Computers...

"R2, you know better than to trust a strange computer" -C3P0

Computers are not just cyberpunk, though that subgenre is definitely represented. Computers can also be main characters themselves, or people can live in a society with computerized (robotic) or semi-computerized (cybernetic, cyborg) people on a regular basis. If your best friend plugs into the wall and needs a surge protector, these books are for you. Please beware: some of the older works are extremely dated- just pretend they're right and keep going.

Plug In

• Joan D. Vinge
  • Catspaw (Cat's psi powers allow him to travel inside the information network that controls the Federation.)
• Neal Stephenson

  I have no idea where to put these books, so I'll put them here. They're geeky enough.

  • Cryptonomicon (Some of the characters are involved in the computer business, and I am informed that that's pretty important to the plot.)

Computer Pals

• Larry Niven
  • Integral Trees (Okay, so he isn't a pal. He's supposed to keep the colonists in line, but his programming has gotten a little confused.)
• Robert Heinlein
  • Time Enough for Love (Three of the women in Lazarus Long's life are computers- but not all of them want to stay that way.)
  • The Moon is a Harsh Mistress (Mike is just a computer, but he is the only hope for the Loonies to gain their independence from Earth.)
  • The Number of the Beast (Gay Deceiver is the spaceship in which 4 people escape a destroyed Earth.)

Cyborgs

• Anne McCaffrey
  • "Brainship" series (children with damaged bodies are placed inside metal hulls, destined to be the minds behind starships and cities

Robots

• Douglas Adams
  • "The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy" (Marvin is the most depressed robot in the universe, but he has every reason to be.)
• Jerome Beatty, Jr.
  • Maria Looney and the Remarkable Robot (While Maria is learning wilderness survival, her life is saved by a robot who becomes her friend.)

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Last Updated: October 14, 1999

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