Great Sci-Fi Novels of all time

Some science fiction novels fill us with ideas. Some we admire as works of art. And some do it all. At their best, these novels help us understand the social pressures for and consequences of innovation.

• The Island of Dr. Moreau (H. G. Wells, 1896) - This timeless fable of biological manipulation explores scientific power in the hands of an imperialist unbound by community or ethical standards.
• Limbo (Bernard Wolfe, 1953) - What happens to people and to society when the rich, both wounded and hale, can choose to remake their bodies?
• The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress (Robert A. Heinlein, 1966) -  Extraterrestrial colonies sound like a fine idea until you begin to ask who goes, who stays, and who controls the relationships with the home world.
• Stand on Zanzibar (John Brunner, 1968) - In an overcrowded world, what does personal space mean, and how does its diminution change our mores and our demands on technology?
• The Left Hand of Darkness (Ursula K. LeGuin, 1969) - We are shaped by the natural and cultural environment we inhabit. How much of that environment is natural, and how much do we make ourselves?
• The Futurological Congress (Stanislaw Lem, 1971) - The future grows from our imagination, but our imagination is constrained by our expectations, our language, and by invisible technologies.
• Man Plus (Frederik Pohl, 1976) - If you lose a leg, are you still yourself? And if you gain wings? And what if you remake yourself perfectly for an inhuman environment?
• Where Late the Sweet Birds Sang (Kate Wilhelm, 1976) - In a world of exhausted fertility, will the technologies of reproduction bind us together, change us all forever, or separate us from our offspring?
• China Mountain Zhang (Maureen F. McHugh, 1992) - In a backwater America, outsiders dominate through the strength of their technologies. This novel questions whether American values of individualism can survive.
• Calculating God (Robert J. Sawyer, 2000) -If we are not alone, what does the Other make of us? And if the Other is more powerful yet seems to want to help us, what do we make of the Other?