“What are the best Science Fiction & Fantasy books of 2016?” We aggregated 32 year-end lists and ranked the 254 unique titles by how many times they appeared in an attempt to answer that very question!
There are thousands of year-end lists released every year and, like we do in our weekly Best Book articles, we wanted to see which books appear on them the most. We used 32 Science Fiction & Fantasy book lists and found 254 unique titles. The top 42 books, all appearing on 3 or more lists, are below with images, summaries, and links for learning more or purchasing. The remaining books, along with the articles we used, can be found at the bottom of the page.
Be sure to check out our other Best Book of the year lists:
And if you want to see how they compare to last year, take a look at the 2015 lists as well!
Happy Scrolling!
“Michael J. Sullivan’s trailblazing career began with the breakout success of his Riyria series: full-bodied, spellbinding fantasy adventures whose imaginative scope and sympathetic characters won a devoted readership and comparisons to fantasy masters Brandon Sanderson, Scott Lynch, and Tolkien himself. Now, Sullivan’s stunning hardcover debut, Age of Myth, inaugurates an original five-book series–and one of fantasy’s finest next-generation storytellers continues to break new ground.
Since time immemorial, humans have worshipped the gods they call Fhrey, truly a race apart: invincible in battle, masters of magic, and seemingly immortal. But when a god falls to a human blade, the balance of power between men and those they thought were gods changes forever. Now, only a few stand between humankind and annihilation: Raithe, reluctant to embrace his destiny as the God Killer. Suri, a young seer burdened by signs of impending doom. And Persephone, who must overcome personal tragedy to lead her people.”
“The galaxy has seen great empires rise and fall. Planets have shattered and been remade. Amongst the ruins of alien civilizations, building our own from the rubble, humanity still thrives.
And there are vast fortunes to be made, if you know where to find them…
Captain Rackamore and his crew do. It’s their business to find the tiny, enigmatic worlds which have been hidden away, booby-trapped, surrounded by layers of protection – and to crack them open for the ancient relics and barely-remembered technologies inside. But while they ply their risky trade with integrity, not everyone is so scrupulous.”
“In a distant future in which Latin Americans have pioneered faster-than-light space travel, Dr. Jan Amos Sangan Dongo has a job with large and unusual responsibilities: he’s a veterinarian who specializes in treating enormous alien animals. Mountain-sized amoebas, multisex species with bizarre reproductive processes, razor-nailed, carnivorous humanoid hunters: Dr. Sangan has seen it all. When a colonial conflict threatens the fragile peace between the galaxy’s seven intelligent species, he must embark on a daring mission through the insides of a gigantic creature and find two swallowed ambassadors—who also happen to be his competing love interests.
Funny, witty, raunchy, and irrepressibly vivacious, Super Extra Grande is a rare specimen in the richly parodic tradition of Cuban science fiction, and could only have been written by a Cuban heavy-metal rock star with a biology degree: the inimitable Yoss.”
“In the wake of a fever that decimated the earth’s population—killing women and children and making childbirth deadly for the mother and infant—the midwife must pick her way through the bones of the world she once knew to find her place in this dangerous new one. Gone are the pillars of civilization. All that remains is power—and the strong who possess it.
A few women like her survived, though they are scarce. Even fewer are safe from the clans of men, who, driven by fear, seek to control those remaining. To preserve her freedom, she dons men’s clothing, goes by false names, and avoids as many people as possible. But as the world continues to grapple with its terrible circumstances, she’ll discover a role greater than chasing a pale imitation of independence.
After all, if humanity is to be reborn, someone must be its guide.”
“In this dark and gripping sci-fi noir, an exiled police detective arrives at a lunar penal colony just as a psychotic android begins a murderous odyssey across the far side of the moon.
Purgatory is the lawless moon colony of eccentric billionaire, Fletcher Brass: a mecca for war criminals, murderers, sex fiends, and adventurous tourists. You can’t find better drugs, cheaper plastic surgery, or a more ominous travel advisory anywhere in the universe. But trouble is brewing in Brass’s black-market heaven. When an exiled cop arrives in this wild new frontier, he immediately finds himself investigating a string of ruthless assassinations in which Brass himself—and his equally ambitious daughter—are the chief suspects.
Meanwhile, two-thousand kilometers away, an amnesiac android, Leonardo Black, rampages across the lunar surface. Programmed with only the notorious “Brass Code”—a compendium of corporate laws that would make Ayn Rand blush—Black has only one goal in mind: to find Purgatory and conquer it.”
“When Ben, a suburban family man, takes a business trip to rural Pennsylvania, he decides to spend the afternoon before his dinner meeting on a short hike. Once he sets out into the woods behind his hotel, he quickly comes to realize that the path he has chosen cannot be given up easily. With no choice but to move forward, Ben finds himself falling deeper and deeper into a world of man-eating giants, bizarre demons, and colossal insects.
On a quest of epic, life-or-death proportions, Ben finds help comes in some of the most unexpected forms, including a profane crustacean and a variety of magical objects, tools, and potions. Desperate to return to his family, Ben is determined to track down the “Producer,” the creator of the world in which he is being held hostage and the only one who can free him from the path.”
“One thing any Librarian will tell you: the truth is much stranger than fiction…
Irene is a professional spy for the mysterious Library, a shadowy organization that collects important works of fiction from all of the different realities. Most recently, she and her enigmatic assistant Kai have been sent to an alternative London. Their mission: Retrieve a particularly dangerous book. The problem: By the time they arrive, it’s already been stolen.
London’s underground factions are prepared to fight to the death to find the tome before Irene and Kai do, a problem compounded by the fact that this world is chaos-infested—the laws of nature bent to allow supernatural creatures and unpredictable magic to run rampant. To make matters worse, Kai is hiding something—secrets that could be just as volatile as the chaos-filled world itself.”
“Everything has a spirit: the willow tree with leaves that kiss the pond, the stream that feeds the river, the wind that exhales fresh snow . . .
But the spirits that reside within this land want to rid it of all humans. One woman stands between these malevolent spirits and the end of humankind: the queen. She alone has the magical power to prevent the spirits from destroying every man, woman, and child. But queens are still just human, and no matter how strong or good, the threat of danger always looms.
