New Scientist Book Club

Delivering “some felons to a labour camp on a remote planet” … Alien Clay Shutterstock / Space creator They say …

“A world organised along very different lines to Earth” … Alien Clay Science Photo Library/Alamy “Hard” science fiction exists to …

The weather outside may be frightful but the new books inside are delighful Lechatnoir/Getty Images An Increasingly divisive politics. Media …

Is your favourite sci-fi short story in this list? Sometimes you’re in the mood for a slice of science fiction …

2024 has been a great year for sci-fi, from time travel stories to those set in space Matt Mawson/Millennium Images, UK …

Mars – the kind of place to raise your kids? ESA /MPS/OSIRIS/MPS/UPD/LAM/​IAA/RSSD/INTA/UPM/DASP/I​DA As a kind of living embodiment of the …

A reconstruction of male and female Neanderthals based on the La Chapelle-aux-Saints fossils S. ENTRESSANGLE/E. DAYNES/SCIENCE PHOTO LIBRARY Extract taken …

“There’s no moon, but we can see very well. The sky is full of stars.” The Milky Way in the …

N.K. Jemisin Laura Hanifin There’s power in threes. The rule of three, we call it in the writing world: repeat …

Compressed air now keeps beer fresh by allowing bottle tops to be pushed on firmly Shutterstock/Parilov It’s a GasMark Miodownik (Viking (UK, out …