This is a neccesarily brief episode - because there is much in this book that must not be spoiled. The Palace of Eternity is an excellent 1969 novel by the Northern Irish writer Bob Shaw. It is a fast-paced, dynamic piece of work, full of surprising developments and wild ideas. Welcome to a fast-moving tale that explores interstellar war, environmental destruction, and even the source of artistic inspiration.

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Breakfast in the Ruins is a sometimes harrowing experimental novel by Michael Moorcock. Originally published in 1972, the novel is a loose sequel of sorts to Moorcock's earlier novel Behold the Man - covered in episode 96. This time, protagonist Karl Glogauer is split into many different lives, in which he becomes entangled, and increasingly guilty of, some of history's worst atrocities.

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Since he died in 1982, Philip K. Dick has become, and has remained, one of the best-known science fiction writers of all time. He has recognition not only from established fans of SF, but also from more general audiences - very unusual for a writer who started out publishing in Ace Doubles in the 1950s. To a significant extent, that wide acceptance has to do with the film adaptations of Dick's work, which began with Blade Runner - released shortly after he died.

This episode focuses on the novel that inspired that film: Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?, published at the midpoint of PKD's career, in 1968. It is an iconic SF classic of the 1960s, packed with brilliant speculations and questionings of the author's favourite themes and a deep philsophical insight.

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Oddly, the British author Ian Watson may be best known today for his various novels in the Warhammer 40,000 setting. Long before he flirted with "the grim darkness of the far future", Watson carved a space for himself as one of the most intellectually challenging and formidable British SF writers of the 1970s.

This episode covers Watson's bracing debut novel The Embedding. Originally published in 1973, it is a startling combination of linguistics, anthropology, geopolitics, and first contact with alien life. With settings in the UK, the US, Brazil, and in space, it is an expansive and ambitious debut posing big questions about humankind's search for meaning and a place in the universe. It also features a gonzo fusion of drugs, language theory, sex, and political violence.

J.G. Ballard once described Watson as the UK's only SF writer of ideas - and The Embedding is definitely packed with those.

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It's been over a year since we last covered a novel in Alan Dean Foster's expansive Humanx Commonwealth setting. In these far-future novels, humanity has allied with the insectoid thranx species, which resemble huge, intelligent ants. Together, the two species create a benevolent, star-faring civilisation.

The thranx are disappointingly absent from the sixth standalone book in the setting, The Howling Stones. What this 1997 novel does have is a pair of bickering xenologists, warlike lizard-like aliens, and the apparently magic rocks of the title. How does it stack up against Foster's earlier novels, like the excellent Midworld from 1975?

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In recent years, the reputation of the Northern Irish writer Bob Shaw has grown. He died in 1996, but left behind a large body of cleverly entertaining science fiction series, novels, and stories. Today, more readers are discovering Shaw's work, which is eminently readable and packed with intriguing ideas taken in surprising directions.

Recently, I covered Shaw's excellent 1976 novel A Wreath of Stars, one of his most celebrated works. This episode covers his debut novel, the deft and exciting Night Walk. Shaw had a fear of blindness, rooted in his own eye health issues, and a strong interest in the science of optics. Like several of his later novels, Night Walk explores this preoccupation.

In this far-future spy story, our hero is blinded and dumped in a prison on a hostile colony world. To escape, survive, and protect a secret with interstellar significance, he must rely on a device that restores his ability to see - but not through his own eyes, but the eyes of others.

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The hugely prolific Michael Moorcock is credited with making a major contribution to New Wave science fiction, mainly due to his editorship of the pivotal British magazine New Worlds. Moorcock wrote relatively few science fiction novels, certainly compared to his huge output of fantasy work, which he used to help support New Worlds financially.

However, some of Moorcock's own SF novels are themselves significant contributions to the New Wave. The Black Corridor, written in uncredited collaboration with his then-wife Hilary Bailey, is one example. To catch up with my review of another classic Moorcock SF novel from 1969, listen back to episode 96 for Behold the Man.

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The time has come to continue exploring Iain M. Banks' Culture series. Inversions is the fifth of nine novels, and also the last to be published in the 1990s. This time, Banks stretched himself further than ever before, experimenting with a radically different view of his post-scarcity setting. What does the Culture look like, viewed from a medieval society that is unaware that other worlds even exist?

To catch up with my coverage of the series, listen to episode 90 for The State of the Art, 93 for Consider Phlebas, 99 for The Player of Games, 105 for Use of Weapons and 110 for Excession.

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