With the position so precarious, young women are chosen to train as heirs. Daleina, a seemingly quiet academy student, is under no illusions as to her claim to the throne, but simply wants to right the wrongs that have befallen the land. Ven, a disgraced champion, has spent his exile secretly fighting against the growing number of spirit attacks. Joining forces, these daring partners embark on a treacherous quest to find the source of the spirits’ restlessness—a journey that will test their courage and trust, and force them to stand against both enemies and friends to save their land . . . before it’s bathed in blood.”
“A child is kidnapped with consequences that extend across worlds… A writer reaches into the past to discover the truth about a possible murder… Far away a young woman prepares for her mysterious future…
In a future scarred by fracking and ecological collapse, Jenna Hoolman’s world is dominated by illegal smartdog racing: greyhounds genetically modified with human DNA. When her young niece goes missing that world implodes… Christy’s life is dominated by fear of her brother, a man she knows capable of monstrous acts and suspects of hiding even darker ones. Desperate to learn the truth she contacts Alex, who has his own demons to fight… And Maree, a young woman undertaking a journey that will change her world forever.”
“ELKA BARELY REMEMBERS a time before she knew Trapper. She was just seven years old, wandering lost and hungry in the wilderness, when the solitary hunter took her in. In the years since then, he’s taught her how to survive in this desolate land where civilization has been destroyed and men are at the mercy of the elements and each other.
But the man Elka thought she knew has been harboring a terrible secret. He’s a killer. A monster. And now that Elka knows the truth, she may be his next victim.
Armed with nothing but her knife and the hard lessons Trapper’s drilled into her, Elka flees into the frozen north in search of her real parents. But judging by the trail of blood dogging her footsteps, she hasn’t left Trapper behind—and he won’t be letting his little girl go without a fight. If she’s going to survive, Elka will have to turn and confront not just him, but the truth about the dark road she’s been set on. “
“Decades ago, Japan won the Second World War. Americans worship their infallible Emperor, and nobody believes that Japan’s conduct in the war was anything but exemplary. Nobody, that is, except the George Washingtons – a shadowy group of rebels fighting for freedom. Their latest subversive tactic is to distribute an illegal video game that asks players to imagine what the world might be like if the United States had won the war instead.
Captain Beniko Ishimura’s job is to censor video games, and he’s working with Agent Akiko Tsukino of the secret police to get to the bottom of this disturbing new development. But Ishimura’s hiding something… He’s slowly been discovering that the case of the George Washingtons is more complicated than it seems, and the subversive videogame’s origins are even more controversial and dangerous than either of them originally suspected. “
“Embark on an exciting, adventurous, and dangerous journey through the galaxy with the motley crew of the spaceship Wayfarer in this fun and heart-warming space opera—the sequel to the acclaimed The Long Way to a Small, Angry Planet.
Lovelace was once merely a ship’s artificial intelligence. When she wakes up in a new body, following a total system shut-down and reboot, she has no memory of what came before. As Lovelace learns to negotiate the universe and discover who she is, she makes friends with Pepper, an excitable engineer, who’s determined to help her learn and grow.
Together, Pepper and Lovey will discover that no matter how vast space is, two people can fill it together.”
“Since Newton witnessed a bubble rising from his bathtub, mankind has sought the stars. When William III of England commissioned Capt. William Kidd to command the first expedition to Mars in the late 1600s, he proved that space travel was both possible and profitable.
Now, one century later, a plantation in a flourishing British colony on Mars is home to Arabella Ashby, a young woman who is perfectly content growing up in the untamed frontier. But days spent working on complex automata with her father or stalking her brother Michael with her Martian nanny is not the proper behavior of an English lady. That is something her mother plans to remedy with a move to an exotic world Arabella has never seen: London, England.”
“From the small coastal town of Senjan, notorious for its pirates, a young woman sets out to find vengeance for her lost family. That same spring, from the wealthy city-state of Seressa, famous for its canals and lagoon, come two very different people: a young artist traveling to the dangerous east to paint the grand khalif at his request—and possibly to do more—and a fiercely intelligent, angry woman, posing as a doctor’s wife, but sent by Seressa as a spy.
The trading ship that carries them is commanded by the accomplished younger son of a merchant family, ambivalent about the life he’s been born to live. And farther east a boy trains to become a soldier in the elite infantry of the khalif—to win glory in the war everyone knows is coming.
As these lives entwine, their fates—and those of many others—will hang in the balance, when the khalif sends out his massive army to take the great fortress that is the gateway to the western world…”
Everfair is a wonderful Neo-Victorian alternate history novel that explores the question of what might have come of Belgium’s disastrous colonization of the Congo if the native populations had learned about steam technology a bit earlier. Fabian Socialists from Great Britian join forces with African-American missionaries to purchase land from the Belgian Congo’s “owner,” King Leopold II. This land, named Everfair, is set aside as a safe haven, an imaginary Utopia for native populations of the Congo as well as escaped slaves returning from America and other places where African natives were being mistreated.
“Darrow would have lived in peace, but his enemies brought him war. The Gold overlords demanded his obedience, hanged his wife, and enslaved his people. But Darrow is determined to fight back. Risking everything to transform himself and breach Gold society, Darrow has battled to survive the cutthroat rivalries that breed Society’s mightiest warriors, climbed the ranks, and waited patiently to unleash the revolution that will tear the hierarchy apart from within.
Finally, the time has come.”
“People move to New York looking for magic and nothing will convince them it isn’t there.
Charles Thomas Tester hustles to put food on the table, keep the roof over his father’s head, from Harlem to Flushing Meadows to Red Hook. He knows what magic a suit can cast, the invisibility a guitar case can provide, and the curse written on his skin that attracts the eye of wealthy white folks and their cops. But when he delivers an occult tome to a reclusive sorceress in the heart of Queens, Tom opens a door to a deeper realm of magic, and earns the attention of things best left sleeping.
A storm that might swallow the world is building in Brooklyn. Will Black Tom live to see it break?”
