Hard Science Fiction > A Deepness in the Sky

(2000) by Vernor Vinge [4.32] Though written after A Fire upon the Deep, A Deepness in the Sky is a prequel to Vinge's earlier novel, and shares one of its protagonists: the Qeng Ho trader Pham Nuwen. Though I read A Fire upon the Deep once and enjoyed it, I've read A Deepness in the Sky at least half a dozen times, and consider it my favorite hard sci-fi novel, period. Vernor Vinge was one of the first people to propose the idea of the technological singularity, and the near-future novels he wrote a decade or more ago have revealed themselves to be almost eerily prescient. - @isochronous