HACKER Q&A
📣 notomorrow

What are your favorite (sort) sci-fi stories with twists?


I am compiling short sci-fi stories to read for the next 4 months. Any recommendation?


  👤 denton-scratch Accepted Answer ✓
I think all the short stories in Ray Bradbury's collection "The Illustrated Man" have twists. Strong recommend, if you've never read it.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Illustrated_Man

The Sentinel, by Arthur C. Clarke, certainly has a twist. But it doesn't come as a surprise nowadays, because everyone's seen 2001.

Hmmm. Many of Kurt Vonnegut's stories have astonishing twists, but I can't think of any that are short (although I guess most of the early ones were initially magazine serials).




👤 MilnerRoute
William Gibson's "Burning Chrome".

(Provided the rough skeleton for the movie "Johnny Mnemonic".) Appears in a collection of Gibson stories also titled Burning Chrome.


👤 IronWolve
Older stuff, Man-Kzin Wars, Stainless Steel Rat

Newer stuff, We Are Bob, Undying Mercenaries. Expeditionary Force, Old Man Wars

Risky Stuff, Forbidden Thoughts

All kinds of twists in the stories.


👤 mathematically
Emergency Skin - N. K. Jemisin

👤 andrei_says_
8 o’clock in the morning is great.