Quote:
Originally Posted by BWinmill
I'm claiming that most stories are hard to categories specifically because of that technological angle, and because a lot of SF stories are focussed upon the technology. Technology used to examine society through a critical lens, technology to form the basis of war stories, technology as a tool for adventure, and so forth. Yet there are stories that are about science proper. Science as a tool, such as we see in some Asimov mysteries. Science as a means to understand human behaviour, perhaps we see in books where scientific research serves as a foundation for the story. Science as a motivator for adventure. I find it hard to see why those wouldn't be classified as science fiction. They are, after all, about science. On the other hand, they don't reflect the majority of stories that fall under the banner of science fiction.
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There's also the stories where a SF concept or an advanced *technology* triggers the story. SF is also about technology or exotic phenomena.
Examples abound:
Larry Niven's NEUTRON STAR is about tidal effects. Asimov joked that he saw the physics and wrote an essay, Niven saw the physics and wrote a story and got a Hugo. Rim shot for Asimov.
Lois MacMaster Bujold's CIVIL CAMPAIGN looks like a regency romance in SF drag from the outside but it is really about social change driven by biomedical advances, like many others of her Vorkosigan books.
Niven and Pournelle's OATH OF FEALTY isn't about rocket ships or ray guns or aliens from outer space, but it is about an architectural concept (arcologies) leading to an "alien" culture right here, right now. The one "advanced" technology in the story isn't essential to the narrative and it's still in the labs, 30 years after the book came out. (It does use a bit of cellphone tech.
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Alternate history is SF. Some uses time travel, other doesn't need to.
Harry Turtledove's ATLANTIS comes to mind. (What if there really was an Atlantis? Not a myth, but a real land mass in the Atlantic?)
Most of the 163x series...
It's not hard to sort out SF, really.
It's not restrictive.
Or fuzzy.
Science is in there, so is technology, cosmological phenomena, even social sciences and medicine qualify. The key issue isn't "what" is in as much as in "how" it is used, the role it serves in the story. If the "SF" is just a "blue screen" background for Romeo and Juliet or a car chase it isn't a story about anything inherently science fictional. It's just posing for effect.
It might be a great read but if the SF isn't integral, why bother to stick on the label?
It's more likely to scare off buyers.
That's why you see labels like paranormal romance, YA, dystopia, etc used for near field stories that might actually fit the bill.
I love Hunger Games, books and movies, so far.
I'd call it SF but I can see why SCHOLASTIC avoided the label: a Hugo probably would've cost them millions.