最棒的10本科幻小說：總有一本你會愛
Underground Railroad by Colson Whitehead
1.科爾森·懷特海德：《地下鐵路》
Winner of a 2016 National Book Award, The Underground Railroad is the story of Cora, a slave who escapes via the Underground Railroad, which is rendered as an actual railroad system. Through its brilliant visions of a past both ours and not quite ours, The Underground Railroad depicts America’s horrifying history with a devastating clarity.
本書榮獲2016年美國國家圖書獎。故事圍繞一位名叫科拉的奴隸展開，他通過真實存在的地下鐵路系統逃亡。本書以其獨特新穎視角極其清晰描繪了美國那令人恐懼的歷史。
Vegetarian by Han Kang
2. 韓康：《素食者》
In The Vegetarian by South Korean writer Han Kang (translated into English by Deborah Smith), a housewife decides to become a vegetarian. This seemingly harmless decision has terrible, wide-ranging consequences, throwing her entire family into disarray. With its phantasmagorical images and haunting, alienated characters, The Vegetarian is a book that compels even as it dares you to look away.
本書由韓國作者韓康所作，並由黛博拉·史密斯翻譯爲英語。韓康本是一名家庭主婦，後決心成爲一名素食主義者。這個決定看似沒什麼壞處，但卻產生了極其重大廣泛的影響，打亂了她整個家庭的生活。本書大量運用變化莫測的意象以及邊緣化卻揮之不去的人物讓人挪不開眼。
3. What Is Not Yours Is Not Yours by Helen Oyeyemi
3. 海倫·奧耶耶美：《不是你的你永遠也得不到》
The stories in What Is Not Yours Is Not Yours are linked thematically by keys of all kinds, but are otherwise only bounded by the limits of Oyeyemi’s playful, searching imagination — which is to say, not at all. Whether you’re reading about puppetry schools or a disillusioned fan seeking an apology from a pop star, these stories have you diving in and surfacing somewhere else — delightfully, unexpectedly — altogether.
本書中的每個故事在主題上由各類線索關聯起來，但是都逃不出作者戲虐幽默卻透徹清晰的想象力。無論是傀儡學校還是一位幻滅粉絲製作追求明星的道歉，所有的故事都能讓人爲之沉迷並在另一些時候在心頭上涌現——快樂而又意想不到的。
Regional Office Is Under Attack! by Manuel Gonzales
4. 曼努埃爾·岡薩雷斯：《地區辦事處遭襲！》
The Regional Office Is Under Attack!, the first novel from acclaimed short fiction writer Manuel Gonzales, chronicles the secret history of the Regional Office, an organization composed of super-powered female assassins and the mysterious powers that be who manage them. Combining joyous comic book verve with masterful literary craft and a keen sense of character, The Regional Office Is Under Attack! is a rare and special beast indeed: fun that tastes good and is good for you.
本書是飽受好評的短篇小說作家曼努埃爾·岡薩雷斯的首部小說，記錄了地區辦事處的祕密歷史，這個組織由能力強大的女刺客們組成並受到神祕力量的管理支配。本書不僅包含諸多有趣的連環畫元素，而且嫺熟高超的文字技藝、人物感極強，確實是一部不可多得的佳作：有趣好讀又有益身心。
5. The Mothers by Brit Bennett
5.佈雷特·班尼特：《母親們》
Bennett’s stellar debut, The Mothers, brings us into the world of a black church community in California, where three teenagers — Nadia, Aubrey, and Luke — navigate love and loss and consequences, all while being observed and commented on by a chorus of church mothers. Graceful, wise, and affecting, The Mothers is a beautiful exploration of community, and how its ties can both constrain and comfort.