What if life was neverending? What if you could change your body to adapt to an alien ecology? What if the pope were a robot? Spanning galaxies and millennia, this must-have anthology showcases classic contributions from H. G. Wells, Arthur C. Clarke, Octavia E. Butler, and Kurt Vonnegut, alongside a century of the eccentrics, rebels, and visionaries who have inspired generations of readers. Within its pages, you’ll find beloved worlds of space opera, hard SF, cyberpunk, the New Wave, and more. Learn about the secret history of science fiction, from titans of literature who also wrote SF to less well-known authors from more than twenty-five countries, some never before translated into English. In The Big Book of Science Fiction, literary power couple Ann and Jeff VanderMeer transport readers from Mars to Mechanopolis, planet Earth to parts unknown. Immerse yourself in the genre that predicted electric cars, space tourism, and smartphones. Sit back, buckle up, and dial in the coordinates, as this stellar anthology has got worlds within worlds.
With his debut novel, The Grace of Kings, taking the literary world by storm, Ken Liu now shares his finest short fiction in The Paper Menagerie and Other Stories. This mesmerizing collection features many of Ken’s award-winning and award-finalist stories, including: “The Man Who Ended History: A Documentary” (Finalist for the Hugo, Nebula, and Theodore Sturgeon Awards), “Mono No Aware” (Hugo Award winner), “The Waves” (Nebula Award finalist), “The Bookmaking Habits of Select Species” (Nebula and Sturgeon Award finalists), “All the Flavors” (Nebula Award finalist), “The Litigation Master and the Monkey King” (Nebula Award finalist), and the most awarded story in the genre’s history, “The Paper Menagerie” (The only story to win the Hugo, Nebula, and World Fantasy awards).
“Maia and her family raise dragons for the political war machine. As she comes of age, she hopes for a dragon of her own to add to the stable of breeding parents. But the war goes badly, and the needs of the Dragonry dash her hopes. Her peaceful life is shattered when the Summer Dragon—one of the rare and mythical High Dragons—makes an appearance in her quiet valley. The Summer Dragon is an omen of change, but no one knows for certain what kind of change he augurs. Political factions vie to control the implied message, each to further their own agendas.
And so Maia is swept into an adventure that pits her against the deathless Horrors—thralls of the enemy—and a faceless creature drawn from her fears. In her fight to preserve everything she knows and loves, she uncovers secrets that challenge her understanding of her world and of herself.”
“In the much-anticipated sequel to the “magnificent fantasy epic” (NPR) Grace of Kings, Emperor Kuni Garu is faced with the invasion of an invincible army in his kingdom and must quickly find a way to defeat the intruders.
Kuni Garu, now known as Emperor Ragin, runs the archipelago kingdom of Dara, but struggles to maintain progress while serving the demands of the people and his vision. Then an unexpected invading force from the Lyucu empire in the far distant west comes to the shores of Dara—and chaos results.
But Emperor Kuni cannot go and lead his kingdom against the threat himself with his recently healed empire fraying at the seams, so he sends the only people he trusts to be Dara’s savvy and cunning hopes against the invincible invaders: his children, now grown and ready to make their mark on history.”
“Mycroft Canner is a convict. For his crimes he is required, as is the custom of the 25th century, to wander the world being as useful as he can to all he meets. Carlyle Foster is a sensayer–a spiritual counselor in a world that has outlawed the public practice of religion, but which also knows that the inner lives of humans cannot be wished away.
The world into which Mycroft and Carlyle have been born is as strange to our 21st-century eyes as ours would be to a native of the 1500s. It is a hard-won utopia built on technologically-generated abundance, and also on complex and mandatory systems of labelling all public writing and speech. What seem to us normal gender distinctions are now distinctly taboo in most social situations. And most of the world’s population is affiliated with globe-girdling clans of the like-minded, whose endless economic and cultural competition is carefully managed by central planners of inestimable subtlety. To us it seems like a mad combination of heaven and hell. To them, it seems like normal life.”
“The acclaimed author of The Dream of Perpetual Motion returns with a compelling novel about the effects of science and technology on our friendships, our love lives, and our sense of self.
Rebecca Wright has reclaimed her life, finding her way out of her grief and depression following a personal tragedy years ago. She spends her days working in customer support for the internet dating site where she first met her husband. But she has a strange, persistent sense that everything around her is somewhat off-kilter: she constantly feels as if she has walked into a room and forgotten what she intended to do there; on TV, the President seems to be the wrong person in the wrong place; her dreams are full of disquiet. Meanwhile, her husband’s decade-long dedication to his invention, the causality violation device (which he would greatly prefer you not call a “time machine”) has effectively stalled his career and made him a laughingstock in the physics community. But he may be closer to success than either of them knows or can possibly imagine.”
“A cynical, disabled film director with borderline personality disorder gets recruited to join a secret organization that oversees relations between Hollywood and Fairyland in the first book of a new urban fantasy series from debut author Mishell Baker.
A year ago, Millie lost her legs and her filmmaking career in a failed suicide attempt. Just when she’s sure the credits have rolled on her life story, she gets a second chance with the Arcadia Project: a secret organization that polices the traffic to and from a parallel reality filled with creatures straight out of myth and fairy tales. “
“New Arcadia is a city-sized oil rig off the coast of the Canadian Maritimes, now owned by one very wealthy, powerful, byzantine family: Lynch Ltd.
Hwa is of the few people in her community (which constitutes the whole rig) to forgo bio-engineered enhancements. As such, she’s the last truly organic person left on the rig–making her doubly an outsider, as well as a neglected daughter and bodyguard extraordinaire. Still, her expertise in the arts of self-defense and her record as a fighter mean that her services are yet in high demand. When the youngest Lynch needs training and protection, the family turns to Hwa. But can even she protect against increasingly intense death threats seemingly coming from another timeline?”
“The ancient csestriim are back to finish their purge of humanity; armies march against the capital; leaches, solitary beings who draw power from the natural world to fuel their extraordinary abilities, maneuver on all sides to affect the outcome of the war; and capricious gods walk the earth in human guise with agendas of their own.
But the three imperial siblings at the heart of it all–Valyn, Adare, and Kaden–come to understand that even if they survive the holocaust unleashed on their world, there may be no reconciling their conflicting visions of the future.”
