Questions tagged [novella]
For questions about novellas or short novels.
90
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Story Identification: Rousing speech delivered on alien planet to alien allies that borrowed heavily from Shakespeare and Churchill
This story or novella probably dates from the '80s and I probably read it in Analog or Galaxy, but I cannot swear to it.
An exploratory team of humans, or maybe a small colonizing team, (call them &...
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3
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2
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594
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Short story/novella featuring armored vehicle vs. dragon
It was in an anthology I of course also don't know the name of. This anthology would be at least several years old, perhaps as much as a decade or so. I see some interesting results about a novel ...
6
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0
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Looking for title of story, probably sci-fi, about mentally declining man who built prompts allowing him to perform daily functions. Any help here? [duplicate]
I have no idea when it was written, nor when I read it, but it's been at least a couple of decades My memory is very vague on particulars, just that it seemed to be pretty prophetic, bringing to mind ...
11
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0
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A very cramped place with visiting aliens
I read this novella (or maybe longish novelette ?) at least 20 years ago, probably in a magazine so it could have been older than that.
I don't remember much. It took place in a crowded place, ...
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1
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Novella where protagonist's catatonic uncle predicts the dates of novas
40 years or so ago, I read a paperback that was already old then in which one of the stories had a young adult male protagonist working in a nursing home or hospital.
By coincidence, one of the ...
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9
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1
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Short story or novelette about a planet where sex is not taboo
I think I read this short Sci-Fi story (or maybe a novelette) about 20-25 years ago. Can't remember where, and I'm sorry but I can't remember more details. It was probably published earlier, but I ...
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1
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A short story about a man going through insect-like metamorphosis and gaining superhuman powers from it
The story is definitely pre-00's, possibly quite older.
The general gist is:
The protagonist goes into a hibernation state after some procedure he undergoes or accident that happens to him.
His wife(?)...
14
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1
answer
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Novel about dimensional alien goo [duplicate]
An older male researcher and a younger female researcher (a strange relationship develops here with the age gap and power dynamic) are working on some dimensional rift (maybe on a moon base) trying to ...
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Story about a Singaporean company that is contracted to modernize an Indian city?
As for question title, I am looking for a story about a Singaporean company that is contracted to modernize an Indian city.
The story should be quite short, probably under the average under novel ...
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2
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Vampires in space
I remember reading a novella in an old sci-fi anthology about vampires in space from what they call "the golden age of sci-fi".
It was NOT Blindsight by Watts (loved that one), or the choose ...
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Short story where a recovering alcoholic scientist uses a chronoscope to try and find out if the Resurrection really happened
Featured in a "best of" anthology between around 2006 and 2015, not an old story.
The ending is a spoiler so:
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Story where a man on a space station checks the dreams of incoming travellers
Short novel (1961-1965.) On a space station at the outskirts of our solar system works a fat man who is controlling the returning pilot who was exploring some distant galaxy.
The pilot is in deep ...
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8
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1
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Ongoing story about an asteroid (Apophis?) that destroys Earth
I started reading a story that I believe was originally posted on reddit within the last 3 years or so, about an asteroid destroying the Earth. I think the asteroid is Apophis 99942, but I may be ...
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12
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1
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A broadcast enforces pacifism/vegetarianism
An American 40s to 60s novella read in the 80s. Set near Detroit or Chicago at about the same time.
After a nuclear war, broadcast towers have been installed to stop aggression, and nearly all the ...
- 309
9
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1
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211
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Teaching alien race about scientific method and religion [duplicate]
I read a short-story/novella/novel 10 years ago, about a (scientist/astronaut) who crash(?)-landed on an unknown planet.
He soon discovers these short and fearsome aliens with pointy teeth.
He figures ...
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Student expelled in order to go undercover; his father heads the agency
Student cadet recruited to secret agency. Has to be expelled to go undercover. Turns out his father who he believed dead is the boss of the agency. Set in a future Earth society. Agency gets busted so ...
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1
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'80s novella about a computer running everything, which is destroyed by a punch card
I have been trying to find even a reference to this book and haven't been able to do so. I read it in the early '80s, but it might have been published a bit earlier. It was a rather small mass market ...
