NEWS: Wil Wheaton's Geek in Review: Five Books Every Geek Should Read

GEEK: Wil Wheaton's Geek in Review: Five Books Every Geek Should Read

Long before we wrote our blogs, long before we argued about the finer points of the Prime Directive on UseNet, even before we nervously waited for ASCII porn to download at 300 baud from Fidonet, geeks buried our faces in books.

Maybe it's because we were easily bored by television and movies (or without the Internet to facilitate arguing about them) or maybe it's because we were less likely to be tormented by a cool kid if we kept our faces safely buried in the pages of some novel, but books are important to every geek I know. We all have huge libraries of well-worn novels, often fighting for shelf-space with our action figures.

This week, I took a walk through my personal library, and picked out five mostly-sci-fi books that I think all geeks should read, if they haven't already. I chose these books for various reasons, including their contributions to the genre, how well they hold up over time, how fun they are to read, and how significant they were to me in my development as a geek. Those of you non-geeks who have a geeky significant other can also use this list as a starting point to eventually understand exactly why your geek looks at Google News and says there's a Seldon Crisis brewing, but this list is by no means comprehensive (Fahrenheit 451 and Flowers for Algernon are conspicuously absent, for example,) but I had to keep it concise; please add your own recommendations in the comments.


I, Robot
Author: Isaac Asimov
Published: 1950

Though published in collected form in 1950, the stories in this volume date all the way back to 1940. It is just astonishing to me that Asimov could come up with the three laws of robotics, and create so many different types of robots (domestic robots on Earth, science robots on Mars) at a time when the zeppelin had just been retired and airplanes were still cutting-edge technology. I'm not talking about canals on Mars, or fantastically spun tales of a journey to the moon—I'm talking about stories and creations that, sixty-six years and countless iterations of Moore's Law later, appear prescient and remain relevant.

Most of the stories in this collection deal with the consequences of the three laws of robotics, but all of them (notably Robbie) challenge the image of robots as one-dimensional servants with flailing arms and stilted speech. Asimov created characters readers could care about and relate to, and balanced the science with the fiction as well as anyone ever has.

Oh, and don't waste your time with the Will Smith movie, if you're expecting anything resembling a faithful adaptation.

Readers may also like: The Foundation Trilogy, The Caves of Steel.


Neuromancer
Author: William Gibson
Published: 1984

Its opening line is one of the most repeated and well-known in the geek universe, "The sky above the port was the color of television, tuned to a dead channel." Of course, when Neuromancer was written, that meant the sky was a dull grey color, perhaps broken in places by swirling eddies of darkness in the clouds, but if it were written today, it would actually mean the sky was a clear, bright blue color, creating quite a different mood in the heavens above Chiba, and for the entire novel.

While much attention has been paid to Gibson's prediction of the Internet, and his coining of the term "cyberspace," Neuromancer endures because it's a fucking brilliantly imagined novel. It's a tightly-knit, clever (without being too clever) story with smart dialogue, set in a very plausible near future. It's populated with characters that geeks love: they're smart, they're sexy, (they actually have the sex, too, and it's pretty hot) and they're cool. It's one of the few sci-fi books on my shelf that actually gets better with each reading, the same way Watchmen does, revealing new connections and uncovering new layers every time I open its cover and jack in.

Readers may also like: Count Zero, Mona Lisa Overdrive.

Ringworld
Author: Larry Niven
Published: 1970

Larry Niven's Hugo and Nebula award-winning novel follows Louis Wu, a 200 year-old man who's grown bored with life, as he is recruited by Nessus, a Pierson's Puppeteer, and travels with fellow human Teela Brown, and fearsome Kzin Speaker-to-Animals to the eponymous Ringworld, a solid structure one Earth-orbit in diameter, orbiting a star and teeming with life. After crashing on the ring's surface, Louis and his fellow travelers must find a way back home, and figure out exactly who built it, and why.

Ringworld is, like all of Niven's books, dedicated to exploring advanced theoretical concepts and may turn off readers who are intimidated or bored by so-called "hard science fiction." It also has a significant flaw (the Ringworld is unstable) that is so undeniable, he wrote a sequel in 1980 to correct his mistake (and the Ringworld's lack of stability.)

