Could you recommend scifi for a 13 year old?

Ender's Game, by Orson Scott Card. When I was his age, it was revolutionary to me.

I'll send up a third for Ender's Game. I'm not a big SciFi fan, but I really enjoyed this book.

Dune

Good sci-fi is generally pretty close to fantasy, at that age.

"Pretty Monsters" by Kelly Link has both sci-fi and fantasy, and some horror.

When I was 13, I was all up on reading the Dragonriders of Pern series.

The Talisman by Stephen King and Peter Straub.

For dystopian sci-fi, try everything by Lois Lowry: specifically, The Giver and Gathering Blue.

Also, A Wrinkle in Time is fantastic (literally and figuratively ).

I asked my son (12) what he'd recommend. Although he's more into fantasy, her reckons Mortal Engines is pretty good - so good he wants the sequel which is fairly unusual for him.

He also fell over his sister today because he was walking and reading this at the same time.

Bradbury dated? Oh my. When I was thirteen, I was devouring H. G. Wells and H. P. Lovecraft. And Heinlein should be right up his alley. Dune, too, if he can handle the politics (including the sexual variety) and the semi-pseudo-mystical aspects. And Princess Irulan's chapter headers.

I think early Heinlein is great for YAs. Heinlein's later stuff... well, the less said about that, the better.

I'm surprised no one has recommended Hunger Games yet.

Philip Pullman's His Dark Materials is great.

Paulo Bacigalupi's Ship Breaker (a YA dystopian sci-fi novel) is supposed to be quite good. I've read Bacigalupi's The Windup Girl, which was excellent, but not appropriate for every 13-year-old (there are a couple of rape scenes and a whole lot of racial politics)

Cory Doctorow: Little Brother

In addition to all the previous suggestions (which I second), there's an old space opera series by Margaret Weis (of Weis and Hickman fame). I think the first one is called the Lost Prince or something similar. Very Star Wars-esque, but pretty good plotting and characterization.

Throwing my hat in the ring for Ender's Game, too!

Also, there are usually good stories in the Writers of the Future volumes. They're not big on sex/violence/profanity, so that should be a good bet for a teen. Lots of variety, too.

The collected short stories of Isaac Asimov. I remember reading a collection called 'Nightfall' around that age.
Heinlein - The Moon is a Harsh Mistress
The Lensman Series by E.E 'Doc' Smith

kdbeaar said:

I thought about 2001, but was afraid it might be too slow? You know how kids are nowadays, they want immediate action.

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It's weird - I thought my son would be all about that - he is in other areas such as games - but he loves slower stuff too. His fave book ever by far is the Hobbit, and that's not exactly wall to wall robots and explosions

KD... Why does it matter if it's dated? Heinlein and Asimov were dated when I read them at 12-13, but I still loved them. Growing up and learning how science had improved only gave me more appreciation for these authors... because despite being wrong about much of their science, these authors were *right* very often too.

Asimov's David Starr series, Heinlein's Farmer in the Sky and Have Spacesuit, Will Travel are great reading at that age. And if he likes military stuff, he'll transition easily from the YA Heinlein into Starship Troopers, and you can tell him that that's the original Halo: Old School ODST, if you will.

Andre Norton's Space Ka'at series is good, but maybe for slightly younger readers (10-12, maybe?).

And I loved the abridged/illustrated editions of the old classics at that age: HG Wells, Jules Verne... their stuff was penned with ink directly sucked from boys' imaginations, and transcend age or time.

badducky said:

Good sci-fi is generally pretty close to fantasy, at that age.

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I'd think it varies with the person. I definitely like SF a lot more than Fantasy, and always have as long as I can remember. When I was 10 or 12 I thoroughly enjoyed "Star Surgeon" and (mumbly) decades later I still enjoyed reading the other books/short story collections/whatever-they-are from James White's "Sector General" story series. They're all about solving problems, mostly of (very!) alien medical patients, but also of the practical and logistical problems of dealing with interstellar hospital patients and visitors who need different atmospheres, gravities, etc. The series is of course a bit dated, but I feel it's "True SF." That and some other things, such as a few Heinlein juveniles, probably had something to do with me going to engineering school.

For what it's worth, I read The Hobbit around the same age and did not enjoy it. Decades ago I read several Piers Anthony books hoping he would have written something else as good as "Macroscope," but no, he found a somewhat different genre that sells better...

kdbeaar said:

Thanks for the suggestions, everyone!

I totally forgot about Enders Game...and I loved it. He's read all the Mortal Engines books, so you guys are really on the right path.

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I read Ender's Game and ... well, while enjoyable, I don't think it's the greatest thing of the decade as it seems so many others do. I consider it a bit more Space Fantasy than "true" SF, not that there's anything wrong with that ...

kdbeaar said:

I thought about 2001, but was afraid it might be too slow? You know how kids are nowadays, they want immediate action. And I adore Heinlein, I might give him Job A Comedy of Justice to start with, or maybe the Cat Who Walks Through Walls, although I don't remember that too clearly.

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Amadan said:

I think early Heinlein is great for YAs. Heinlein's later stuff... well, the less said about that, the better.

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I echo that - give him Heinlein's Juveniles while he's at the perfect age to best enjoy them! If he likes those, he'll surely find his way to the rest of Heinlein's works.

IdiotsRUs said:

It's weird - I thought my son would be all about that - he is in other areas such as games - but he loves slower stuff too. His fave book ever by far is the Hobbit, and that's not exactly wall to wall robots and explosions

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Okay, dunno if he'll enjoy my suggestions or not... maybe he'll like all those Piers Anthony books I didn't like...

Okay, dunno if he'll enjoy my suggestions or not... maybe he'll like all those Piers Anthony books I didn't like...

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He likes lots of different stuff - I'll let him know. And there goes the visa card again.... He's quite the critical reader already though. He was on a panel for a YA ( or was it MG?) book award and they had to articulate what they did and did not like and...it kinda rubbed off. There's several books I bought he wanted he didn't make it through. But the classic SF (and fantasy) - loves it.

I enjoyed The Lab by Jack Heath (pending watching people get How Computers Work wrong isn't like nails on a chalkboard to him -- the second book made me hate existing for those pages).

I was right around 13 when I first encountered H.G. Wells. I started with The Time Machine and after that, had to read everything of his I could get my hands on. Within weeks I had read The War of the Worlds, The Invisible Man, The First Men in the Moon, The Food of the Gods, The Island of Dr. Moreau and probably twenty or twenty-five short stories. He's still good.

The Uglies series, by Scott Westerfeld.

Maryn said:

I second "Ender's Game."

When our son was 12 and 13, he very much liked Timothy Zahn's books in the Star Wars novel series (which is by multiple authors): "Heir to the Empire"; "Dark Force Rising"; "The Last Command."

He also liked the dated classics pretty well, especially Asimov's "Fantastic Voyage" and "I, Robot," and Clarke's "2001: A Space Odyssey" and its sequels.

Maryn, remembering her boy with his nose in books

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If he's into Star Wars, I'll throw in my hat for Timothy Zahn's Star Wars novels as well. I remember eating those up as a youngin', but I was (and still am) a very avid Star Wars fan.

Bradbury is timeless, and while they aren't space exploration and wars with aliens, I read Orwell and Huxley around that time.

There are Halo novels out there, too, since you mentioned that series, though I'm not sure of the quality of the adaptations. I'm pretty sure there are novelizations/spin-offs of the sci-fi game Mass Effect as well.