Science fiction or other genres with particularly realistic scientists
Blood Music
by Greg Bear
Thriller: Genetically engineered cells take over (admittedly in an over-the-top way, but the lab scenes are extremely realistic, hence the book’s inclusion here).
Links: Amazon (UK)
Jurassic Park
by Michael Crichton
Thriller: Ancient dinosaur DNA wreaks more havoc (also surprisingly plausibly; one could argue that dinosaurs could be cloned as Crichton describes, and the scientists are believable too).
Links: Amazon (UK)
Timescape
by Gregory Benford
Drama: A Californian scientist in the 60’s find signatures of tachyons in a spin resonance experiment which turn out to comprise an urgent subatomic message.
Links: the author chats on LabLit’s forums • Amazon (UK)
Cosm
by Gregory Benford
Drama: Amidst academic intrigue, a high-energy physicist creates an unusual object which she suspects could be a pocket universe.
Links: the author chats on LabLit’s forums • Amazon (UK)
Twistor
by John Cramer
Drama: A physics postdoc and graduate student access a portal to the dark-matter universe.
Links: Amazon (UK)
The Secret
by Eva Hoffman
Drama: A futuristic account of a cloned young woman which contains a substantial amount of credible detail by a non-scientist who has done her homework.
Links: Amazon (UK)
Survival
by Julie E. Czerneda
Drama: A biologist studying salmon gets captured by alien archeologists for her unique perspectives on migration, featuring startling accurate field biology culture (first part of a series, ‘Species Imperative’).
Links: Amazon (UK)
His Master’s Voice
by Stanislaw Lem
Drama: A large team of scientists try to decode a message from space, featuring a great depiction of how scientific collaborations work.
Links: Amazon (UK)
The Swarm
by Frank Schatzing
Drama: Deep-sea intelligent life seeks revenge on man’s careless environmental ways, with realistic scientist characters (and a cameo by a real one).
Links: Our piece by its translator • Amazon (UK)
Red Mars
by Kim Stanley Robinson
Drama: People arrive on Mars and debate the ethics of terraforming, featuring realistically drawn science and scientists (Part 1 of a trilogy).
Links: our author interview • Amazon (UK)
Green Mars
by Kim Stanley Robinson
Drama: The scientist settlers, now technically traitors, rebel against Earth (Part 2 of a trilogy).
Links: our author interview • Amazon (UK)
Blue Mars
by Kim Stanley Robinson
Drama: Mars looks beyond Earth to the future (Part 3 of a trilogy).
Links: our author interview • Amazon (UK)
The Gold Coast
by Kim Stanley Robinson
Drama: A near-future California becomes obsessed with technology and divided by a battle between weapons manufacturers and terrorists.
Links: our author interview • Amazon (UK)
Trouble with Lichen
by John Wyndham
Drama: Two scientists investigating a rare lichen make a remarkable discovery.
Links: Amazon (UK)
Master and Commander
by Patrick O’Brian (and others in the series)
Naval adventure: Chronicles the voyage of a ship with a science-friendly captain and his very scientific ship’s naturalist.
Links: our related essay • Amazon (UK)
A For Andromeda
by Fred Hoyle
Drama: Scientists at a radio telescope study to decode a message from space.
Links: Amazon (UK)
The Andromeda Strain
by Michael Crichton
Drama: A bacteriologist helps the government contain deadly microorganisms from space.
Links: Amazon (UK)
Darwin’s Radio
by Greg Bear
Drama: A virologist grapples with a strange and ancient virus that appears to be the next phase of human evolution. (Also its sequel, Darwin’s Children
Links: Amazon (UK)
Galileo’s Dream
by Kim Stanley Robinson
Drama: Galileo’s historic world is brought to life – but he’s also transported to colonies of Jupiter to troubleshoot.
Links: Amazon (UK)
The Highest Frontier
by Joan Slonczewski
Drama: A young girl goes to college to learn more about the interesting world of biology but learns that not everything is what it seems – or is it?
Links: Amazon (UK)
A Door Into the Ocean
by Joan Slonczewski
Drama: Two completely different worlds collide: a world inhabited by pacifists and the new violent rulers.
Links: Amazon (UK)
In His Genes
by Robin Stratton
Drama: A lab researcher struggles to find a cure for his son’s disease.
Links: our review • Amazon (UK)
Ratner’s Star
by Don DeLillo
Drama: In the near future a brilliant mathematician is living with Nobel prize winners to decipher transmissions from outer space.
Links: Amazon (UK)
Fluke: I Know Why the Winged Whale Sings
by Christopher Moore
Drama: A marine biologist studies humpback whales, which shouldn’t be able to spell – should they?
Links: Amazon (UK)
FlashForward
by Robert J. Sawyer
Thriller:
What would you do if you saw your future in a flash? And what would the world do?
