Best selling science fiction books. What makes them so special

Best selling science fiction books. What makes them so special

The foundation of science rests on one rudimentary principle; that of a new idea or a new concept being tossed around in all directions within the crucible of logic and reality. And if the idea or concept withstands these tests, it is no longer fiction. It is an idea or concept that has won its place in the reality of science and logic. This is why I believe fiction is not falsehood portrayed as real, or someone’s far reaching imagination desperately seeking its place in reality. Because someone who believes his/her imagination to be more real than reality, wants it to secure its place in the real world. In the world of logically proven facts.

So, does this mean that the best selling #sciencefiction books are based on falsehood and they are a mere work of imagination with no facts in them? A mere work of fiction where nothing is real, because it is just a fanciful and exaggeratingly dramatic expression of someone’s imagination, with no reality to it. 

Many reader’s may think so. But the truth is different and nobody explains it better than Tyron Edwards.

“Fiction is not falsehood, as some seem to think. It is rather the fanciful and dramatic grouping of real traits around imaginary scenes or characters. It may give false views of men/women or things, or it may, in the hands of a master, more truthfully portray life than sober history itself.”

And that is where best selling #scifibooks differ from ordinary #scifibooks. Because these scifi books are written by the masters of science fiction who have this ability to portray a scientific concept more beautifully than the most of us. Because their imagination is vivid and not bound by the knowledge on the subject or topic, which will always have a limit. But a master #scifi author is free from these restrictions and very often these best selling science fiction authors offer new ideas that an equally adept master scientist can easily recognise as concepts with the potential to set a new trend in the given discipline. Therefore it cannot be denied that the fiction in these best selling science fiction books is more instructive and scientifically far more invigorating to mind of the true seeker of knowledge. It is this quality of best selling science fiction books that makes them special.

Any scientific thought or concept needs to be nursed and then nurtured like a baby. Because when a scientific concept is born in the thinker’s mind, he/she then has to deal with it day and night, while walking, while talking, while sleeping, almost every time. And all the time he/she investigates the validity of the thought still in its infancy. 

As the thinker broods on it long enough, the scientific concept begins to mature; and after a rigorous scientific meditation the scientific concept begins to take a shape that is reasonable and definitive when cast in the mirror of reality which contains many layers: reasoning, logic, knowledge, existing content that either supports or opposes this new scientific concept. And if the concept casts a perfect reflection in this mirror of reality, it has managed to emerge unscathed and as an invincible scientific concept from the crucible of reality. 

It is exactly so when it comes to best selling  #scifibooks. Where the best selling #scifi author treats a scientific concept as a child he/she wants to grow and be recognised by the reader’s intellect with similar logical credibility that the father/mother of the scientific concept assigns to it.

But sometimes the scifi reader’s face a sort of perversion when it comes to dealing with the fiction part in the best selling science fiction book. And at this stage the science fiction book suffers from the reader’s predisposition that this book may not be able to suffice his/her need of a #scifi story that he/she can believe in as a passive scientific critic. And it is this predisposition that becomes the reader’s event horizon in the infinity of scientific thoughts, because this reader is unable to entertain them with the flair of a reader who is willing to believe in the imagination of others as much as he/she believes in his/her own imagination. 

If a reader can overcome this bias of imagination he/she will always find the fiction part in the best selling science fiction books to be as real as it can possibly get when examined logically and via scientific reasoning. But ruling out such a possibility because you are unable to entertain the imagination of other people, works to the detriment of the reader’s own ability to gain more knowledge. And it is these #scifi readers who witness a stunned growth of their own scientific imagination/thought, because they only view it from their own, single point of view. Had it not been so, they would certainly have found some valuable information in the best selling science fiction book, and they would not have given it up. Because they suffered from the bias towards other people’s imagination.

This is why I believe, reading a best selling science fiction book is like looking at a painting and appreciating it. Not all can do that. Because a painting, even though world famous and painted by the master painter, will always carry different colours. A different shade of red, a lighter shade of green, a less radiant shade of gold, along with many other colours. But the viewer who wants to look at the painting with closed imagination, always seeks his favourite shade of red, yellow and other colours in the painting. And when that happens, the viewer will never get to appreciate the painting, because he/she is trying to paint the painting with his/her own colour of locked imagination. Thus, this person may find “Sunflowers” a painting by Mr. Vincent van Gogh quite drab and dull. On the contrary a person who is free from the limitations of his/her own self imposing imagination will experience all stages of life in these flowers- Birth, growth, adulthood, middle age and old age followed by death. But someone who suffers from the condition called biased imagination, will always seek his/her favourite and brighter shade of yellow. without ever realising that the flowers representing middle age, old age and death, cannot be painted in extremely bright yellow. The use of such strong shade of yellow will dilute the very purpose of one of the masterpieces in the world of paintings. The Sunflowers by the grand master of impressionism, Mr. Vincent van Gogh.

