Good hard science fiction + body horror books

[Oasis Nadrama]

I'm in constant search of this one special fix. I'm into serious stories that try to use (at least approximately) correct science and that contain creatures, entities, principles of body horror. Always looking for new novels like this. I'm gonna list the best ones I know, every suggestion welcome.

Good science fiction and good horror are also appreciated, even if not mixed.

Here is my selection of the best experiences!



HARD SCIFI/HORROR

- Alien: The Cold Forge, Alex White
- Blindsight, Peter Watts
- Blood Music, Greg Bear
- Body Snatchers, Jack Finney
- Cymic Parasit Breach, Darcy Coates
- Hyperion, Dan Simmons
- I Am Legend, Richard Matheson
- Jurassic Park, Michael Crichton
- Puppet Masters, Robert Heinlein
- Parasite Eve, Hideaki Sena
- Phantoms, Dean Koontz
- Ship of Fools / Unto Leviathan, Richard Paul Russo
- Slimer, Harry Adam Knight [warning: questionable science]
- The Day of the Triffids, John Wyndham
- The Greatest Adventure, John Taine
- The Hatching (trilogy), Ezekiel Boones
- The Luminous Dead, Caitlin Starling
- The Midwich Cuckoos, John Wyndham
- The Southern Reach (trilogy), Jeff VanderMeer
- The Thing: Zero Day, Lee McGeorge
- The Vang (trilogy), Christopher Rowley
- The War of the Worlds, H.G. Wells
- Who Goes There?, John W. Campbell



SCIFI BOOKS

- Dune (hexalogy), Frank Herbert
- Perdido Street Station, China Miéville
- Roadside Picnic, Arkady and Boris Strugatsky
- Terra Ignota (quadrilogy), Ada Palmer
- The Gods Themselves, Isaac Asimov (and all of Asimov's science fiction)
- The Martian Chronicles, Ray Bradbury



HORROR BOOKS

- Books of Blood, Clive Barker (and all of Barker's horror)
- House of Leaves, Mark Z. Danielewski
- It, Stephen King (and all of King's horror)
- Ring (hexalogy), Koji Suzuki
- The Rats (trilogy), James Herbert

[thexenomorph]

Awe man, I was going to recommend "Ship of Fools"! Such an underrated gem.

A book I really like (you can probably guess why haha) is "Calculating God".

[SiL]

Basically anything by Stanislaw Lem, but if you're going to put something Alien-related on a list of "hard" sci fi I guess anything is game.

[Wweyland]

Basically anything by Stanislaw Lem, but if you're going to put shutting Alien-related on a list of "hard" sci fi I guess anything is game.

I was just about to suggest Solaris.

[SiL]

It's one of my all-time favourites.

Will need to read His Master's Voice.

[Oasis Nadrama]

Thank you everyone for the suggestions!

Basically anything by Stanislaw Lem, but if you're going to put something Alien-related on a list of "hard" sci fi I guess anything is game.

Oh wow, yeah, Lem looks like the kind of writer I'm looking for (along with more Pohl, Anderson and Le Guin books). Tarkovsky's adaptation of Solaris was incredible. Thank you very much for the recommendation!

About hard scifi, I'm going with a, hum, flexible definition since true hard scifi + body horror mixes are terribly hard to find. They shouldn't be, to me good biology/genetics should INSPIRE good body horror, not restrict it, but such is the current state of the field.  
You probably noticed I also listed things like Parasite Eve and Jurassic Park that have even more questionable science than Alien (vulgarized nineties genetics aged like MILK).

Let's say a Babylon 5 level of consistency is enough for this search and this list. But if you get me enough true hard scifi + body horror works to be able to make it a separate list, I'll be more than pleasantly surprised, it will be a day worthy of celebration.

[SiL]

Oh wow, yeah, Lem looks like the kind of writer I'm looking for (along with more Pohl, Anderson and Le Guin books). Tarkovsky's adaptation of Solaris was incredible. Thank you very much for the recommendation!

Call me a heathen but I prefer Soderberg's (love both, though.)

Neither are like the book, though. They take the drama of the implications of the Visitors, but the book itself is mostly about the futility of trying to understand the planet. It is pages and pages of technobabble highlighting the depths we go to to categorise and analyse but none of it amounts to anything.

It's half the length of Dune but twice as much effort to get through. Worth it, though.

[Slutty Badger]

Jurassic Park is a total classic, and I was surprised at how different it is from the film.

Never have detailed graphs been more compelling!

[Xenotaris]

Jurassic Park is a total classic, and I was surprised at how different it is from the film.

Never have detailed graphs been more compelling!

I'm currently making a comipo adapation of the first Jurassic Park book

[Kradan]

Jurassic Park ... is it that cheap rip-off of "Billy and The Clonesaurus" ?

[Xenotaris]

Jurassic Park ... is it that cheap rip-off of "Billy and The Clonesaurus" ?

No, Jurassic Park was released in 1990, while Billy and The Clonesaurus came out in 2014

[Kradan]

[Wweyland]

I would also recommend Swamp Thing by Alan Moore.

[DARIAS93]

THANK YOU for starting this thread!

After getting hooked on the Alien, Jurassic Park, and Star Wars books, I've been on the hunt for more great sci-fi reads. Earlier this year, I finished Rendezvous with Rama by Arthur C. Clarke—honestly, Villeneuve needs to wrap up Dune and start working on that one next.

Please keep the recommendations coming—seriously appreciated!

[Wweyland]

I have probably read about 100+ Alien, Predator, and Star Wars books. Basically I'm starting to regret that I have wasted a large portion on my life on that crap instead of reading something else.