本書是班尼特的首部著作，將讀者帶入了加利福尼亞的一個黑人教堂社區的世界，在那裏有三個年輕人——納蒂亞、奧佈雷和盧克——他們在愛與迷失中穿行，這些都被教堂合唱隊中的母親們看在眼裏並給出評論。這些母親們優雅、智慧、有愛，展現了這個集體的美麗以及如何將剋制與安慰結合在一起。
6. Imagine Me Gone by Adam Haslett
6.亞當·哈撒特：《想象我已離去》
Imagine Me Gone is the story of a family and its legacy of mental illness, first in the father, then in the eldest son. While Haslett is unflinching when it comes to the devastating toll that depression and anxiety can take on a person and their family, this coexists — and is inextricable from — his portrait of an unforgettable, frustrating, loving family.
本書講述了一個家庭極其遺傳性精神疾病的故事，父親首當其衝，緊接着長子也患上了精神疾病。當抑鬱和焦慮席捲他的家人時，哈撒特從不畏縮，這雖是其家庭逃不開的命運，但同時也爲其帶來了難以忘懷、令人沮喪卻又充滿愛意的經歷。
7. Homegoing by Yaa Gyasi
7.雅·吉亞瑟：《回家》
Homegoing, Yaa Gyasi’s debut novel, opens in18th-century Ghana with two half-sisters set upon different paths. While one of the sisters stays in Africa, the other is sold into slavery in America, and each following chapter delves into the lives of their descendants, showing clearly the effects of racism and slavery on the history of the world through its trauma to individual lives. Homegoing is ambitious, panoramic, and continually riveting.
本書是該作者的首部小說，故事發生在18世紀的加納，兩個有一半血緣關係的姐妹走上了截然不同的人生道路——一個留在了非洲，而另一個被賣到了美國做奴隸。接下來的每一個章節詳述了她們後代的生活，從對於個人生活造成的創傷談起，清晰地展示了種族歧視和奴隸制對於世界歷史的影響。《回家》是一部有野心、詳盡概述並且經久不衰的小說。
8. The Association of Small Bombs by Karan Mahajan
8.卡蘭·馬哈：《小炸彈協會》
Three young boys visit a New Delhi marketplace when a bomb goes off, killing two of them and devastating their families and the surviving boy. With great empathy and intelligence, The Association of Small Bombs explores the ramifications of a terrorist attack on both the victims and the terrorists themselves.
三個年輕的男孩造訪了新德里的一個市場，卻恰逢一枚炸彈爆炸了，兩個男孩死於這場爆炸，而他們的家庭和倖存下來的男孩也飽受折磨。本書充滿共情和智慧，探索了恐怖襲擊對於受害者和恐怖分子自身的分歧。
9. Version Control by Dexter Palmer
9.德克斯特帕爾默：《控制眼界》
Rebecca, the main character of Version Control, has the funny feeling that something is fundamentally wrong with her world, where self-driving cars fill the roads, her husband is obsessed with building a time machine, and the president just doesn’t seem right. Of course, it’s a world much like ours, which is part of the brilliance of Version Control, a novel that, by holding up a science-fictional mirror to our reality, reflects back something all the more truthful for its bizarreness.
本書的主人公名叫麗貝卡，她總覺得自己的世界有什麼不對，比如馬路上擠滿了自動駕駛的車輛，而她的丈夫執迷於製造一部時光機，連總統也好像出了什麼問題。當然，這個世界和我們的真實世界非常相似，也正是本書的高明之處——以科幻世界爲鏡子來展現現實世界，以其奇異之處來反映出真理。
10. What Belongs to You by Garth Greenwell
10.加思·格威：《屬於你的一切》
In What Belongs to You, an American teacher in Bulgaria encounters a captivating hustler named Mitko in a public bathroom, setting into motion an ambiguously transactional relationship marked by both tenderness and brutality, connection and isolation. What Belongs to You speaks of desire and the lives of those who desire with exquisite specificity and power, and will haunt you long after you turn the final page.
在本書中，一位在保加利亞的美國教師在公共浴室遇到了一個名叫Mitko的妓女，引發了一場模糊的關係轉變——溫柔與狂野、聯結與分離。該書以獨特有力的筆觸描述了渴望以及人們渴望的生活，直到你關上最後一頁也揮之不去。