What I (and my unscientific poll of two friends) find so compelling about Ringworld is its sheer size and scope: with the surface area of three million Earths, it could be Science Fiction's original Big Dumb Object. But beneath the mystery of the Ringworld and the Engineers who created it, is a story that's compelling and engaging, and is just begging to be made into a movie.

And all the damn kids today who play Halo can thank Larry Niven; the game takes place on a structure that was clearly inspired by his creation.

Readers may also like: Tales of Known Space, The Ringworld Engineers.


The Hacker Crackdown
Author: Bruce Sterling
Published: 1992

In 1990, the Secret Service launched a series of raids called Operation Sundevil, a nationwide crackdown on computer hackers. A great deal of attention was focused on Phrack, an underground e-zine co-created and edited by Craig Neidorf, (aka Knight Lightning) who faced 31 years in prison for allegedly stealing what Bell South called the source code for its E911 service, valued at over $80,000. At trial, it was proved that the document was not source code, but was more of a memo about the service, and not only was it not valued at over $80,000, but could be purchased from Bell for $13. The charges were dismissed, but the case, and what was eventually determined to be an illegal raid of Steve Jackson Games, lead to the founding of the Electronic Frontier Foundation.

Bruce Sterling, one of the founding fathers of the Cyberpunk genre, and editor of the definitive Mirrorshades anthology, investigated both of these cases and the entire underground hacker and phreaker culture of the late 80s. The result of his research is The Hacker Crackdown, a highly-readable, comprehensive, entertaining, and fascinating look at the computer underground at a time before the Internet was widely available, when information was traded via "philes" on BBSes, hijacked long-distance phone chats, and in magazines like TAP and 2600.

The entire text of the book was made available, for free, by its author, and has been online in one form or another since 1994.

Readers may also like: Cyberpunk, The Cuckoo's Egg.


The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
Author: Douglas Adams
Published: 1979

Every single self-respecting geek in the world has read this book, at least once, likely more, and has also played the Infocom game based upon it, though many of us never got past the goddamn babelfish puzzle.

Douglas Adams' hilarious 1979 novel is the first (and best) of the five books in the incorrectly-and-unapologetically-described Hitchhiker's Trilogy, and introduced generations of readers to Vogon poetry, The Heart of Gold, Zaphod Beeblebrox, Marvin the clinically-depressed Android, Arthur Dent, Ford Prefect, and the ultimate answer, but not the ultimate question, to life, the universe, and everything.

Geeks love this book for the same reasons mundanes don't: it is filled with complex layers of satire and absurdist humor, and its confirms that the world is just not . . . normal.

Like I, Robot, there is a film adaptation, which I personally found quite disappointing and my wife (who hasn't read the book) found confusing. Your milage may vary, but I'd recommend checking out the original radio plays, or the BBC television series, if you want to experience HHG in some non-literary form. Just don't forget to take your towel with you.

Readers may also like: The Restaurant at the End of the Universe, Good Omens.


As I said, this is nowhere near a comprehensive or even definitive list of geeky reading, but all of these titles bring me joy every single time I pick them up, or even glance at them on my shelves while I'm looking for something else. They are all a big part of who I am today, and I suspect many of my fellow geeks can say the same thing about at least one or two of them.

Now tell me why I'm wrong, and tell me what I missed.

Wil Wheaton is a hoopy frood who knows where his towel is.

no heinlein?

Read all of them and now rejoicing in my geekiness. In fact, I just reread Neuromancer again -- about ten years after I read it the first time -- and you're right, you do pick up new ideas on other rounds.

I would also add an Aldous Huxley in there.

I'm on my third copy of Neuromancer. That book was amazingly influential to getting me into technology as a young teenager. I like to joke that without Neuromancer and Burning Chrome (a collection of early Gibson short stores), large parts of my resume wouldn't exist.

yes, yes, and yes. that pretty sums it up. i love asimov, i remember reading his "Asimov on.." essay series like "Asimov on Physics" in the Bergstrom AFB library when i was a wee lad. He's prolific as hell.

haha. fidonet..the seed of the intarweb. dude, i had 300 baud for the longest time on my amiga 500. my hooty tooty 1200 baud friends would make fun of me. where's my geritol?

That's what I was looking for too...

Well, I know it's probably blasphemy to say this, but Heinlein never did it for me the way Asimov or Bradbury did. It's not to say that his work shouldn't be on an Essentials list (of course it should) but by the formula I used to come up with this list, he didn't make it.