“Written by a highly regarded expert on space travel and exploration, Allen Steele’s Arkwright features the precision of hard science fiction with a compelling cast of characters. In the vein of classic authors such as Robert Heinlein, Isaac Asimov, and Arthur C. Clarke, Nathan Arkwright is a seminal author of the twentieth century. At the end of his life he becomes reclusive and cantankerous, refusing to appear before or interact with his legion of fans. Little did anyone know, Nathan was putting into motion his true, timeless legacy.
Convinced that humanity cannot survive on Earth, his Arkwright Foundation dedicates itself to creating a colony on an Earth-like planet several light years distant. Fueled by Nathan’s legacy, generations of Arkwrights are drawn together, and pulled apart, by the enormity of the task and weight of their name.”
“A worldwide diaspora has left a quarter of a million people at the foot of a space station. Cultures collide in real life and virtual reality. The city is literally a weed, its growth left unchecked. Life is cheap, and data is cheaper.
When Boris Chong returns to Tel Aviv from Mars, much has changed. Boris’s ex-lover is raising a strangely familiar child who can tap into the datastream of a mind with the touch of a finger. His cousin is infatuated with a robotnik—a damaged cyborg soldier who might as well be begging for parts. His father is terminally-ill with a multigenerational mind-plague. And a hunted data-vampire has followed Boris to where she is forbidden to return.”
“A triumphant return to the world of City of Stairs.
A generation ago, the city of Voortyashtan was the stronghold of the god of war and death, the birthplace of fearsome supernatural sentinels who killed and subjugated millions.
Now, the city’s god is dead. The city itself lies in ruins. And to its new military occupiers, the once-powerful capital is a wasteland of sectarian violence and bloody uprisings.
So it makes perfect sense that General Turyin Mulaghesh— foul-mouthed hero of the battle of Bulikov, rumored war criminal, ally of an embattled Prime Minister—has been exiled there to count down the days until she can draw her pension and be forgotten. “
“In the not-too-distant future, a simple outpatient procedure to increase empathy between romantic partners has become all the rage. And Briddey Flannigan is delighted when her boyfriend, Trent, suggests undergoing the operation prior to a marriage proposal—to enjoy better emotional connection and a perfect relationship with complete communication and understanding. But things don’t quite work out as planned, and Briddey finds herself connected to someone else entirely—in a way far beyond what she signed up for.
It is almost more than she can handle—especially when the stress of managing her all-too-eager-to-communicate-at-all-times family is already burdening her brain. But that’s only the beginning. As things go from bad to worse, she begins to see the dark side of too much information, and to realize that love—and communication—are far more complicated than she ever imagined.”
“Eleanor West’s Home for Wayward Children
No Solicitations
No Visitors
No QuestsChildren have always disappeared under the right conditions; slipping through the shadows under a bed or at the back of a wardrobe, tumbling down rabbit holes and into old wells, and emerging somewhere… else.”
“It’s been twenty years and two election cycles since Information, a powerful search engine monopoly, pioneered the switch from warring nation-states to global micro-democracy. The corporate coalition party Heritage has won the last two elections. With another election on the horizon, the Supermajority is in tight contention, and everything’s on the line.
With power comes corruption. For Ken, this is his chance to do right by the idealistic Policy1st party and get a steady job in the big leagues. For Domaine, the election represents another staging ground in his ongoing struggle against the pax democratica. For Mishima, a dangerous Information operative, the whole situation is a puzzle: how do you keep the wheels running on the biggest political experiment of all time, when so many have so much to gain?”
“Four months have passed since the shadow stone fell into Kell’s possession. Four months since his path crossed with Delilah Bard. Four months since Rhy was wounded and the Dane twins fell, and the stone was cast with Holland’s dying body through the rift, and into Black London.
In many ways, things have almost returned to normal, though Rhy is more sober, and Kell is now plagued by his guilt. Restless, and having given up smuggling, Kell is visited by dreams of ominous magical events, waking only to think of Lila, who disappeared from the docks like she always meant to do. As Red London finalizes preparations for the Element Games-an extravagant international competition of magic, meant to entertain and keep healthy the ties between neighboring countries-a certain pirate ship draws closer, carrying old friends back into port.”
“Gov-corp detective Carlos Moreno was only a baby when Atlas left Earth to seek truth among the stars. But in that moment, the course of Carlos’s entire life changed. Atlas is what took his mother away; what made his father lose hope; what led Alejandro Casales, leader of the religious cult known as the Circle, to his door. And now, on the eve of the fortieth anniversary of Atlas’s departure, it’s got something to do why Casales was found dead in his hotel room—and why Carlos is the man in charge of the investigation.
To figure out who killed one of the most powerful men on Earth, Carlos is supposed to put aside his personal history. But the deeper he delves into the case, the more he realizes that escaping the past is not so easy. There’s more to Casales’s death than meets the eye, and something much more sinister to the legacy of Atlas than anyone realizes…”
““Are you happy with your life?”
Those are the last words Jason Dessen hears before the masked abductor knocks him unconscious.
Before he awakens to find himself strapped to a gurney, surrounded by strangers in hazmat suits.
Before a man Jason’s never met smiles down at him and says, “Welcome back, my friend.”
In this world he’s woken up to, Jason’s life is not the one he knows. His wife is not his wife. His son was never born. And Jason is not an ordinary college physics professor, but a celebrated genius who has achieved something remarkable. Something impossible.”
“To win an impossible war Captain Kel Cheris must awaken an ancient weapon and a despised traitor general.
Captain Kel Cheris of the hexarchate is disgraced for using unconventional methods in a battle against heretics. Kel Command gives her the opportunity to redeem herself by retaking the Fortress of Scattered Needles, a star fortress that has recently been captured by heretics. Cheris’s career isn’t the only thing at stake. If the fortress falls, the hexarchate itself might be next.”
“A girl named Rose is riding her new bike near her home in Deadwood, South Dakota, when she falls through the earth. She wakes up at the bottom of a square hole, its walls glowing with intricate carvings. But the firemen who come to save her peer down upon something even stranger: a little girl in the palm of a giant metal hand.