Links: Amazon (UK)
The Infinities
by John Banville
Magic realism: The family of a mathematician who contributed to the foundations of quantum physics has to deal with his terminal illness.
Links: Amazon (UK)
The Jericho Deception
by Jeffrey Small
Thriller:
A Yale neuroscientist is on the verge of a groundbreaking discovery unlocking the secrets of God before a war breaks out.
Links: Amazon (UK)
The Colony
by A.J. Colucci
Thriller: A super-colony of ants is sweeping in to attack New York City – can the world’s greatest ant expert save the day?
Links: Amazon (UK)
Annihilation
by Jeff VanderMeer
Drama/Thriller: A biologist and her team explore dangerous and unknown territory. The first of a trilogy.
Links: Amazon (UK)
In The Garden of Iden
by Kage Baker
Drama/Thriller: A botanist travels back in time to collect samples from an Elizabethan garden. Series.
Links: Amazon (UK)
The Discovery of Heaven
by Harry Mulisch
Magic realism: An astronomer who loves fast cars, nice clothes and women meets a cerebral chaotic philologist who cannot bear the banalities of everyday life (translated from the Dutch).
Links: Amazon (UK)
The Black Cloud
by Fred Hoyle
Drama: Scientists struggle to understand a black cloud threatening Earth’s existence.
Links: Amazon (UK)
A Box of Birds
by Charles Fernyhough
Drama: A neuroscientist conducting experimental brain research gets drawn into more than she bargained for.
Links: Amazon (UK)
Sixth Winter
by John Gribbin & Douglas Orgill
Thriller: Will the next ice age start next winter?
Links: Amazon (UK)
Boneland
by Alan Garner
Drama: A tortured scientist savant searches for sister and sanity (part of the Weirdstone Trilogy)
Links: Amazon (UK)
The Edge of the Sky
by Roberto Trottam
Experimental fiction: Exploring the most important ideas about the universe in language simple enough for anyone to understand
Links: Amazon (UK)
Galileo’s Daughter
by Dava Sobel
Historical Fiction: On the cusp between non-fiction and fiction, this work is a narrative treatment of great Italian scientist Galileo and his daughter Virginia
Links: Amazon (UK)
Flowers for Algernon
by Daniel Keyes
Drama: An experiment in the enhancement of human intelligence turns a simple man into a genius
Links: our review • Amazon (UK)
Infinite Ground
by Martin MacInnes
Thriller: A forensic scientist finds curious abnormalities in bacteria after a man disappears
Links: Amazon (UK)
The Calculus Affair (The Adventures of Tintin)
by Hergé
Comic: A slightly distracted professor invents a novel weapon that could change the world
Links: Amazon (UK)
Odds Against Tomorrow
by Nathaniel Rich
Thriller: A gifted mathematician spends his days in a near-future Manhattan, calculating worst-case scenarios for a consulting firm that indemnifies corporations against potential disasters.
Links: Amazon (UK)
Spaceman of Bohemia
by Jaroslav Kalfar
Sci-fi: A Czech astronaut launches into space to investigate a mysterious dust cloud covering Venus.
Links: Amazon (UK)
Good Morning, Midnight
By Lily Brooks Dalton
Drama: A scientist in the Artic and an astronaut returning from Jupiter find themselves on the same journey.
Links: Amazon (UK)
The Echo Wife
by Sarah Gailey
Thriller: A married scientist who works with her husband on human cloning is disturbed when he leaves her for a younger version of herself.
Links: Amazon (UK)
The Need
by Helen Phillips
Drama: A palaeobotanist and mother coping with two young children working at a dig where a number of fossil plants are found starts to hear strange things.
Links: Amazon (UK)
Haw (2015)
by Sean Jackson
Drama A bioengineer struggles to save his son from a corrupt society in a bleak, futuristic America.
Links: Amazon (UK)
A Philosophical Investigation
by Philip Kerr
Thriller In near-future Britain, men who are at risk of being violent sociopaths are given special treatment.
Links: Amazon (UK)
Extinction
by Bradley Somers
Drama: While rockets are leaving earth with refugees, a mountain ranger protects the last grizzly bear from a group of poachers.
Links: Amazon (UK)
The Offset
by Calder Szewczak
Drama: The anti-natalist daughter of a professor working on replanting radioactive Greenland is forced to choose which of her mothers must die.
Links: Amazon (UK)
Clade
by James Bradley
Drama: A scientist and his wife undergo IVF in a collapsing world.
Links: Amazon (UK)>
The Frequency of Souls
by Mary K. Zuravleff
Drama/lLablit lite: A designer’s beliefs are shaken when his new work colleague reveals she is on a quest to find electrical evidence for life after death.
Links: Amazon (UK)