If you were suggesting Heinlein to someone like, uh, me, where would you suggest he start?

Snow Crash by Neil Stephensen

no Bradbury?

probably the moon is a harsh mistress, it's a great book but it's much lighter to read than some of his other stuff.

Asimov's just so dry and Heinlein is just so not. I always think of him as the Howard of sci-fi. As for recomending something, it's hard because he's all over the place. Starship Troopers is military Sci-Fi. Stranger in a Strange Land is hippy acid-trip stuff. Friday is a spy novel. "All you Zombies..." should be turned into a Christopher Nolan movie.

Gateway by Frederick Pohl

I'm reading Starship Troopers right now, and I'd say start with that. Stranger in a Strange Land is great, but it's just more of a commitment - I've only been working on Troopers for about a day and a half at this point, and it'll be done in another hour. It could easily be read in a day, I think - and it will tell you whether or not you like the way Heinlein writes.

Also, Snow Crash should be on this list, along with some Heinlein, but the list is just going to have to be longer - there's nothing there that can be removed.

The Book of the New Sun tetralogy, by Gene Wolfe. In it's subtle complexity, Wolfe unfolds a sci-fi epic that blows my mind with each page. When I think of the phrase "economy of language," I think of this book. Wolfe's writing is so concise and yet has more depth than you can perceive with a single reading.

Now the book is mostly found in two volumes: Shadow & Claw, and Sword & Citadel; I found all but the first book in single-edition hardbacks in a used bookstore in VT and have never seen them separate again.

See: Shadow of the Torturer, Claw of the Conciliator, Sword of the Lichtor and Citadel of the Autarch.

Alfred Bester's The Demolished Man has long held a special place in my heart. As the first Hugo winner, I think it's deserving.

Agreed. A good place to start with Heinlein, I did. As with the suggestion about "I, Robot", ignore the movie for best results.

of thosue i've read I, Robot and Hitchhikers.

i just cant seem to read fantasy and science fiction anymore. not even comcis in those genres. but I and hitchhikers are so fucking amazing

I personally started with Heinlein's "Job: A Comedy of Errors", which is still my favorite of his books, followed at a close second by "Stranger in a Strange Land". Well...actually, that's not true. I started with his YA novel, "Red Planet", but at the time I had no idea it was Heinlein, so I'm not counting that. And it's fluff, anyhow. Fun, but fluff.

I recently read "Starship Troopers" and while I think it works as an introduction to his writing style given that it's shorter than some of the others, it's not what I'd start with because a) there's not much action to it, despite what the movie might have suggested. It's much more about the training the troopers undergo and the world that created them. and b) it's got some very strong political views (whether they are Heinlein's I couldn't say) and I personally found them very distasteful. Not to the point of disliking the book...but it might well put one off reading his other stuff, which would be a shame.

And I would skip "Glory Road" entirely. Boring, meandering drivel. No tension, no interesting characters, no plot I could find before I gave up.

I think the list of essential geek reading is a nice idea, but doomed to failure. There's just too much range in individual geeky tastes. One can be very geeky by being solely hooked on D&D novelizations, after all, skipping SF and horror altogether and scoffing at other forms of fantasy. Or perhaps one doesn't read at all, but loves computer wargames. Or..well, you get the picture.

It would be easier to assemble a list of essential geek viewing. A few movies (Monty Python and the Holy Grail being either top or near the top), a few TV series...

Most definitely.

I'd like to add "The Moon is a Harsh Mistress" to the list of Heinlein recommendations.

Heh. Funny you should mention that . . .

3 outta 5... not too bad.

And Bradbury's so prolific, damn near anyone who reads has read something by him. Putting him on a list of reccomended reading would just take the spot from someone who needs it more.

Are you sure these aren't books for Nerds?

I'd reccomend The Night's Dawn Trilogy to all teh SG'ers out there. They are big-big books by Peter F. Hamilton, but there's something in them for everyone.

Oh, and smack yourself with a board if you don't read Illium by Dan Simmons. Oh, and / (slash) by either Bear or Bova, sorry, I read a ton. But that is a really good near-future builder.

I don't think that Starship Troopers is a good starting place for someone who isn't into Heinlein. I agree with snottle that The Moon is a Hash Mistress is a better starting point. It has a more friendly story:political philosophising ratio. The Door into Summer is probably a good spot too, though I might be alone in thinking that since I never hear anyone talk about that book..