looking for fantasy or sci-fi stories doesn't have to include much sex. more story and plot any suggestions
looking for fantasy or sci-fi stories doesn't have to include much sex. more story and plot any suggestions
any particular sci-fi sub-genre? SOL has everything from the aliens putting people on prehistoric planets to space battles or both.
If you don't mind unfinished stories of cmsix has a lot of stuff, the Damsels in Distress Universe is good, my Times of Old is good, Rough Diamond has some ESP, One Small Step is a shorty with an alien, Tandra is good, so is Gunslinger, and you can get a lot more by simply doing a category search on Time Travel or Do Over or any of the other sci-fi categories.
https://storiesonline.net/a/cmsix
https://storiesonline.net/universe/65/damsels-in-distress
https://storiesonline.net/s/59645/rough-diamond
https://storiesonline.net/s/55694/one-small-step
https://storiesonline.net/s/41392:29152
https://storiesonline.net/s/50644/gunslinger
No longer available on SoL, but well worth reading.
Gina Marie Wylie's: Hannah Sawyer, Starfarer's Dream, Kinsella, Rescue Branch and Stone Face. I believe they are now available on Amazon, but I don't know about her own site since they are published.
Also, Refusenik's stories available here. Excellent reading and justified high scores.
A quick search for high-scoring, complete SF stories on SOL reveals the aforementioned Gina Marie Wylie and Refusenik, as well as Al Steiner, hammingbyrd7, gwresearch, Mike Cropo (far-spanning science fantasy with lotsa sex), Lazlo Zalezac, and DB_Story.
The Gina Marie Wylie stories mentioned are no longer on SOL, and I stated the Refusenik stories were available here. This is part of SOL.
I was answering a request by the OP, not searching for them.
A plug for my own stories. I have a number of SciFi stories with little or no sex, especially the older ones.
I have two stories in progress on SOL, one is a Sci-fi story the other more Comic Book/Superhero.
They are BDSM stories and contain some extreme elements. Check them out if you want, but pay attention to the story codes before reading.
Bean Books is a good place to look.
http://www.baen.com/
And/or any of the old "pulp" SF and Fantasy prozines, if any are still around. I think I've seen recent issues of Fantasy & Science Fiction (F&SF) Magazine.
Note to other respondenrs, I didn't notice his specifying that the stories had to be on SoL.
I never thought Bean and Baen were homonyms, but I learned something this evening.
There a poem (ok, doggerel) about beans.
Beans, beans the musical fruit, the more you eat, the more you toot. The more you toot, the better you feel, so lets have beans with every meal.
I am not aware of any poetry about Jim Baen. Lots of good books, though.
Another free source of SF books and magazines can be found in the collections at Archive.org
https://archive.org/
Hammingbyrd7, mentioned above, has my favourite story on the site - The Preacher Man. A unique blend of post-apocalyptic, sci-fi, religion and many other elements.
YMMV
Artie had some good hard-SF (various lengths), but it was all taken down after a notice
"This website and ALL ITS CONTENTS are most likely GOING TO DISAPPEAR before the end of December 2011"
--try searching on that notice to find an archive
And, I second Al Steiner's 'Aftermath', gwresearch, Gina Marie Wylie's Kinsella stuff (mostly withdrawn now for commercial reasaons) and more, a little of which is still available on her site
The Wayback Machine's most complete archive of Artie's stories is found at http://web.archive.org/web/20111121131633/http://www.asstr.org/~artie/index.html
Oh gosh, what was one... oh I could note a book I published a few years back, lol. Honestly, though, if you want some decent scifi/fantasy without all the sex, I'd suggest "The Lost Swords" series by fred saberhagen... plenty of imagery but not much sex as I remember. Thick books though.
I recommend "The Gift" and "The Gift-Book Two" by Volentrin. Not much sex but excellent Plot about guy who can "time-dive" and see historical occurrences. Both are excellent.
Not that I am trying to self-promote, but my story is sci-fi (characters with special abilities, light mind control, advanced human evolution) and is light on sex (I think that is the #1 complaint I get as feedback, not enough sex).
https://storiesonline.net/a/Lumpy
If you're interested.
Cause pimping my own stuff always feel ... icky I guess. I mean, I know it's important to self-promote, but in a forum like this. Doesn't feel right.
How you feel matters. However, I look for recommendations on what to read from lots of sources. If I try a story and don't like it, I quit reading it. No harm, no foul.
I suspect authors know more about their own stories than most others they might recommend. If you like a story, its entirely appropriate to recommend it to someone else, certainly if that someone has gone on record that he (or she, but not all that often on SOL) is looking for something to read. If the story you like that fits what the other person is looking for, go ahead and recommend it, even if (gasp) you wrote it. You are doing a favor for someone who either is or might become a friend.
Its not like you are recommending a new job or a marriage partner. Or even a blind date.
Fair enough. I retract my dig at self-promotion.
(also, I hope I like what I am writing. Couldn't imagine writing something I thought was terrible :) )
Possibly the greatest ongoing sci-fi series of books online that are available for free, is the *Spartans War Chronicles* by: Mike Cropo
http://www.aspartanswarchronicles.com/
Just reading the books he already has posted will take you days, if not weeks.