Seventeen years later, the mystery of the bizarre artifact remains unsolved—its origins, architects, and purpose unknown. Its carbon dating defies belief; military reports are redacted; theories are floated, then rejected.
But some can never stop searching for answers.”
“The fireman is coming. Stay cool.
No one knows exactly when it began or where it originated. A terrifying new plague is spreading like wildfire across the country, striking cities one by one: Boston, Detroit, Seattle. The doctors call it Draco Incendia Trychophyton. To everyone else it’s Dragonscale, a highly contagious, deadly spore that marks its hosts with beautiful black and gold marks across their bodies—before causing them to burst into flames. Millions are infected; blazes erupt everywhere. There is no antidote. No one is safe.
Harper Grayson, a compassionate, dedicated nurse as pragmatic as Mary Poppins, treated hundreds of infected patients before her hospital burned to the ground. Now she’s discovered the telltale gold-flecked marks on her skin. When the outbreak first began, she and her husband, Jakob, had made a pact: they would take matters into their own hands if they became infected. To Jakob’s dismay, Harper wants to live—at least until the fetus she is carrying comes to term. At the hospital, she witnessed infected mothers give birth to healthy babies and believes hers will be fine too. . . if she can live long enough to deliver the child.”
“This is the way the world ends, for the last time.
The season of endings grows darker, as civilization fades into the long cold night.
Essun — once Damaya, once Syenite, now avenger — has found shelter, but not her daughter. Instead there is Alabaster Tenring, destroyer of the world, with a request. But if Essun does what he asks, it would seal the fate of the Stillness forever.
Far away, her daughter Nassun is growing in power – and her choices will break the world.”
“With The Three-Body Problem, English-speaking readers got their first chance to experience the multiple-award-winning and bestselling Three-Body Trilogy by China’s most beloved science fiction author, Cixin Liu.
Now this epic trilogy concludes with the New York Times bestelling Death’s End. Half a century after the Doomsday Battle, the uneasy balance of Dark Forest Deterrence keeps the Trisolaran invaders at bay. Earth enjoys unprecedented prosperity due to the infusion of Trisolaran knowledge. With human science advancing daily and the Trisolarans adopting Earth culture, it seems that the two civilizations will soon be able to co-exist peacefully as equals without the terrible threat of mutually assured annihilation. But the peace has also made humanity complacent.”
“Childhood friends Patricia Delfine and Laurence Armstead didn’t expect to see each other again, after parting ways under mysterious circumstances during middle school. After all, the development of magical powers and the invention of a two-second time machine could hardly fail to alarm one’s peers and families.
But now they’re both adults, living in the hipster mecca San Francisco, and the planet is falling apart around them. Laurence is an engineering genius who’s working with a group that aims to avert catastrophic breakdown through technological intervention. Patricia is a graduate of Eltisley Maze, the hidden academy for the world’s magically gifted, and works with a small band of other magicians to secretly repair the world’s every-growing ailments. Little do they realize that something bigger than either of them, something begun years ago in their youth, is determined to bring them together―to either save the world, or plunge it into a new dark ages.”
| # | Books | Authors | Lists |
| (All Appear On 2 Lists Each) | |||
| 42 | A Head Full of Ghosts | Paul Tremblay | SFFWorld |
| SciFiNow | |||
| 43 | A Night Without Stars | Peter F. Hamilton | Kirkus |
| Forbidden Planet | |||
| 44 | A Taste of Honey | Kai Ashante Wilson | Barnes & Noble |
| Tor | |||
| 45 | Admiral | Sean Danker | The Biblio Sanctum |
| The BiblioSanctum | |||
| 46 | An Accident of Stars | Foz Meadows | Tor |
| Bibliotropic | |||
| 47 | Azanian Bridges | Nick Wood | The Guardian |
| Best Science Fiction Books | |||
| 48 | Babylon’s Ashes | James S.A. Corey | The Best Sci Fi Books |
| SFFWorld 2 | |||
| 49 | Bite | K.S. Merbeth | The Biblio Sanctum |
| The BiblioSanctum | |||
| 50 | Black Panther | Ta-Nehisi Coates | Tor |
| 51 | Cloudbound | Fran Wilde | The Best Sci Fi Books |
| Tor | |||
| 52 | Conspiracy of Ravens | Lila Bowen | Tor |
| SciFiNow | |||
| 53 | Creation Machine | Andrew Bannister | Forbidden Planet |
| SFFWorld 2 | |||
| 54 | False Hearts | Laura Lam | Forbidden Planet |
| Bookworm Blues | |||
| 55 | Gemina | Amie Kaufman and Jay Kristoff | The Biblio Sanctum |
| The BiblioSanctum | |||
