Books like The Oracle — picked by fans

I can probably find a way to put this novel into every book category there is – I love it that much!

Elizabeth Zott is a brilliant chemist in the 1960s, a time when society accepted that only men could be brilliant or chemists. But through a series of opportunities and her defiance in the face of attempts to marginalize her, Elizabeth becomes a de facto leader of a small but mighty group of women who change their circumstances and thereby begin to change the world. 

As a fan (and author) of first contact science fiction, written from the extraterrestrial's perspective, I was eager to read Raq and I was not disappointed.

Raq is a reptilian warrior of the Hlad race on a planet that humans had set out to colonize. When a follow-up mission is sent to find the colonists, the humans are killed by the Hlad, with the exception of a man named David.

Raq is assigned to guard David (known as "The Dayyid" among the Hlad). At first, Raq is ashamed to be given the assignment of caring for such a repulsive, inferior creature, whose existence threatens the foundations of the Hlad's religious beliefs. For his part, The Dayyid only wants to run into the desert and die there to escape captivity. Over the course of the story, the relationship between Raq and The Dayyid evolves and deepens in unexpected ways.

I recommend this book because it captures everything I love about Arthur C. Clarke, that sense of vast, quiet wonder, where the universe feels enormous and ancient and full of secrets we may never fully understand.

This story of a massive alien craft drifting through our solar system pulled me in with its scale alone, but what stayed with me was the mystery. Clarke never shows you the aliens, just like in 2001: A Space Odyssey, only the technology, the structures, the hints of something far beyond us. I loved that restraint, that feeling of standing at the edge of something we can sense but not grasp.

Readers who enjoy epic, contemplative science fiction will feel right at home here. And it fits my theme because it honors the unknown, the same quiet mystery I explore in my own writing.

This is my favorite hard sci-fi classic. I love the beautiful mix of real science (wormholes excepted), compelling story, and characters, and it touches on both first contact and the way in which human nature might cause us to react to it. That is the power combo, in my opinion!

The movie of the book was very good — Robert Zemeckis is a brilliant director — although it left out some fantastic details that, as a math and science fan, I really loved! (I won’t spoil it here; it’s too good.)

I love books that are clever, imaginative, and portray a particular person or character as the main theme. This book does it for me.

The character is a murderer robot, but I came to like him and his weird but insightful perspective. I could see his world through his eyes. I felt sorry for him by the end of the book and was rooting for him. That was great.

I always like a bit of technology thrown in, but not have it be the main story or too complicated that it gets in the way of the characters. The writing was especially good, and I found myself turning page after page, engrossed in the story.

I love this book because it blends real science with an incredibly human story about survival and connection.

Andy Weir makes complex physics feel accessible, while still keeping the stakes intense and the pacing fast. What really stands out for me is the unexpected friendship at the heart of the story—it turns what could have been a solitary mission into something deeply emotional.

An astoundingly good novel. Well-researched, well told, and well-narrated in audio. I had a slightly harder time getting into the spider timeline—I kept waiting to get back to the human one—but in the end I was engaged by that one too, and of course deeply impressed by the sheer power of the author's informed imagination in creating this entirely new species, tracing its rapid evolution, and giving us its point of view in an entirely plausible way. But the human story is even more amazing, in my view, in part because of the way it uses time. Highly recommended!

Although this title seems obscure, most people will recognize the classic movie adaptation under the name The Thing.

For a science fiction story written before the Second World War, this book stands up surprisingly well. It’s the First Contact story we don’t want, where instead of meeting an intelligent extraterrestrial species, we come face to face with a monster. And it is intelligence that saves the day, not brute force or strength.

Although it is out of print, this book can be read online. 

Peter Cawdron has written a whole series based on various first-contact scenarios, each an independent novel.

Apothecary is one of my favorites. Set in 16th-century England, it follows a young apprentice named Anthony, who works at a London apothecary (a pharmacy). When his blind friend Julia is accused of witchcraft and set to burn at the stake, Anthony seeks help from a member of the aristocracy who harbors a deep secret about her arrival in this medieval land.

The story is accurate, fascinating, and fun, as superstition and primitive technology clashes with advanced alien science. But like all Peter Cawdron stories, at its heart Apothecary is a story of characters struggling to do what’s right.

Kathryn is the best sci-fi author you haven’t read. How do I know? I was her critique buddy. We traded chapters as we wrote, each acting as advisor to the other.

I really liked Monkey Girl, a great choice for teen girls. But Project Hannibal is my favorite. Kathryn works at a zoo, so she knows a lot about animals. In Hannibal, she asks, could DNA from extinct woolly mammoths be used to impregnate a modern elephant? And if you could produce mammoth offspring, why do it?

As it turns out, mammoths might be exactly the wildlife our neglected planet needs. Join a flying doctor and her teenage assistant in a grand adventure across the wilderness of Alaska.