement of mechanical implants and robots are upgraded with human tissue. In this rapidly converging landscape, cyborg superagent Major Motoko Kusanagi is charged to track down the craftiest and most dangerous terrorists and cybercriminals, including “ghost hackers” who are capable of exploiting the human/machine interface and reprogramming humans to become puppets to carry out the hackers’ criminal ends.…
Daemon (Daemon, #1) by Daniel Suarez (4.16)
From the blurb:
Daemons: computer programs that silently run in the background, waiting for a specific event or time to execute. They power almost every service. They make our networked world possible. But they also make it vulnerable…
When the obituary of legendary computer game architect Matthew Sobol appears online, a previously dormant daemon activates, initiating a chain of events that begins to unravel our interconnected world….
Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? by Philip K. Dick (4.17)
From the blurb:
By 2021, the World War has killed millions, driving entire species into extinction and sending mankind off-planet. Those who remain covet any living creature, and for people who can’t afford one, companies built incredibly realistic simulacra: horses, birds, cats, sheep. They’ve even built humans. Immigrants to Mars receive androids so sophisticated they are indistinguishable from true men or women. Fearful of the havoc these artificial humans can wreak, the government bans them from Earth.…
Ready Player One (Ready Player One, #1) by Ernest Cline (4.23)
From the blurb:
A world at stake. A quest for the ultimate prize. Are you ready?
In the year 2045, reality is an ugly place. The only time Wade Watts really feels alive is when he’s jacked into the OASIS, a vast virtual world where most of humanity spends their days.
When the eccentric creator of the OASIS dies, he leaves behind a series of fiendish puzzles, based on his obsession with the pop culture of decades past. Whoever is first to solve them will inherit his vast fortune—and control of the OASIS itself.…
