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Science Fiction
April 2026 |
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In this Issue:
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Open Minds, Open Worlds “By the time I'm 75 and I have a new hip, and my eyes are laser cleaned of cataracts, I won't think I'm a bionic man. I think that's just how technology works. The posthuman future of humanity will not announce itself; it will just creep up on us..." – John Scalzi
Welcome to the FCPL Science Fiction Newsletter. This bi-monthly newsletter provides reading suggestions for science fiction books both new and old. All titles will be available in print through the Forsyth County library system, and some are available for immediate download in e-book or audiobook format on your phone or tablet! Download the Libby and Hoopla apps or ask a librarian about our digital library for more information.
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The Forest on the Edge of Time
by Jasmin Kirkbride
Recruited by the mysterious Project Kairos to change history and save the future from ecological disaster, Echo and Hazel are transported through time to opposite worlds. Echo works as a healer's assistant in Ancient Athens, embroiled in dangerous politics and wild philosophy. Hazel is the last human alive, in a laboratory on a polluted island with nothing but tiny robots and an untrustworthy AI for company. Both women suffer from amnesia, but when they fall asleep, their consciousnesses transcend time and they meet in their dreams. Together, they start to uncover their past - but soon discover the past threatens humanity's survival. If Echo and Hazel have a chance of changing the future, they must remember to forget...
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The Hospital at the End of the World
by Justin C. Key
In a year not so far from our own, society is run by the shepherds, a global AI system. The shepherds have controlled every aspect of Pok's twenty years of life -they decided what schools Pok went to, what jobs he was eligible for, what foods he ate, and even his medical care. He's content living a carefree life until his father is killed by a mysterious illness. Searching for answers, Pok decides to follow in his father's footsteps and travel to the very last hold-out city and train at the one hospital that still practices human-led medicine: Hippocrates. As Pok works his way through medical school, he's pulled into the terrifying mystery of a strange illness plaguing immigrants who grew up under shepherd rule. Will Pok be able to uncover what's truly going on in the inner sanctum of the shepherds?
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The Poppy Fields
by Nikki Erlick
Welcome to the Poppy Fields, where there's hope for even the most battered hearts to heal. Here, in a remote stretch of the California desert, lies an experimental and controversial treatment center that allows those suffering from the heartache of loss to sleep through their pain ... and keep on sleeping. After patients awaken from this prolonged state of slumber, they will finally be healed. But only if they're willing to accept the potential shadowy side effects. On a journey to this mystical destination are four very different strangers and one little dog: Ava, a book illustrator; Ray, a fireman; Sasha, an occupational therapist; Sky, a free spirit; and a friendly pup named PJ. As they attempt to make their way from the Midwest all the way west to the Poppy Fields--where they hope to find Ellis, its brilliant, enigmatic founder--each of their past secrets and mysterious motivations threaten to derail their voyage.
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The Iron Garden Sutra
by A. D. Sui
Vessel Iris has devoted himself to the Starlit Order, performing funeral rites for the dead across the galaxy, guiding souls back into the Infinite Light. The spaceship Counsel of Nicaea has been lost for more than a thousand years, its passengers reduced to dust and bone. A relic of Earth's dying past, its sudden appearance has attracted a team of academics eager to investigate its archeological history. And Iris has been assigned to bring peace to the crew's long departed souls. Carpeted in moss and intertwined with vines, Nicaea is more forest than ship. Iris's religious rituals are met with bemusement by the scientists--and outright hostility by engineer Yan Fukui. But the plant life isn't the only sentience to have survived in the past millennia. Something onboard is stalking the explorers one by one. And Iris with his AI enhancement may be their only hope for survival. .