| 56 | Gentleman Jole and the Red Queen | Lois McMaster Bujold | Barnes & Noble |
| SFFWorld 2 | |||
| 57 | Iraq + 100: Stories from a Century After the Invasion | The Guardian | |
| Tor | |||
| 58 | Kingfisher | Patricia A. McKillip | Kirkus |
| Publishers Weekly | |||
| 59 | Labyrinth Lost | Zoraida Córdova | Tor |
| NPR | |||
| 60 | League of Dragons | Naomi Novik | Best Fantasy Books |
| Booklist Online | |||
| 61 | Lovecraft Country | Matt Ruff | Tor |
| SciFiNow | |||
| 62 | Machinations | Hayley Stone | Amazon |
| Omnivoracious | |||
| 63 | Magic Binds | Ilona Andrews | Best Fantasy Books |
| Goodreads | |||
| 64 | Marked in Flesh | Anne Bishop | Best Fantasy Books |
| Goodreads | |||
| 65 | Mongrels | Stephen Graham Jones | Tor |
| SciFiNow | |||
| 66 | Queen of the Night | Alexander Chee | SFFWorld 2 |
| Tor | |||
| 67 | Saint’s Blood | Sebastien De Castell | Passionate Foodie |
| Best Fantasy Books | |||
| 68 | Star Wars: Bloodline | Claudia Gray | The Biblio Sanctum |
| The BiblioSanctum | |||
| 69 | Star Wars: Dark Disciple | Christie Golden | The Biblio Sanctum |
| The BiblioSanctum | |||
| 70 | The Bands of Mourning | Brandon Sanderson | Best Fantasy Books |
| Goodreads | |||
| 71 | The Blood Mirror | Brent Weeks | Barnes & Noble |
| Stevereads | |||
| 72 | The Burning Isle | Will Panzo | Amazon |
| Omnivoracious | |||
| 73 | The Devourers | Indra Das | Barnes & Noble |
| Washington Post | |||
| 74 | The Gradual | Christopher Priest | The Guardian |
| Best Science Fiction Books | |||
| 75 | The Last Days of Jack Sparks | Jason Arnopp | Bookworm Blues |
| SFFWorld | |||
| 76 | The Last Days of New Paris | China Mieville | Best Science Fiction Books |
| Stevereads | |||
| 77 | The Long Way to a Small, Angry Planet | Becky Chambers | Tor |
| SFFWorld 2 | |||
| 78 | The Medusa Chronicles | Stephen Baxter and Alasdair Reynolds | Tor |
| SciFiNow | |||
| 79 | The Nightmare Stacks | Charles Stross | Forbidden Planet |
| SFFWorld | |||
| 80 | The Power | Naomi Alderman | Tor |
| SciFiNow | |||
| 81 | The Raven King | Maggie Stiefvater | Best Fantasy Books |
| Tor | |||
| 82 | The Sunlight Pilgrims | Jenni Fagan | Tor |
| NPR | |||
| 83 | The Unfinished World | Amber Sparks | Washington Post |
| Tor | |||
| 84 | The Waking Fire | Anthony Ryan | Best Fantasy Books |
| Stevereads | |||
| 85 | The Wheel of Osheim | Mark Lawrence | Best Fantasy Books |
| Bookworm Blues | |||
| 86 | The Winged Histories | Sofia Samatar | Best Fantasy Books |
| NPR | |||
| 87 | Underground Airlines | Ben H. Winters | Goodreads 2 |
| The Verge | |||
| (All Appear On A Single List Each) | |||
| 88 | A Green and Ancient Light | Fredrick S. Durban | Bookworm Blues |
| 89 | A City Dreaming | Tor | |
| 90 | A Collapse Of Horses: A Collection Of Stories | Brian Evenson | NPR |
| 91 | A Conspiracy of Ravens | Lila Bowen | Barnes & Noble |
| 92 | A Murder in Time (Kendra Donovan, #1) | Julie McElwain | Goodreads 2 |
| 93 | A Promise Of Fire | Amanda Bouchet | NPR |
| 94 | A Tree or a Person or a Wall | Matt Bell | Tor |
| 95 | Alight | Scott Sigler | SFFWorld 2 |
| 96 | All Good Children | Dayna Ingram | Publishers Weekly |
| 97 | AND I DARKEN | KIERSTEN WHITE | SciFiNow |
| 98 | Arcadia | Iain Pears | Booklist Online |
| 99 | Armada | Ernest Cline | Booklist Online |
| 100 | Barsk: The Elephant’s Graveyard | Lawrence Schoen | Passionate Foodie |
| 101 | Beyond Redemption and The Mirror’s Truth | Michael Fletcher | Passionate Foodie |
| 102 | Binary Storm | Christopher Hinz | Passionate Foodie |
| 103 | Bloodline | Claudia Gray | Goodreads 2 |
| 104 | Bloodmage & Chaosmage | Stephen Aryan | SFFWorld |
| 105 | Certain Dark Things | Silvia Garcia-Moreno | NPR |
| 106 | Chains of the Heretic | Jeff Salyards | Best Fantasy Books |
| 107 | Children of the Dark | Jonathan Janz | Michael Patrick Hicks |
| 108 | Children Of The New World: Stories | Alexander Weinstein | NPR |
| 109 | Children of Time | Adrian Tchiakovsky | Barnes & Noble |
| 110 | Citizen of the Galaxy | Robert A Heinlein | SFFWorld 2 |
| 111 | Cold-Forged Flame | Marie Brennan | Tor |
| 112 | Crooked Kingdom | Leigh Bardugo | Best Fantasy Books |
| 113 | Dark Run | Mike Brooks | The Best Sci Fi Books |
| 114 | Deadlight Jack | Mark Onspaugh | Sci-Fi and Scary |
| 115 | Demon, Volume 1 | Jason Shiga | NPR |
| 116 | Drake | Peter McLean | Best Fantasy Books |
| 117 | End of Watch | Stephen King | SFFWorld |
| 118 | Escapology | Ren Warom | Barnes & Noble |
| 119 | Eternity’s Mind | Kevin J Anderson | SFFWorld 2 |
| 120 | Europe in Winter | Dave Hutchinson | Best Science Fiction Books |
| 121 | Every Anxious Wave | Mo Daviau | NPR |
| 122 | Faith Volume 1: Hollywood And Vine | Jody Houser, illustrated | NPR |
| 123 | Fear The Drowning Deep | Sarah Glenn Marsh | NPR |
| 124 | Fellside | M.R. Carey | NPR |
