I’ve been reading a lot of non-fiction and theory recently and was looking for a break.
I’ve read a lot of Ursula K. le Guin but don’t really know any other leftist fiction writers so any recommendations are welcome.
I'd highly recommend Iain M. Banks' Culture series. Sci-Fi with a fairly clear leftist bent, it rules.
I'll second this, and add that The Player of Games is probably the best one to start on. They don't need to be read in any particular order.
Cory Doctorow's Walkaway
The Three Body Problem trilogy by Liu Cixin
Oh yeah I love Cory Doctorow, I read 'Pirate Cinema' when I was a teen and it really pushed me to learn more about copyright law and his recent story collection 'Radicalized' was really good.
And I've been meaning to read 'The Three Body Problem' so I'll look into that one.
I'll add a voucher point or whatever for the Three Body Problem. The author obviously doesn't give a shit about women, which becomes apparent in the second book which manages to be EVEN BETTER than the first one. Wholly recommend the first and second, I haven't read the third book in the trilogy yet but I hear its just as good :)
Have you read anything by Kim Stanley Robinson? The Years of Rice and Salt is good, and the Mars trilogy is a classic
I've always seen his books at the library but never read them for some reason, I looked up the Mars trilogy and saw people compare it to The Dispossessed so I'm definitely checking them out now.
The Mars trilogy is great. He spends a little too much time describing the geography of Mars but it's still a good read.
China Mieville is absolutely a comrade, but I find his books very hit or miss. For what it's worth, "Kraken" is amazing and I absolutely recommend it.
I only tried The City and The City which everyone told me was fucking amazing, and it fucking sucked.
It's not that explicitly leftist, but Red Rising is essentially like "what if hunger games + Spartacus in space". It's good too! Lots of fun politics later on if that's your thing, plenty of violence against evil motherfuckers, and also good, righteous rage at the ruling class.
The Water Knife by Paolo Bacigalupi. It's set in the near future where climate change has caused massive droughts in the Southwest US and Las Vegas is a powerful city-state fighting a covert war against Phoenix for water rights.
The Parable of the Sower by Octavia E. Butler. One of the saddest books I've ever read. It's about a black teenage girl growing up in Southern California as the United States collapses and a right-wing Christian theocracy takes over. She invents a new religion and starts to build a community with other survivors.
Singularity Sky by Charles Stross. It's partially a retelling of the October Revolution, but with post-singularity space colonies. The story is fun and goofy and weird.
Ubik by Philip K. Dick. Great satire of a future capitalist hell where everything is coin operated, including your shower, appliances and doors.
Asimov's Foundation series is pretty great and the whole premise of psychohistory is just historical materialism with sci-fi characteristics.
I would argue that his view of history is that it is materialist rather than idealistic, but it certainly isn't a Marxist conception of historical materialism in any way. While one could probably develop a left wing ideology using some of Asimov's ideas about history, I would in no way put him on the left (eg he was a Malthusian). Still an exceptional series though.
An interesting bit of trivia is that the CPUSA had Asimov flagged as public figure that would be "amendable to its goals," which prompted the FBI to spy on him to see if he was a soviet spy ( source from wikipedia)
I've heard the Illuminatus! trilogy is at least vaguely left and have a physical copy next to my bed that I keep meaning to read as a way to get back into fiction reading.
I gave up about halfway through because the story was so incoherent. Maybe I'm just dumb but it felt like dream logic.
If you like that sort of thing, check out Someone Comes to Town, Someone Leaves Town by Cory Doctorow. The main character's father is a mountain and his mother is a washing machine, and his brothers fit together like matryoshka dolls. It makes no goddamn sense and reminds me of the stuff I was forced to read and "analyze" for deeper meaning in high school english class. Doctorow is reading the whole thing on his podcast right now.
