Foundation

What Hacker News says

1. manarthOct 2026
   And yes: Tolkien, Dune, Pratchett, Douglas Adams, Asimov/Foundation, McCaffrey/Pern, Janny Wurts, Raymond E Feist, and more recently Brandon Sanderson, Patrick Rothfuss, and Melissa McPhail (who sadly passed away, with the Pattern of Shadow and Light incomplete).
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2. wise_bloodSep 2026
   20 years ago I read a The Guardian article about the "top geek novels". I immediately read a bunch of those.

   Recently I managed to find the list again, and it's been endless pleasure:

   - American Gods -- Neil Gaiman

   - Brave New World -- Aldous Huxley

   - The Colour of Magic -- Terry Pratchett

   - Consider Phlebas -- Iain M Banks

   - Cryptonomicon -- Neal Stephenson

   - Cloud Atlas -- David Mitchell

   - The Diamond Age -- Neal Stephenson

   - The Dispossessed -- Ursula K Le Guin

   - Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? -- Philip Dick

   - Dune -- Frank Herbert

   - Foundation -- Isaac Asimov

   - Giles Goat-Boy -- John Barth

   - Gravity's Rainbow -- Thomas Pynchon

   - The HitchHiker's Guide to the Galaxy -- Douglas Adams

   - I, Robot -- Isaac Asimov

   - The Illuminatus! Trilogy -- Robert Shea and Robert Anton Wilson

   - The Left Hand of Darkness -- Ursula K Le Guin

   - The Man in the High Castle -- Philip K Dick

   - Microserfs -- Douglas Coupland

   - Neuromancer -- William Gibson

   - Nineteen Eighty-Four -- George Orwell

   - Orlando -- Virgina Woolf

   - The Shockwave Rider -- John Brunner

   - Snow Crash -- Neal Stephenson

   - Stand on Zanzibar -- John Brunner

   - Stranger in a Strange Land -- Robert Heinlein

   - Trouble with lichen - John Wyndham

   - UBIK -- Philip Dick

   - Watchmen -- Alan Moore & Dave Gibbons

   - Woman on the Edge of Time -- Marge Piercy

   (I am creatively interpreting "The Colour of Magic" as "all Discworld", "Dune" as "the six Dune books", etc.)

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3. jahalaMay 2026
   I absolutely LOVE Accelerando. I've recommended it to everyone I meet for years.

   If you're looking for other great sci-fi reads:

   John Ringo - Live free or die

   John Varley - Titan (-> Wizard / Demon)

   Charles Stross - Singularity Sky

   Vernor Vinge - A Fire Upon the Deep / A Deepness in the Sky

   Robert Heinlein - Stranger in a Strange Land

   Dan Simmons - Hyperion

   Alastair Reynolds - Revelation Space / The Prefect

   Orson Scott Card - Enders game

   Isaac Asimov - Foundation

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4. sifarFeb 2026
   Gell-Mann Amnesia strikes again. It feels strange - almost as if Asimov hated Orwell. So many personal attacks.

   And I say this as fan of Foundation/Robot series.

   Despite quoting below from Fromm's afterword, how does Asimov miss it ? "Books like Orwell's are powerful warnings, and it would be most unfortunate if the reader smugly interpreted 1984 as another description of Stalinist barbarism, and if he does not see that it means us, too."

   " Orwell was unable to conceive of computers or robots, or he would have placed everyone under non-human surveillance. Our own computers to some extent do this in the IRS, in credit files, and so on, but that does not take us towards 1984, except in fevered imaginations. "

   Now apply this to many of today's experts/billionaires/technical celebrities whose words matter but are in reality quite myopic.

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5. BoredGuyAtWorkFeb 2026
   I loved the Foundation series and Isaac Asimov was definitely my most read science fiction author as a kid, but damn - my estimation of Asimov as a man just fuckin plummeted. He comes across like a whiny nerd. He's upset that 1984 gets such acclaim in "his" area of expertise, science fiction. And how dare this non science fiction guy step foot in his domain. If 1984 weren't set in the future, he wouldn't have any gripes with it, I'm sure.

   The one thing Asimov gives Orwell credit for is predicting that there would be three separate great powers? Like, what? The other nations don't matter at all. We're not even sure they really exist or not. Or how he complains that Orwell used a missile strike, instead of calling it what, a 2X00 Plasma Fueled Missile Strike? It's not about the missile strike. It's about the fear the missile strike incites into people. People afraid are easy to control.

   Or about how the warring nations didn't use nukes. Like, there's no way Asimov didn't understand that it was probably not even the other nations that were responsible, but rather the party itself, right? But that's what it sounds like. It reminds me of how in the Foundation series, one of the characters has an "atomic" wristwatch. Like, you can tell that Asimov thought that would be possible in the future and would be cool, and just had to include it. But really, who cares. As if cool gadgets or what people might use in the future is what makes or breaks science fiction. Not to mention how outdated an atomic watch feels now.

   Asimov had great ideas, but his actual writing ability doesn't hold a candle to George Orwell's. Orwell was a true literary master. Asimov was a very creative scientist, with a lot of ideas in his head, and he successfully put them to paper.

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6. globular-toastFeb 2026
   The point was more that the female characters turn up in books two and three. Three in particular.

   If you like SF you can't go wrong reading all of Asimov IMO. The entire Robots/Empire/Foundation series is fantastic. It doesn't mean you can't also read other, "better" SF either. Asimov's main SF work will take a few months to read at most.

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