More on Sunflowers: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sunflowers_(Van_Gogh_series)

In a painting the colours and shapes represent the imagination of the painter, and when it comes to the best selling science fiction book, the science fiction is the imagination of the author who believes that this science fiction can grow into a real and scientifically provable concept, provided one offers it that attention and scientific meditation in the crucible of reality,  where the reader does not have to extirpate the essence of best selling scifi author’s imagination by treating it with a biased and scientific narrow mindedness. Only then can the scifi reader find the reality in the fiction, exactly the way the author of the best selling #scifi book sees it. 

Afterall imagination and reality are inextricable entities. They may appear quite opposing in nature, but if you examine them with scientific open mindedness you will notice that they retract at a particular point as one entity. A point where reality always meets imagination, before imagination confronts reality suddenly. And it is true because reality can sustain any assault, being reality, it will always emerge unscathed. Because it is reality. It is a little difficult to understand but it is a fact that we all should understand if we have to be good and more patient scifi readers.

For us reality is associated with life or being alive. So, when someone dies or for that mater even when the world would end one day. It would mean death for the person who dies or the world that ends. The reality is still intact. It has just changed its form. Now for that person or that world the reality is death, and at this stage death becomes real for the dead person and the dead world as well. But a person who is living will find a concept like death as bogus and ridiculous. But is it really so? Not actually, because death too is real, and this is one of the greatest enigmas of every life form. To know or witness the reality of death, one must die! But death is a reality as profound as life or being alive. 

And the fiction or scientific imagination expressed by the scifi author sometimes suffers from a similar irony. A person who is locked within his/her own imagination is unable to see beyond the restricting horizon of his/her own imagination.  Thus he/she stands trapped in it unable to see the reality in the imagination of others. if a scifi reader is a victim of similar creative limitations then he/she may never be able to understand what is special about the best selling #scifibooks.

But the fact remains that they are very special because they possess the ability to let the scifi reader see a reality that otherwise would always rest in the realm of obscurity and anonymity. But for this transition to take place, where the reader’s imagination is willing to assess the reality of scifi author’s imagination, the scifi reader first has to open his/her mind to the new idea and then examine it delicately based on his/her own views. And he/she should continue with the process until he/she has not read the last page of the best selling #scifi book. It is then, that the scifi reader will always find the most fascinating scientific reality in it. And when it comes to this, the best selling science fiction books are very special. Because they almost always navigate the reader’s imagination to the end point of their own scientific imagination that they present in the form of wonderfully written scifi story.

However, just like summer rose cannot bloom or look like the winter rose. A #scifi reader who is unwilling to accept other forms of realities, will always find something repulsive in the best selling science fiction book. No matter who has authored it or whether it is a best selling science fiction book or just another science fiction book. All due to one reason: Biased imagination!

There is a similar science fiction book that eliminates the paradoxes associated with flamboyant works of science fiction. It is titled: They Loved in 2075. This romance science fiction book is full of creative scientific concepts revolving around an intensely romantic story. Where a boy falls in love with a beautiful girl in 2075, only to realise that she cannot emote like humans because she is used to dealing with self aware and intelligent machines. 

Now, apart from their seemingly impossible love story, the world is also dealing with a new kind of war, that with self aware machines. And in this obnoxious reality, the boy’s unique imagination saves many clans. Because he dares to think of alternate reality, he dares to imagine!

To know if the girl finally loves him with same human like emotions and feelings, and whether the world survives the assault of self aware machines, you must read the #scifi book, They Loved in 2075.

But let us always remember, if you can imagine it, you can do it. Because imagination is the precursor of reality, that we still do not know, but it exists. Either in a different form or in an alternative setting. Finding it is our job, provided we look at the Sunflowers not with a single shade of yellow in mind. But in the shade of yellow that Mr. Vincent van Gogh had in mind while painting the masterpiece.