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What is the earliest published horror anthology of original material?
When it comes to science fiction, this topic has been researched extensively over the years, but I find little to nothing about it regarding horror fiction.
My search criteria are:
It is an anthology ...
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2
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0
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Explanation sought: the ending of "The Web of the Magi"
Just read Richard Cowper's The Web of the Magi. It was going along as a well-written if somewhat bog-standard Victorian-traveler-stumbles-into-magical-lost-civilization story right up until the last ...
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Short story about gigantism potion
Someone accidentally devised a chemical/potion which caused anything it touched to grow massively - IIRC the first example was dandelions ten feet tall. The initial protagonists (a couple familes) ...
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Which guilds are there in "Nightwings" by Robert Silverberg, and what are their purposes?
I really liked reading Nightwings, especially for the world created there. I liked the idea of inherent guild membership due to past modifications, etc. I would like to take my RPG or LARP players ...
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1
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Aliens with innate mathematical ability
I'm trying to find the title and author of a short novel I read about 10 years ago. The book was in English, and the writer was a woman, and not a "big name" as far as I recall. The story ...
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Agent sent to another planet to stop a genocide and is blinded by the tyrant
I remember reading this about 20 years ago, but neither the author nor the title stand out to me. It starts I believe with the agent having made planetfall, but is soon captured and blinded ...
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Fantasy story identification: LSD, dimensional travel, dwarves?
Had good luck on my first question for the eventual ID of The Last Planet / Star Rangers, let's see what happens with this one.
probably pre-1982. This is when I started reading sci-fi and fantasy in ...
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Trying to identify an old sci-fi novel: a group of space travellers visiting a planet previously long-inhabited but regressed?
I know this is a very long shot, but for years I've been trying to ID a sci-fi novel, quite likely the first I ever read.
Published pre-1982. Fairly short paperback, like an old Tor novel. Novella? ...
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1
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Novella about the first woman allowed on a planet
A husband and wife team are escorting a young woman to a planet; all planets are first colonised by men, and when it is deemed safe, one woman is sent. If she can safely have normal children, the ...
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11
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1
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Novella about Domed city with advanced infiltrator
This is a SF novella I read in the late 1980s in the UK.
There is a domed city where people went for refuge generations earlier, the predicted apocalypse never happened but they're unaware.
The ...
- 26.3k
7
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2
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330
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Title of a "Spy vs Extraterrestrials" Novella set on Pacific Island?
This question
SF short story by British author WW2 Burma
made me think of a story whose title (and much else about it) I can't remember.
The setting is the-near-future-when-written and humanoid ...
- 50.3k
4
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1
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Novel about time traveller amongst a group that go back in time to view historical events
I am searching for the name of a short novel, it was a bundle of novel inside one book, it must have been a famous sci fi author
The story is about humans from the future taking pleasure to teleport ...
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16
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1
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Mid 60s short story/novella in which failed fusion reactor destroys London
Probably appeared in Analog, Galaxy or Fantasy and Science Fiction between 1964 and 1968. The protagonist has written a massive PhD thesis - over 250,000 pages long - that claims to be the design for ...
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3
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1
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Novella where a man bonds with an alien who lives inside of him
A book I read in the early 70s, novella-length. A man bonds with an alien who lives inside him and keeps him alive for centuries. Basically immortal.
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Fantasy/Horror novella about a young boy travelling on a ship and finding a giant eye in a volcano crater
I read the novella about 5-6 years ago, but I do not know how old it is. I am also not sure, if it was written in German or English. In any case, it was quite short, maybe 150 pages and I had to order ...
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2
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Novella with psychic killing, southern family cult camp set on fire by a boy who escapes
I'm looking for the name of a novella I read in an anthology, I believe it was a collection of Nebula Award-winning science fiction but I'm not entirely sure.
The story has a main protagonist, a ...
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1
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Short story or novella about a guy who keeps getting infected but doesn't die from any of them
I’m going crazy trying to remember this science fiction story about a guy who is kinda like Typhoid Mary. He has been exposed to hundreds of deadly pests but didn’t die himself. He just gets more ...
