John Scalzi's latest novel,The Consuming Fire, is the second book in his new series about a human-created intergalactic empire. Below, the acclaimed author and Los Angeles Times critic at large names his six favorite examples of sci-fi worldbuilding.
Dune is in many ways the gold standard of sci-fi worldbuilding, creating a complex political, cultural, and religious milieu and putting it in service of a story with ecological and economic ramifications for our world. Dune's universe is so complex that no one yet has made a decent visual version of it, though they keep trying. (Hint: Make it a series.)
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Though less heralded than Dune, Grass is equally complex in its worldbuilding (here done with a feminist bent) and has a civilization-threatening mystery at its core. By imagining a story that unfolds on a planet whose human population is dominated by hunting-obsessed toffs, Tepper takes on patriarchy, aristocracy, alien moral systems, and the problem of being too good to do good.
This lesser-known but fascinating book by Le Guin imagines a culture of people in a future California and reveals them to the reader not just through story but by describing their rituals, fables, and daily lives. It's less a novel than a travelogue.
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This book started the millennium off with a bang and is a prime example of the "new weird" subgenre of fantasy. Miéville's city of New Crobuzon is filled with shady humans and other strange-yet-intelligent creatures, living in a place that's a cross between fin-de-siècle Paris and an H.P. Lovecraft nightmare. A fascinating place to visit. You probably don't want to live there.
Stephenson's vision of a fractured and fragmented United States is both hilariously written and depressing in its accurate depiction of increasing polarization. I don't think Stephenson intended to be a prophet for this crazy age we live in, but he's got the gig anyway.
Each of the three novels of this trilogy won the prestigious Hugo Award, which is a first and wholly deserved. Jemisin's world is literally shattering, and the characters, human and otherwise, are shaping the future in unexpected ways. The Broken Earth is a monumental achievement, from a voice like no other in the field.
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