________________________________________________
Also, one of the greatest fantasy stories online, is the *Sennadar* series by: James Galloway.
http://www.weavespinner.net/worlds_of_fel.htm
Some of the stories are Science Fiction. One easy way to tell is if there are spaceships and aliens.
Although Science Fiction doesn't need spaceships or aliens. I received a pretty pointed complaint that my story is tagged as sci-fi and there weren't any aliens.
Now admittedly, until I made a revel of what was actually happenings, there were a lot of people guessing the central twist of the book was Alien related so maybe the reader felt let down by that.
But still, sci-fi is more that space....
You are correct, sir. Science Fiction is far more than just aliens and spaceships. My point was that if a story has both there is a high probability that the story is Science fiction. It could have other features, (much sex, yeah) or discuss politics (Atlas Shrugged, Ann Rand boo) or be a juvenile (RAH did a lot of those and they don't call him a grand master of science fiction for no reason). We could nudge a lot of electrons discussing what is science fiction, and even more where the border, relatively amorphous, is between SF and other genres like Fantasy, "real" fiction (what gets published without the SF collar. Back when publishing houses and the New York Times Review of Books decided what was what, some obvious SF didn't get that "kiss of death" for being stocked in bookstores. Neville Shute wrote an end of the world nuclear war book, the final scenes were in Australia, but nobody hinted it was SF. Even though it was set in part in a submarine, if I remember way back then correctly. Now if I could just think of the title.
I seem to have run out of things to say. The problem with theme shift, after a few paragraphs I can't remember what this post was about. Oh, what is science fiction. Your opinion is at least as good as mine. One of the supreme court judges said about pornography, I know it when I see it.
Thanks, how could I forget that novel. It lead to the Beach Boys, and Annette and all the other girls in bikinis in B Movies. Beach Blanket Bingo was one of the sequels, maybe.
Singing in the Rain (it's about the impact of a new technology (talking pictures) on society.)
But still, sci-fi is more that space....
True, however I would expect at least one of (space, aliens, advanced tech) to make at least a cameo appearance in any story that calls itself sci-fi.
And by advanced tech I mean something that either doesn't exist at all in the real world or is bleeding edge.
True, however I would expect at least one of (space, aliens, advanced tech) to make at least a cameo appearance in any story that calls itself sci-fi.
Isaac Asimov has made great books that were sci-fi and had no aliens at all because everyone was a human, just set in advanced technology. The same is true for many sci-fi stories - E.E. Doc Smith usually had no aliens.
Sci-fi just needs something to do with science and is fiction.
Seems to be a misunderstanding here. I said I would expect any one of those things to at least make a cameo appearance in a sci-fi story.
A cameo role or cameo appearance (/ΛkΓ¦mioΚ/; often shortened to just cameo) is a brief appearance or voice part of a known person in a work of the performing arts, typically unnamed or appearing as themselves.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cameo_appearance.
None of Asimov's or E.E. Doc Smith's stories fall outside my definition.
Sci-fi just needs something to do with science and is fiction.
Sorry, it takes a bit more that that for me. I refuse to consider crime lab dramas (CSI) science fiction.
Let me elaborate a little on Ernest's statement. The classic definition of science fiction is where the author postulates some scientific device or process not currently existing, and extrapolates what the effect of that postulate would have on society. So yes, the only thing sci-fi about CSI is the speed of their lab results and the ability of their photo enhancement techniques.
A classic example of this definition is Heinlein's 'The Door Into Summer', where he postulates the commercial use of 'deep sleep', and how it affects society. He does cheat a little and throws in a little time travel as a 'deus ex machina', but the rest is just pure extrapolation.
Sorry, it takes a bit more that that for me. I refuse to consider crime lab dramas (CSI) science fiction.
Well, the science in them is mostly fiction, or exaggerated extrapolation.
Long recognized as one of the earliest science fiction stories was Verne's 'Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea', where he basically drops a modern day nuclear sub into the 19th century, and lets events unfold from there. True, most people don't recognize it as sci-fi because it doesn't have rockets or blasters or aliens, but that is their problem.
When Verne wrote 'Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea", The H.L Hunley, a Confederate submarine with no air supply, a crew of nine and a hand cranked propeller was the state of the art in submarines.
The first practical submarines with anywhere near the endurance Verne ascribed to the Nautilus were still 50 to 60 years in the future, so yeah it qualifies as science fiction.
PS
The Nautilus was not nuclear, it was described as electrically powered by sodium/mercury batteries.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nautilus_%28Verne%29
As I recall, he never actually describes how the batteries are charged, though it's likely catalytic/chemical as the sodium for the batteries was described as being drawn from sea water.
Long recognized as one of the earliest science fiction stories was Verne's 'Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea', where he basically drops a modern day nuclear sub into the 19th century, and lets events unfold from there. True, most people don't recognize it as sci-fi because it doesn't have rockets or blasters or aliens, but that is their problem.
Today it would be considered steampunk. Of course at the time it was very scifi. See also http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/Zeerust
I didn't mean to imply that Verne's Nautilus was nuclear, I just pick the closest modern day equivalent as an example.
I just read a book in which vampires were actually misunderstood aliens and there was travel to other planets with an entire zoo of aliens. There were all kinds of futuristic gadgets as well. But very few people would consider it to be science fiction. It was paranormal.
I agree Dominion's Son, but labeling it sci-fi would tick off a lot of those fans because of the vampires and werewolves