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1
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Novella (and follow up short story) in Isaac Asimov's Science Fiction Magazine about the stars going out. Published ~20 years ago
I am trying to find a novella (and its follow up short story) that were published in "Isaac Asimov's Science Fiction Magazine" on the order of 20 years ago (+/- 5 years).
Premise: for reasons unknown,...
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17
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1
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Teen girl named "Leaf" or "Twig" who grew up in wild of forest planet raised by "Grandfather"(forest's plant root nexus). Colonists out to destroy him
While reading the first chapter of the webcomic The Meek, I had a sense of déjà vu, because a number of elements reminded me of a SF novella or short story I had read, years back. (The similarities ...
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2
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Short story/novella: Ship sling shots around a spinning black hole
Synopses: Ship is being chased by 'bad guys', to escape they use a sling shot maneuver around a spinning black hole. As a consequence the black hole's event horizon expands (due to the rotational ...
6
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0
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116
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Sci-fi story/novella which involves intelligent probe exchanging messages with a group of children, contact diminishes over time
There's an artificial intelligence/computer/spacecraft flying away from Earth on a long mission. In the beginning, it exchanges messages with a group of children (I think it was 100), whose parents ...
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4
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Short story/novella about old-school Biblical angels wrecking the world
I feel like this was a short story or novella, no timeframe really coming to mind. I don't think it is Angelfall by Susan Ee, as in my memory, the protagonist never meets an angel, or the angels never ...
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SciFi Short Story/Novella where Advanced Aliens are Choosing a Galactic Overseer
My memory on this is a little fuzzy since I thought the story was in one of the Golden Age of anthologies that I have but I can't find it there.
I can provide a few more details than in the title.
...
8
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1
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Star Trek books about the Federation outside of Starfleet?
Are there any Star Trek novels that depict the Federation primarily or entirely outside of Starfleet? There’s been a lot of fan speculation over the years on what civilian life in the Federation would ...
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Novella, possibly from 1960's, Bingo babies breeding goes out of control
I think I might have partially asked this already in the comments on somebody else's question. As far as I remember it was in an anthology of four or five novella's or "long" short stories....I read ...
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1
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Short story/novella: alien stranded on Earth befriends girl, gives her a device protecting from rape, accidentally goes to the past and dies in Italy
I remember reading a short story (or novella?) that had a girl who was raised by some terrible relatives because her father went missing. She was befriended by an alien who was stranded on Earth and ...
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Short story (possibly a novella) about people living in caves; women start giving birth to worms
In eleventh grade, we read many a short story, sometimes novellas if our teacher liked them enough. I remember reading The Most Dangerous Game. This one short story I have been trying to find for ...
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1
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Sci fi story: Clever pigs that help a galaxy lawman
This was read in the early 1980's in UK. I think it was a 'longish' short story (most likely a novella) in a book with 3 or 4 others.
There is a Earth colony planet and a rough and ready spaceship ...
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11
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2
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466
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The youngest person on Earth in a society of immortals
The protagonist is the youngest person on Earth -- the only one to be born in many centuries. Terrestrial society is small but every individual is unique and multitalented, as they are all immortal ...
3
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0
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Novella/short book involving teleportation, ghosts and a magic tree
All I remember is it's some sort of cross between fantasy and sci-fi. I seem to remember there is a teleporter in it that has created some sort of monster. And there are some ghost like creatures that ...
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Linked novellas where humans are engineered to adapt to a variety of environments
As a child I remember having a book with a collection of novellas that revolved around a common theme that went like this:
Survivors of an ill-fated expedition arrive on a distant planet and create, ...
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1
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SF novella separating the dumb majority from the intelligent part of mankind
Some 20+ years ago, I’ve read a SF novella written by an American author, and I’d like to re-read this book.
The story goes like this: a farmer unearthes, while plowing his field, a sarcophagus with ...
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19
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3
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3k
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1960s sci-fi novella with a character who is treated as invisible by being ignored
In the late 1960s I read a fascinating science fiction novella - part of a double header paperback series (Ace Doubles books?) - which I have been trying to identify.
The lead male character ...
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