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Wibbly wobbly timey wimey plots
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Costumes for Time Travelers
by A. R. Capetta
Anyone who has hiked through time knows the town of Pocket. It's the place travelers first reach after they stumble away from their hometime, passing through on their way to any other when. To Calisto, Pocket is home. They love their grandmother's shop, which is filled with clothes from every era that are used to make costumes for time travelers. Calisto has no intention of traveling--it's too dangerous. For Fawkes, traveling is life. He put on time boots when he was young and has been stumbling through eras ever since. When he floats into Pocket, Calisto meets him for the first time, though Fawkes has seen Calisto--in glimpses of what hasn't happened yet. He's also seen the villains chasing them both. Now Calisto and Fawkes must rush--from Shakespeare's London to ancient Crete to California on the eve of a millennium--to save Pocket, and travelers, from being erased.
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Doctor Who: A Tale of Two Time Lords
Vol. 1: A Little Help from My Friends
by Jody Houser
The 13th Doctor is back with her friends - Yaz, Ryan and Graham - in a brand new time-traveling adventure. This time she faces the horrific Weeping Angels - who else can help her out but one of her previous incarnations: the Tenth Doctor himself! Landing in the swinging 60s, Thirteen and fam are stranded in the middle of a territorial battle between the Angels and the creepy autons, all the while having to avoid her former self and causing the universe to implode! What could go wrong?
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The Memory Collectors
by Dete Meserve
What would you do if you could spend an hour in your past? Four strangers in the beach town of Ventura, California are about to find out. Elizabeth aches for one more precious hour with her son who died in a senseless accident. Andy is desperate to find his first love who vanished after a whirlwind romance. Logan craves the rush of surfing and mountain climbing, yearning to reclaim the freedom he lost after a misstep landed him in a wheelchair. Brooke is looking for an hour of relief from the guilt of an unforgivable mistake. Enter Aeon Expeditions which allows some lucky clients the chance to spend an hour in their past. All four clients yearn to revisit the hour that changed their lives forever. But when their hour extends beyond sixty minutes, they find themselves stranded in the past. As their paths intertwine unexpectedly, a startling revelation emerges. They were not alone. Someone else was present, harboring deadly intentions.
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Time's Mouth
by Edan Lepucki
Ursa possesses a very special gift. She can travel through memory and revisit her past. After she flees her hometown for the counterculture glory of 1950s California, the intoxicating potential of her unique ability eventually draws a group of women into her orbit and into a ramshackle Victorian mansion in the woods outside Santa Cruz. But Ursa's powers come with a cost--
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Jurassic Park
by Michael Crichton
An astonishing technique for recovering and cloning dinosaur DNA has been discovered. Now humankind's most thrilling fantasies have come true. Creatures extinct for eons roam Jurassic Park with their awesome presence and profound mystery, and all the world can visit them--for a price. Until something goes wrong. . . .
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Whalefall
by Daniel Kraus
Jay Gardiner has given himself a fool's errand--to find the remains of his deceased father in the Pacific Ocean off the coast of Monastery Beach. He knows it's a long shot, but Jay feels it's the only way for him to lift the weight of guilt he has carried since his dad's death by suicide the previous year. The dive begins well enough, but the sudden appearance of a giant squid puts Jay in very real jeopardy, made infinitely worse by the arrival of a sperm whale looking to feed. Suddenly, Jay is caught in the squid's tentacles and drawn into the whale's mouth where he is pulled into the first of its four stomachs. He quickly realizes he has only one hour before his oxygen tanks run out--one hour to defeat his demons and escape the belly of a whale.
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Nexus: Mankind Gets an Upgrade
by Ramez Naam
In the near future, the nano-drug Nexus can link mind to mind. There are some who want to improve it. There are some who want to eradicate it. And there are others who just want to exploit it. When a young scientist is caught improving Nexus, he's thrust over his head into a world of danger and international espionage, with far more at stake than anyone realizes.
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Meru
by S. B. Divya
In a future where human life has been restricted to Earth, while posthuman descendants called alloys freely explore the galaxy, Jayanthi, the adopted human child alloys, and her alloy pilot Vaha are sent to test the habitability of an Earthlike planet called Meru, an unoccupied new world, and the future of human-alloy relations.
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Your Virtual Library is Open 24/7 |
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Contact us for more great books! |
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Forsyth County Public Library
660 W. Fifth St., Winston-Salem, NC 27101
336-703-2665forsythlibrary.org |
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