The end of the year is fast approaching – how quickly has this year gone by? – so I thought I would take a look through the best science fiction books of 2017, as voted by readers on Goodreads. Now we were never going to have read many of these, as over half of them are later books in series, but I was shocked to find we have read exactly none of the books that made it in to the top science fiction books of 2017.
11. For We Are Many (Bobiverse #2)
Dennis E Taylor
10. And the Rest is History (The Chronicles of St Mary’s #8)
Jodi Taylor
9. The Collapsing Empire (The Interdependency #1)
John Scalzi
Elan Mastai
7. Babylon’s Ashes (The Expanse #6)
James S.A. Corey
6. Borne
Jeff Vandermeer
Nnedi Okorafor
4. American War
Omar El Akkad
3. Thrawn (Star Wars Disney Canon Novel)
Timothy Zhan
2. Waking Gods (Themis Files #2)
Sylvain Neuvel
1. Artemis
Andy Weir
There’s been such a buzz about Artemis, so I’m keen to check it out, maybe even read it over the Christmas break. I’ve also just seen on Twitter that some of John Scalzi’s work is being turned into a Netflix Original, so that’s piqued my interest as well. Most of the others on this list I’m not so familiar with so I’ll be keeping any eye out for reviews.
You can check out the full list here.
Navigating Worlds 
I have read six of these, including your top three which I agree were all great reads!
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6, that’s pretty good! Mr NW has me reading stuff from 1953. Maybe I’ll get to 2017 sometime in the next decade hahaha.
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Artemis is even worse than the martian…and I thought it wouldn’t be possible. Kudos to the publishers…
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The reviews coming back on Artemis seem to be a mix of people who hated the book and those who loved it. Seems to be quite polarising. I kind of want to read it now to find out which group I’m in.
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Can’t wait to read your review. If this the path sf is taking I don’t want any part in it. I’m only sorry people will take it as an example of good sf. Rant over.
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I’ve only read Borne (I don’t read as much science fiction as I would like to) and the longer I think about the more impressed I am.
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Gotta point out that being the top voted book at GR just means it’s popular, not actually a good book. And that there is a much bigger world than GR.
But I’ve made my GR stance pretty clear, so I’ll leave it at that 🙂
I haven’t read any of them either. I’m usually a year or 3 behind, so as to let a series wrapup before actually starting it though, so that’s not unusual. Looking over them, the only one that I have on my tbr is the Bobiverse one. The rest, they don’t really interest me so I doubt I’ll ever be reading them.
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Haha yeah a bit of laziness on my part as it was the easiest list to track down. Probably volume of sales or something else is a better metric but a lot of that data is behind paywalls.
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Don’t take it personally. I never pass up a chance to bash GR 🙂
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Artemis is definitely on my to-read list. I’m about three quarters of the way through Thrawn right now and really enjoying it. Nobody does Star Wars like Zahn.
A lot of these I haven’t even heard of… Need to check them out!
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Artemis was incredibly disappointing.
Babylon’s Ashes was fantastic and I’m super excited to read Persepolis Rising!
I haven’t read any of the others, but I will be checking them out eventually.
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I read the first book before Waking Gods… It was okay but I don’t know if I was planning on reading book 2. Artemis is in my tbr but I’ve heard it was nothing like the Martian so I haven’t been prioritizing it.
I have not read or even heard of any of the others and I am wondering if I should have!
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I was surprised too that there were quite a few on there I hadn’t come across at all before.
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I’m not surprised I didn’t know… I always seem to be behind the times!!
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Hi Mr & Mrs NW, Woohoo! I have actually read one of these books and I bet you can guess which one it is! Yes, I have read Thrawn and at first I was slightly disappointed but I think that it may be down to just me, not the book. I thought the story felt as if it “ran on rails” and the outcome was inevitable, everything just seemed too convenient and allowed Thrawn to progress through it. I did read this book in isolation from other materials so maybe I was missing relevant information to fully appreciate the book.
I have since read up more on the surrounding story and I reassessed my initial thoughts. But I wouldn’t recommend it as your first Star Wars novel.
I have read other books like Karen Traviss’ “No Prisoners” and Greg Bears’ “Rogue Planet” which felt more of an experience. Thanks for the chart rundown!
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I never would have guessed! 🤣 It’s hard if you need to know the back story to fully appreciate it.
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Great post! I’ve been wanting to get into sci-fi lately so I’ll definitely check some of these out. I recently read Waking Gods and I absolutely loved it! One of the best I’ve read this year! And I’m so looking forward to Artemis!
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Thanks. Sounds like you’ve already made a pretty good start into sci-fi!
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Havent heard about any of these. Appart from artemis
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I don’t read much sci-fi, but I did read Borne and really enjoyed it. On my favorite books of the year for sure!
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That’s good to know. I’ve been looking for sci-fi books that have wider appeal. I’ve got a bit stuck on some of the heavier stuff.
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I’ve heard such good things about the Themis files, really want to read it. And I really enjoyed Artemis 🙂
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Just dug this out of the spam box – did you get hit by the same glitch as Bookstooge?
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Oh thanks- yeah, I did, Akismet fixed it, but they couldn’t save all the comments that were already spammed- thanks for rescuing me! 🙂
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Great list! the Binti books are fantastic, and I’m eagerly awaiting Borne to be available in paperback.
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I hadn’t heard some of these books on this list. I need to get out more 😂 Artemis sounds like a good book to read. Good blog by the way going to write these down so I don’t forget them 😁
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