| 125 | Feverborn (Fever, #8) | Karen Marie Moning | Goodreads |
| 126 | Fire Touched (Mercy Thompson, #9) | Patricia Briggs | Goodreads |
| 127 | Fix | Ferrett Steinmetz | Bibliotropic |
| 128 | Foundation and Foundation and Empire | Isaac Asimov | SFFWorld 2 |
| 129 | Four Roads Cross | Max Gladstone | Barnes & Noble |
| 130 | Furnace and Other Stories | Livia Llewellyn | Tor |
| 131 | Ghostland | Colin Dickey | Tor |
| 132 | Good Morning Midnight | Lily Brooks-Dalton | Sci-Fi and Scary |
| 133 | Hag-seed | Margaret Atwood | Tor |
| 134 | Harmonic Resonance | Nico Laesser | Sci-Fi and Scary |
| 135 | Harry Potter and the Cursed Child – Parts One and Two (Harry Potter, #8) | J.K. Rowling | Goodreads |
| 136 | Heroine Complex | Sarah Kuhn | Barnes & Noble |
| 137 | Hex | The West | |
| 138 | Hope and Red | Jon Skovron | SFFWorld |
| 139 | HUNTERS AND COLLECTORS | M SUDDAIN | SciFiNow |
| 140 | I AM PROVIDENCE | NICK MAMATAS | The Verge |
| 141 | Icon | Genevieve Valentine | The Best Sci Fi Books |
| 142 | Invisible Planets | Ken Liu | Bibliotropic |
| 143 | Javelin Rain | Myke Cole | SFFWorld |
| 144 | Jerusalem | Alan Moore | NPR |
| 145 | Judenstaat | Simone Zelitch | Barnes & Noble |
| 146 | Kings Rising | The West | |
| 147 | Lies, Damned Lies, and History (The Chronicles of St Mary’s, #7) | Jodi Taylor | Goodreads 2 |
| 148 | Lights Out | Nate Southard | Michael Patrick Hicks |
| 149 | Livia Lone | Barry Eisler | Michael Patrick Hicks |
| 150 | Los Nefilim | Teresa Frohock | Passionate Foodie |
| 151 | Malafrena | Ursula Le Guin | Tor |
| 152 | MASTERS’ MYSTERIUM: LAS VEGAS | R.R. Reynolds | Huffington Post |
| 153 | Mechanical Failure | Joe Zieja | Barnes & Noble |
| 154 | Monstress: Vol. 1 | Marjorie Liu | MPR News |
| 155 | MY BEST FRIEND’S EXORCISM | GRADY HENDRIX | SciFiNow |
| 156 | Necessity: A Novel | Jo Walton | NPR |
| 157 | Necrotech | K.C. Alexander | Passionate Foodie |
| 158 | Night of the Animals | Bill Broun | Stevereads |
| 159 | Night Without Stars | Peter F Hamilton (See: told you so! MarkY) | SFFWorld 2 |
| 160 | NOD | ADRIAN BARNES | SciFiNow |
| 161 | Northwoods | Bill Schweigart | Sci-Fi and Scary |
| 162 | NOT SO MUCH, SAID THE CAT | Michael Swanwick | Kirkus |
| 163 | Occupy Me | Tricia | Forbidden Planet |
| 164 | Odd Man Out | James Newman | Michael Patrick Hicks |
| 165 | ODY-C: Cycle One | Matt Fraction, illustrated | NPR |
| 166 | On the Edge of Gone | Corinne Duyvis | Sci-Fi and Scary |
| 167 | Patience | Daniel Clowes | NPR |
| 168 | PHILOMENA | Mark Guiney | Huffington Post |
| 169 | Pirate Utopia | Bruce Sterling | Best Science Fiction Books |
| 170 | Planetfall | Emma Newman | Bibliotropic |
| 171 | Plutona | Emi Lenox and Jeff Lemire, illustrated | NPR |
| 172 | Pretty Deadly Volume 2: The Bear | Kelly Sue DeConnick, illustrated | NPR |
| 173 | Red Right Hand | Levi Black | Passionate Foodie |
| 174 | Regeneration | Stephanie Saulter | Bibliotropic |
| 175 | Roses and Rot | Kat Howard | Barnes & Noble |
| 176 | RUN RAGGED | Kari Aguila | Huffington Post |
| 177 | Savages | Greg F. Gifune | Michael Patrick Hicks |
| 178 | SERVANT OF DARKNESS, SERVANT OF LIES and SERVANT OF FIRE | Simon J Cambridge | Huffington Post |
| 179 | SHRIVERS | Jeb Kinnison | Huffington Post |
| 180 | Sisters of Tomorrow edited | Lisa Yaszek & Patrick B. Sharp | Best Science Fiction Books |
| 181 | Skinner Luce | Patricia Ward | Amazon |
| 182 | SLIPPING | LAUREN BEUKES | SciFiNow |
| 183 | Smoke: A Novel | Dan Vyleta | NPR |
| 184 | Sorcerer to the Crown | Zen Cho | The Guardian |
| 185 | Star Nomad: Fallen Empire, Book 1 | Lindsay Buroker | Amazon |
| 186 | Stiletto | Daniel O’Malley | Bookworm Blues |
| 187 | Strike | Delilah S. Dawson | SFFWorld 2 |
| 188 | Summerlong | Peter S. Beagle | Barnes & Noble |
| 189 | SUPERNOVA | C.A. Higgins | Kirkus |
| 190 | Survival Game | Gary Gibson | SFFWorld 2 |
| 191 | The Bird and the Sword | Amy Harmon | Goodreads |
| 192 | The Bloodsworn | Erin Lindsey | Tor |
| 193 | The Chimes | Anna Smaill | Bibliotropic |
| 194 | The City of Mirrors | Justin Cronin | Best Fantasy Books |
| 195 | The Complex | Brian Keene | Michael Patrick Hicks |
| 196 | The Copper Promise | Jen Williams | Tor |
| 197 | The Corporation Wars: Dissidence | Ken MacLeod | SFFWorld 2 |
| 198 | The Curse of Tenth Grave (Charley Davidson #10) | Darynda Jones | Goodreads |
| 199 | The Dark Days Club | Alison Goodman | NPR |
| 200 | THE DARKEST SIDE OF SATURN | Tony Taylor | Huffington Post |
| 201 | The Demonists | Thomas Sniegoski | Sci-Fi and Scary |
| 202 | The Devil You Know | K.J. Parker | Bookworm Blues |
| 203 | The Diabolic | S. J. Kincaid | Amazon |
| 204 | The Dream-Quest Of Vellitt Boe | Kij Johnson | NPR |
| 205 | The Familiar, Volume 3: Honeysuckle & Pain | Mark Z. Danielewski | NPR |
