I was having a conversation-by-post with another science fiction romance (SFR) author, Pauline Baird Jones, and we agreed we're readers as well as writers, and like to recommend books to our friends. I especially like recommending SFR books to my friends because I'd like our relatively new little corner of the genre universe to take over the galaxy. Consider this my part in supporting the rebel alliance.
Recommended Reading in Science Fiction Romance
Misa Buckley‘s Tin Cat features a paraplegic heroine who encounters an android cat and two time-traveling men, one of whom wants to kill her, and the other to love her. My favorite part of the book is the hero's willingness to accept that the heroine doesn't need “fixing.” Ignore the cover that implies it's a light-hearted comedy, because it's much better than that. Several of Misa's other stories also deal with accepting people as they are, a message I appreciate.
Ruby Lionsdrake writes the Mandrake Company series, starting with Mercenary Instinct, which is currently free on Amazon. “Ruby” is the pen name of successful indie fantasy author Lindsay Buroker. The Mandrake series is space opera and romance, with action and humor that Buroker perfected in her Emporer's Edge universe. My favorite of the series so far is The Assassin's Salvation, mostly for the hero, who's managed to overcome a fairly horrific past. “Ruby” is starting a new SFR dystopian series, which should be out in March.
While I'm thinking about series, I'll mention CE Kilgore‘s Corwint series, starting with Ghost in the Machine. I love the concept of the mechas, a series of service androids made self-determining and emotional by their interaction with an alien race, and by a conspiracy of humans who believe mechas deserve their own destiny. The whole series is addicting.
Nalini Singh‘s Psy-Changeling series is a best-seller, and with good reason. Singh bills herself as a paranormal romance author, but the Psy-Changeling series is a nice mashup of alternate history, shifters, and science fiction, plus hot romance. My all-time favorite in the series is Heart of Obsidian, a book I read twice in succession because it was so thoroughly captivating that I wanted to see how she did it.
Even within the SFR genre, there are sub-genres: space opera, dystopian, etc. C.E. Kilgore has a nice list of them at her SFR Station site, where you can find a treasure trove of new books to read, including steampunk.
It's embarrassing how many books I have in my virtual TBR pile on my Kindle, so once I wade through some of them, I'll probably be writing another “you gotta read this” post in the future. UPDATE: OK, maybe it'll just say “recommended,” because I get a little contrary when people tell me I “gotta” do anything.
If you read science fiction romance, what are some of your favorites?
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Thanks for the mention, Carol! 🙂
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My pleasure, since you… uh, Ruby writes books I love to read.
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Thanks for the recommendations! I agree with you on “Assassin’s Salvation.” If the other authors are anywhere near as good, i’ll be set for whole hours of time ….
(I left a review for Overload Flux on Amazon, under the nom de net of Gretchen. Something I forgot to mention is that your editor/copyeditor is amazing. I found two typos: an extra space before a period and a misplaced apostrophe. What can I say? I read better than I type. It’s a gift. Maybe a curse. Overall, thanks for a great read! I plan to pre-order the next.)
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Gwendolyn, thanks for stopping by, and especially thanks for the review. And I agree, my copy editor, Shelley Holloway, is amazing. If you’d be so kind, and if you can remember where it is, tell me where the misplaced apostrophe is, so I can fix it when I upload a new version that has an excerpt of the next book.
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Oh, heavens. It’s pretty subtle; most folks wouldn’t notice! I only mentioned it because it surprised me, so I think it’s in the latter half. The characters are talking about the difference between one month’s [x] and three or four month’s (sic) [x]. I think the whole ship’s cast is there, so it’s before the sabotage.
I’ll bookmark it next time. 🙂
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Gwendolyn, thanks — I’ll make sure to search for it. I found another earlier, where I’d said “hat” instead of “that,” making one wonder what an “entry lock hat” looked like. 😉