The Sword and Laser discussion

Hello,

I know there are more topics like this but this is kind of an "emergency".

I want to offer a book to my brother and I had bought - V Wars - but yesterday he arrived home and said "Hey, look at this awesome e-book I bought!" and yep, it was the same :|

So I'm looking for suggestions of something that is a bit "under the radar", not too mainstream, that you think it's great and people should know about it. It has to be released in paperback, cause he seems to buy all the good ebooks once they are available :P

Some of his favorite authors are: Peter F. Hamilton, Dan Abnett, John Ringo, Jack Campbell, John Sandford, Christopher Farnsworth, John Birmingham, Harry Turtledove and Stephen King

What he likes: mechs, space battles, alternative history (specially Weird World War II), zombies, mystery/thrillers mixed with some horror/paranormal factor, end of the world stories, the WH40K series and the Battletech novels.

Although he reads fantasy, he prefers sci-fi. Nothing with too much feelings or romance, please :P

Thanks for any suggestions you can provide!

André

Bitter Seeds was quite under the radar as far as I know, and it's very Weird War II

That's exactly the kind of alternative history he likes but we already have that one, after so much praise from Tom and Veronica :)

Thanks though, great suggestion, having in mind what I said.

In my opinion David Weber is the king of space battles, normally I'd hesitate to recommend In Death Ground as the book is mainly space battles and the evolution of tactics as new weapons are introduced but you did say your brother likes space battles.

I find Weber's On Basilisk Station to be a far more balanced read, it's also free on Kindle or from the publishers website.

Geoff wrote: "In my opinion David Weber is the king of space battles, normally I'd hesitate to recommend In Death Ground as the book is mainly space battles and the evolution of tactics as new weapons are introd..."

Ups, my fault! We have most of David Weber work, since it's also one of his favorite authors...I just forgot to add it to the list! Thanks!

Also forgot to add that he's a big fan of the superheroes genre too.

Hmm, I'm going to take a gamble and suggest something that not quite fits any of the descriptions above except that it's sci-fi-ish, and not too mainstream:
God's War
No mechs, but the tech is based on bugs! It's also pretty hard boiled, so you don't have to worry about running into too much lovey dovey romance stuff.

For zombies end of the world stuff I recommend this one: The Reapers Are the Angels
One of my personal favorites.

I'm not much of a sci-fi reader, but this one I really enjoyed and noone seems to have ever heard of it: Breakaway
The space battles don't come till the third book in the series, but there's plenty of cyborg kicking cyborg ass!

I haven't read Bitter Seeds but after reading the synopsis I think your brother might like Hard Magic. It's noir/urban fantasy/alternate history, but it also feels like it fits into the superhero genre even though the word is never used.

I was thinking the same thing, Geoff. You could also try Monster Hunter International by the same author for the supernatural side of things.

Just finished Patient Zero which I really liked, reminded me more of an action-thriller than a straight up zombie-fest.

Lots of great options, thank you! Now I need to pick one :)

Altered Carbon Very gritty hard sci-fi.

Hi everyone,

just wanted to say that I've already made my choice and thank you all for the suggestions - it lead me to finding 2 good books.

Not going to say the titles cause...spies might be lurking eheh

Thanks :)