Best Mash-up, "hard" SciFi and Fantasy?

[Noisy Rhysling]

Suggestions, please. The subject may be broad, so don't be afraid to put something out for us to consider.

(I'm asking because I haven't really been in the genre in the past few decades.)

 

[ProfuselyQuarky]

What do you mean "hard" and by mash-up, you mean crossover?

 

[Noisy Rhysling]

What do you mean "hard" and by mash-up, you mean crossover?

"The Martian" counts as "hard scifi" for me, wile LOTR is "pure fantasy.) (This may be an artifact from the '70s. (I remember that decade only vaguely.))

mash-up

1. a mixture or fusion of disparate elements.

Thus we might have a space-faring race encountering a species of alien who apparently can do magic.

 

[Noisy Rhysling]

Okay, I see people may be having a hard time with this, so I'll pop out one or a few that are current.

Star Wars, a blend of spaceships and mystical forces.

Dune. Same again. Or is it?

 

[Ryan_m_b]

But neither of those are "hard" sci-fi. Hard science fiction attempts to keep its science close to known science. Fantasy, by it's very definition, is the exploration of the fantastic.

 

[Noisy Rhysling]

But neither of those are "hard" sci-fi. Hard science fiction attempts to keep its science close to known science. Fantasy, by it's very definition, is the exploration of the fantastic.

In order for both to be in a book each has to give way to some extent. The starships in Star Wars are based on science. The force is based on ... something else. Dune gets fuzzy with the precognition and, perhaps, the bending of space.

 

[William Vasiladiotis]

Interstellar was very scientifically accurate. They took into account the relativistic effects near a black hole and used a wormhole to travel through space instead of somehow traveling faster than c like they did in "Guardians of the Galaxy" and many other science fiction movies. I would strongly recommend it.

 

[Ryan_m_b]

In order for both to be in a book each has to give way to some extent. The starships in Star Wars are based on science. The force is based on ... something else. Dune gets fuzzy with the precognition and, perhaps, the bending of space.

But the starships in Star Wars are not hard science. They have visible laser weapons, FTL engines, force fields, artificial gravity etcetera. None of that fits within the hard SciFi genre.

 

[Noisy Rhysling]

But the starships in Star Wars are not hard science. They have visible laser weapons, FTL engines, force fields, artificial gravity etcetera. None of that fits within the hard SciFi genre.

As I said, mash-up have to compromise. I'm not looking for a perfect meld of the two genres, I don't know that such is possible.

 

[Ryan_m_b]

As I said, mash-up have to compromise. I'm not looking for a perfect meld of the two genres, I don't know that such is possible.

I can't think how it would even be possible, unless something started out as hard SF and switched to fantasy or if it was seemingly a fantasy setting but the magic was an artifact of hard-SF technology. The genres are very different, contradictory even.

 

[Noisy Rhysling]

I can't think how it would even be possible, unless something started out as hard SF and switched to fantasy or if it was seemingly a fantasy setting but the magic was an artifact of hard-SF technology. The genres are very different, contradictory even.

The movies and/or books I mentioned don't fit the bill for you?

 

[cpscdave]

I have a perfect set of books for you.
Try reading the Nights Dawn trilogy by Peter F Hamilton.

Starts out as hard(ish) Sci Fi (they do have jump drives though but at least everything is self consistent)
and then

Spoiler: SPOILER!

Part way through the first book people start getting possessed by the dead. The possessed have the ability to change what people see and shoot lightning bolts and such.

 

[Ryan_m_b]

The movies and/or books I mentioned don't fit the bill for you?

No...because they aren't hard science fiction.

 

[Noisy Rhysling]

Seems we're getting stuck on definitions. So, "anything close to a mashup of hard science fiction and fantasy" you can recommend?

 

[Lord Anoobis]

Seems we're getting stuck on definitions. So, "anything close to a mashup of hard science fiction and fantasy" you can recommend?

Maybe these?
A Game of Universe - Eric Nylund
Bio of a Space Tyrant - Piers Anthony

 

[Noisy Rhysling]

I'll look into them. I like Anthony, most of the time.

 

[ProfuselyQuarky]

Why not change the question? Why not ask for everybody’s ideal SciFi/fantasy crossover? Perhaps disregard the definitions of “hard” and accurate science fiction. Like, what two characters from two different stories would you like to see meet?

 

[Noisy Rhysling]

Why not change the question? Why not ask for everybody’s ideal SciFi/fantasy crossover? Perhaps disregard the definitions of “hard” and accurate science fiction. Like, what two characters from two different stories would you like to see meet?

I have no problem with that. Thanks for the suggestion.

 

[Khatti]

Interstellar was very scientifically accurate. They took into account the relativistic effects near a black hole and used a wormhole to travel through space instead of somehow traveling faster than c like they did in "Guardians of the Galaxy" and many other science fiction movies. I would strongly recommend it.

I'm particularly fond of how they handled wormhole travel in Babylon 5, where they used what might be a communal wormhole, or perhaps and alternate universe, to fulfill their FTL needs.

The inevitable dilemma with hard-science stories that allow for FTL (and for this post FTL stands for any scheme used to get from here to Alpha Centuri in the next few days instead of the next few centuries) is that any society that has FTL is going to have a take on physics and technology that will make some, if not most, hard science fiction ideas and tropes mute. In such a place at least some of our ideas on physics will be seriously modified or discredited. The interesting trick to me would be figuring out which ideas have been discredited and what they have been replaced with.