We’ve got 15 books and series here, so there should be something to love for almost every reader (although we need some traditional fantasy page turners – send us some recommendations in the comments please)! Plus, at the end of the episode we each rank our personal top 3.

We intentionally excluded YA and military sci-fi books, although those are often also page-turners - look out for episodes about each of those soon!

Brent’s brother, Alex, joined us for this episode, and brought us a whole new batch of books (and frankly a couple new subgenres) to enjoy. LitRPG / progression fantasy just keep getting more popular, and we can see why – the books we’ve picked up have all been so, so fun to read (although it probably helps we’ve been reading Alex’s recommendations so far, the best of the best from the hundreds of LitRPG books he’s read).

No spoilers anywhere in this episode.

• Join the Hugonauts book club on discord
• Or you can watch our episodes on YouTube if you prefer video

This episode is sponsored by Quinto’s Challenge by Peter McChesney

All the books we recommend, plus timestamps:

• 00:00 Intro
• 02:48 Sponsor – Quinto’s Challenge by Peter McChesney
• 03:26 Silo by Hugh Howey
• 5:06 Mother of Learning by Domagoj Kurmaic
• 7:19 Murderbot by Martha Wells
• 9:10 Beware of Chicken by Casualfarmer
• 12:26 Andromeda Strain by Michael Crichton
• 14:49 Mark of the Fool by J.M. Clarke
• 18:18 Project Hail Mary and The Martian by Andy Weir
• 19:40 Iron Prince by Bryce O'Connor
• 22:33 Dark Matter by Blake Crouch
• 24:04 He Who Fights With Monsters by Shirtaloon
• 28:47 Daemon by Daniel Suarez
• 31:07 The Perfect Run by Maxime J. Durand
• 33:39 The Bobiverse by Dennis E. Taylor
• 36:24 Eight by Samer Rabadi
• 38:37 Dungeon Crawler Carl by Matt Dinniman
• 46:18 Rankings: Top 3 page turners

We've got 18 books and series we highly recommend, so there's something here for all kinds of readers - and at the end of the episode we rank our top 3 to bring you the best of the best.

What is space opera? Books with big characters and a bigger world - they usually even come with big 'ol wordcounts. Space opera is often multi-pov, with interstellar travel and the fate of the galaxy at stake.

No spoilers anywhere in this episode.

• Join the Hugonauts book club on discord
• Or you can watch our episodes on YouTube if you prefer video

This episode is sponsored by indie sci-fi publisher Lil' Factory

All the books we recommend, plus timestamps:

• 00:00 Intro
• 00:36 Sponsor - Lil' Factory
• 1:24 What is a space opera?
• 2:58 The Vorkosigan Saga - Lois McMaster Bujold
• 4:45 The Expanse - James S.A. Corey
• 6:38 Hyperion - Dan Simmons
• 9:51 House of Suns - Alistair Reynolds
• 11:32 Children of Time - Adrian Tchaikovsky
• 13:11 Fire Upon the Deep - Vernor Vinge
• 15:04 The Culture - Iain M. Banks
• 17:17 Peter F. Hamilton's whole discography
• 20:19 Embassytown - China Mieville
• 21:45 A Memory Called Empire - Arkady Martine
• 23:34 Dune - Are you happy now?
• 24:47 Ancillary Justice - Ann Leckie
• 26:34 Downbelow Station - C.J. Cherryh
• 26:05 The Mote in God's Eye - Larry Niven and Jerry Pournelle
• 29:24 Startide Rising - David Brin
• 31:16 The Long Way to a Small Angry Planet - Becky Chambers
• 33:01 Foundation - Isaac Asimov
• 35:22 Rankings: 3rd best Space Opera
• 37:27 Rankings: 2nd best Space Opera
• 38:50 Rankings: 1st best Space Opera

This might be the best sci-fi book out there about nanotechnology. But Stephenson has so many good ones that this one isn't his best book - some of the characters lose their way, and it drags in the middle.

Oh, and one more good recommendation we forgot while we were recording - check out Blood Music by Greg Bear if you want a biological twist on nanotech!

• Join the Hugonauts book club on discord
• Or you can watch our episodes on YouTube if you prefer video

As always, no spoilers until the end when we get into the full plot explanation and discussion.

Similar books we recommend:

• Snow Crash by Neal Stephenson
• Neuromancer by William Gibson
• Cory Doctorow
• Prey by Michael Crichton

This episode is sponsored by Har Megiddon by Ron Bennett.

If you want to jump around, here are the timestamps for the episode:

• 00:00 Intro
• 00:47 Book setup
• 1:49 Sponsor - Har Megiddon
• 2:22 Our review 3.25/5
• 3:53 Great sections - and stinkers
• 4:47 Incredible technology
• 7:33 Hard to visualize?
• 9:38 Dances with Wolves
• 10:17 Labor saving devices
• 13:59 Neal's infodumps
• 19:25 Book structure
• 25:47 Sponsor - Har Megiddon
• 26:08 Similar books we recommend
• 28:40 Spoilers section - book summary
• 31:30 Spoilers section - discussion