Science fiction can get really screwed up sometimes. Of course, there’s always a place in the genre for optimistic visions of the future, but stories about the future often do a lot to explore our current anxieties regarding where we’re heading, and even in stories which are not primarily about examining a screwed up society, they often show us an image of where we’re afraid we’re going. In addition, because sci-fi stories often take place on a larger scale than real history, the atrocities sometimes committed in those stories outclass anything that could happen in real life.
We’re here today to explore the darker side of this genre, and take a look at a bunch of stories that considerstories full of war and murderwhose plots, and, usually, settings, are dark and brutal.
Dune
A novel of grand scope
One of the most popular sci-fi novels of all time, and a major reason why so many space opera stories have archaic social orders, Dune is a series of human rights violations organized into a story.
Duneis one of the greatest and most popular science fiction works of all time. It’s a brutal story, about inevitable doom and horrible atrocities. The setting it takes place in starts out objectionable, and gets worse and worse the more you read, or think, about it. Just enjoy this book’s happy ending, because there’s not going to be a ton more of thosethroughout the rest of the series.
Do Androids Dream Of Electric Sheep?
The original cyberpunk dystopia
As its cover is eager to point out, Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? is a classic sci-fi novel that served as the basis for the Blade Runner film and its associated franchise.
This classic sci-fi novel by Philip K. Dick is the basis for the Blade Runner franchise, and, in being so, is the inspiration formuch of the cyberpunk genre. As those familiar with the genre will be able to guess, this means it’s incredibly screwed up.
What makes this novel so disturbing is its moral ambiguity. The crimes committed against the androids of this novel are disturbing, but so is the genuine danger they present. Where other dark stories allow you to take the relatively comfortable position of judging everyone as evil, this one doesn’t give you any way to rest easy.
The Andromeda Strain
Edge of your seat the whole way through
From the author of Jarrasic Park comes a distressingly relatable thriller about a deadly extraterrestrial plague that threatens all life on earth, and the scientists scrambling to get it under control.
From Michael Chriton, the author of Jurrasic Park and general master of thrillers, comes a story about a plague of extraterrestrial origin and the scientists fighting to keep it from consuming the earth. For no particular reason, we will point out that it was published in 1969.
In all seriousness, this novel is full of tension and interesting sci-fi moments. This book takes place in the real world, rather than a hypothetical darker one, but it’s still pretty bleak throughout most of it, with tons of death and disease.
Oryx And Crake
An excellent read
From the author of the all-time great The Handmaid’s Tale comes the first part of a dystopian trilogy with much more overt sci-fi trappings, but missing none of the wisdom and reflection.
Margaret Atwood is one of the best writers currently alive. She’s best known for the all-time great novel The Handmaid’s Tale, a story which nearly made this list. The reason we ultimately held back on including it is that, though it is a very dark novel, and technically a work of science fiction, it doesn’t get its darkness from its sci-fi elements. The horrifying things in that book are the realistic parts.
This novel does more with its sci-fi elements. While social injustice is still a core element of what’s wrong in this society, the specific form that it takes is grounded in technology, which makes the book feel more genre and suited to this list.
Six Wakes
You will at times find yourself wondering who, precisely, dunnit
This thrilling sci-fi mystery about dead clones and their successors struggling to survive carries an energy almost reminiscent of the alien franchise, making an Among Us scenario brutally real.
There are a lot of thrillers on this list. It’s only natural that stories about creating tension would be the ones dealing with dark subject matter. Still, there’s more that’s screwed up about this novel than the murder. While the horrific deaths of these characters thatspur this story’s mysteryare not a part of the plan, these clones' lives were never all that precious, which is why they have such a difficult time struggling to survive.
Dead Silence
An old nightmare that has not ended
The story of a group of spacefarers investigating a wrecked spaceship, Dead Silence is essentially the sci-fi equivalent of a haunted house story, complete with the horror, both past and present, that that calls for.
Another top-tier sci-fi thriller, and the newest book on our list, this novel by S. A Barnes, who’s done a good job of late making a name for herself in sci-fi horror, concerns the investigation of an abandoned spaceship. In many ways, this story is the sci-fi equivalent of a haunted house novel. That’s not to say it concerns literal ghosts (though maybe it does, you’ll have to read the book) but rather that it carries the same spirit, dealing with past horrors and their remnants.
Annihilation: A Novel
A total mindscrew
This horrifying, mind-bending nightmare of a book concerns the exploration of a stretch of land in California that has gone deeply, deeply wrong, reclaimed by both nature and the bizarre contaminant that ruined it.
Reminiscent of H. P. Lovecraft’s The Color Out of Space, this strange nightmare of a novel is the beginning of a trilogy about the poor fools who must explore a stretch of land that has gone wrong in a very strange way. Area X is a fascinating and deeply horrifying place.
Horror usually comes from the unknown, and there are certainly elements of that here, but what’s so impressive about this series is how the answers to its mysteries really are worse and more horrific than ignorance could ever be. Terrible truths lurk in these novels.
Parable of the Sower & Parable of the Talents Boxed Set
The best novels, period
This post-apocalyptic duology from Octavia Butler consists of perhaps the best two novels ever written, impossibly rich in setting, character, plot, and philosophy, packaged together here for your enjoyment.
Possibly the best two novels ever written, the two parts of the Earthseed Duology are amazingly rich with just about everything you could want from a novel. Their dystopian setting is amazingly fleshed out. They are full of tension. They are emotionally engrossing. They are utterly fascinating.
Parable of the Sower has three or four elements that each could’ve carried a novel on its own, and while other novels would get bogged down by having that much going on, everything about these stories is executed perfectly. The religion the main character founds is fascinating. So is her disability. So is the world she finds herself in.
The second novel, Parable of the Talents, is somehow even better. It takes everything that was great about the first novel and improves it by heightening the moral ambiguity. Where the first novel makes you fall in love with the protagonist and her philosophy, the sequel will have you questioning whether she was ever even a good person.
FAQ
What science fiction has predicted the future?
No single work of science fiction has ever perfectly predicted the future, and no good work of science fiction has ever set out to do so. Sci-fi novels that people regard as prophetic are reminiscent of the future in a variety of ways, but they never get things just right, or even come all that close. When sci-fi visions of the future wind up feeling accurate in retrospect, it’s usually because they were inspired by elements of the then-present and past that happened to recur later in history.
Does science fiction have to be futuristic?
No. Science Fiction, by definition, deals with speculative elements that are not a part of the current world we all live in, but which do not contradict the world as we understand it so completely that it’s fully impossible that they could one day be real. The passage of time, and advancement of technology, is the most common way for new things to become possible, so it’s convenient and believable to set stories about technology we don’t currently have in the future, but there are other ways of introducing those elements, and many sci-fi stories take place in our present or past, or in other worlds altogether.
Who is considered the first science fiction author?
Mary Shelly, the author of Frankenstein, was probably the first sci-fi author, though the fact that there is not, and never will be, a clear-cut line between science fiction and adjacent genres means it will never be possible to say for sure.
