What SciFi books are describing what is now thought to be impossibilities all together in spite of the potentials of singularity?
I feel like everyday there are new, very real discoveries in science as a result of AI and otherwise that reading about that stuff is just as good as reading about any possibilities that may be described in any science fiction book.
We are living in or moving very quickly towards an era where everything around us seems quite fantastical compared to the life I lived some 50 years ago.
Any recommendations?
Then, a bit further afield but for me, at least, exercised what I liked in The Culture series, even though stylistically different: Spin by Robert Charles Wilson.
Some of the closest would likely be:
Charles Stross' various SF, especially the space opera-adjacent stuff. (He has an large range. Merchant Princes and Laundry series are good, but not at all along the lines of Banks.)
Gregory Benford's Galactic Center Saga.
Vernor Vinge's three Zones of Though books.
David Brin's Uplift series.
Perhaps Hannu Rajaniemi's Jean le Flambeur series.
Max Gladstone's Emperess of Forever shares a similar setting, but is much lighter.
The writing of Gene Wolfe and Tamayn Muir has, I think, much in common with Banks in terms of depth and character, but even though SF they have a very different feel and focus to their works.
And, of course, if you want the original space opera, it might be worth tracking down E.E. "Doc" Smith's Lensmen books. Galactic Patrol and Grey Lensman are the heart of it and ought to be read first. Second Stage Lensman and Children of the Lens are worthy sequels that complete the story. They're pretty breezy reads and very different from Banks in everything but the setting of a galaxy filled with different species, and likely seem somewhat hackneyed now, but they're also the source of most space opera archetypes. (If you think of a space opera trope, it probably came from Lensman. Star Wars is largely a Lensman/Flash Gordon mashup.)
This is all because he had an exclusive contract for sci-fi with his other publisher. But not an exclusive contract period. So he stealth wrote a second sci-fi series without actually breaking that contract until later.
I'm not sure if The Laundry Files was done for the same reason. It's possible. I haven't read those past the first novel. But I'm a big fan of everything else he's done.
Indeed. He died way too early. R.I.P.
It's not too much like Banks' stuff, but I must recommend Glasshouse by Charles Stross. Far-future humanity, really interesting ideas re: war, identity, memory and infohazards.
Also if you've not already read Vinge's "Zones of Thought" books, absolutely get on that.
The notion of the inner solar system being converted into computronium sounds less and less far-fetched with each passing month.
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026/may/13/utah-approve...
I was 17 in 2005 and discovered it by chance, and I’ve been binging on hard sf since then. Matrix and this were really transformative for me.
Also, for the longest of times I thought lobste.rs was a reference to this book :-)
Charles has very interesting takes on the modern world on his blog. I still read it with great passion.