| 206 | The Fate of the Tearling | Erika Johansen | Best Fantasy Books |
| 207 | THE FIFTH SEASON | NK JEMISIN | SciFiNow |
| 208 | The Fisherman | John Langan | Tor |
| 209 | The Forgetting Moon | Brian Lee Durfee | Bookworm Blues |
| 210 | The Geek Feminist Revolution | Kameron Hurley | Bibliotropic |
| 211 | The Girl From Everywhere | Heidi Heilig | NPR |
| 212 | The Guns of Empire | Django Wexler | Tor |
| 213 | The Hatching | Ezekiel Boone | SFFWorld |
| 214 | The Island Will Sink | The West | |
| 215 | The Last Adventure of Constance Verity | A. Lee Martinez | Booklist Online |
| 216 | The Last Days of Magic | Mark Tompkins | Bookworm Blues |
| 217 | The Last One | Alexandra Oliva | Goodreads 2 |
| 218 | The Liberation | Ian Tregillis | Tor |
| 219 | The Library at Mount Char | Scott Hawkins | Booklist Online |
| 220 | The Lie Tree | Frances Hardinge | NPR |
| 221 | The Long Cosmos (The Long Earth, #5) | Terry Pratchett | Goodreads 2 |
| 222 | The Lost Time Accidents: A Novel | John Wray | NPR |
| 223 | The Lyre Thief | Jennifer Fallon | Stevereads |
| 224 | The Nature of a Pirate | A M Dellamonica | Bibliotropic |
| 225 | THE PRELAPSARIANS | John Gaiserich | Huffington Post |
| 226 | The Reader | Traci Chee | NPR |
| 227 | The Regional Office Is Under Attack!: A Novel | Manuel Gonzales | NPR |
| 228 | The Rogue Retrieval | Dan Koboldt | SFFWorld |
| 229 | The Second Death | T Frohock | Bibliotropic |
| 230 | THE SECRET HISTORY OF TWIN PEAKS | MARK FROST | SciFiNow |
| 231 | THE SHADOW OF WHAT WAS LOST | JAY ISLINGTON | SciFiNow |
| 232 | THE SILVER TIDE | JEN WILLIAMS | SciFiNow |
| 233 | The Singing Bones | Shaun Tan | NPR |
| 234 | The Spider’s War | Daniel Abraham | Best Fantasy Books |
| 235 | The Story Of Hong Gildong | edited and translated | NPR |
| 236 | THE TIGER AND THE WOLF | ADRIAN TCHAIKOVSKY | SciFiNow |
| 237 | The Underground Railroad | Colson Whitehead | Best Science Fiction Books |
| 238 | The Vagrant | Peter Newman | Barnes & Noble |
| 239 | The War of the Worlds | HG Wells | SFFWorld 2 |
| 240 | The Wicked + The Divine | Gillen and McKelvie | Tor |
| 241 | THIN AIR | MICHELLE PAVER | SciFiNow |
| 242 | Things From The Flood | Simon Stålenhag | NPR |
| 243 | This Census-Taker | China Miéville | NPR |
| 244 | This Savage Song | Victoria Schwab | Tor |
| 245 | Those Below | Daniel Polansky | Best Fantasy Books |
| 246 | VERSAILLES | YANNICK HILL | SciFiNow |
| 247 | Veterans’ Affairs | Joseph Hirsch | Sci-Fi and Scary |
| 248 | Vicky Peterwald: Rebel | Mike Shepherd | The Best Sci Fi Books |
| 249 | War Factory | Neal Asher | SFFWorld 2 |
| 250 | We Are Legion (We Are Bob) | Dennis E. Taylor | Sci-Fi and Scary |
| 251 | What Is Not Yours Is Not Yours | Helen Oyeyemi | Tor |
| 252 | When The Sea Turned To Silver | Grace Lin | NPR |
| 253 | Who’s Afraid | The West | |
| 254 | Wicked Weeds | Pedro Cabiya | Tor |
| Source | Article |
| Amazon | Best science fiction and fantasy of 2016 |
| Barnes & Noble | The Best Science Fiction & Fantasy of 2016 |
| Best Fantasy Books | 23 Best Fantasy Books of 2016 |
| Best Science Fiction Books | THE 15 MUST-HAVE SCIENCE FICTION BOOKS FOR CHRISTMAS 2016 |
| Bibliotropic | Top 11 Books I Read in 2016 |
| Booklist Online | Top 10 SF/Fantasy: 2016 |
| Bookriot | HERE YOU HAVE IT! BOOK RIOT’S FAVORITE BOOKS OF 2016. |
| Bookworm Blues | The Annual Epic Best Books of 2016 List You Can’t Miss! |
| Forbidden Planet | Our Top 10 Books for 2016 |
| Goodreads | BEST FANTASY |
| Goodreads 2 | BEST SCIENCE FICTION |
| Huffington Post | The Best Self-Published Books of 2016 |
| Kirkus | Best Science Fiction and Fantasy of 2016 |
| Michael Patrick Hicks | BEST BOOKS OF 2016 |
| MPR News | Best books of 2016 to give — and receive: Sci-fi and fantasy |
| NPR | NPR’s Book Concierge Our Guide To 2016’s Great Reads |
| Omnivoracious | The Best Science Fiction and Fantasy of 2016 |
| Passionate Foodie | My Favorite Fiction of 2016, From Novels to Anthologies |
| Publishers Weekly | Best SF/Fantasy/Horror |
| Sci-Fi and Scary | Best Sci-Fi & Scary Novels of 2016 |
| SciFiNow | 25 BOOKS YOU SHOULD HAVE READ IN 2016 |
| SFFWorld | SFFWorld Review of the Year 2016: Part 1 – Fantasy |
| SFFWorld 2 | SFFWorld Review of the Year 2016: Part 2 – Science Fiction |
| Stevereads | Best Books of 2016 – SFF! |
| The Best Sci Fi Books | 19 Best Science Fiction Books of 2016 |
| The Biblio Sanctum | Top 10 Tuesday |
| The BiblioSanctum | #RRSciFiMonth: Mogsy’s Top 10 Sci-Fi Reads of 2016 |
| The Guardian | The best SF and fantasy books of 2016 |
| The Verge | The 11 best science fiction and fantasy novels of 2016 |
| The West | My top 5 sci-fi and fantasy books for 2016 |
| Tor | Tor.com Reviewers’ Choice: The Best Books of 2016 |
| Washington Post | Best science fiction and fantasy of 2016 |
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