One of my bugbears with some hard science books is that the technology is all. The writer is so in love with their vision of a shiny new world that they fail to work out what effect that technology is having on their world.
But think about the way we use tech in our real lives today. We use smartphones, tablets, the Internet as additions to our lives. We're doing things with them. We use our tech to connect with other humans, and that's what some of these books forget. We pour millions into researching something because we believe it will enhance human life. Or in the case of a psychopath he/she may pour millions into destroying people.
A few years ago I read an SF book by a well-published female author that left me feeling completely short-changed. The book's title and early chapters led me to believe it would be about a sentient starship, but it wasn't. The book got lots of praise for its shiny tech, but it left me feeling totally unsatisfied.
It felt like the tech was in search of a story, as if the author had invented all these new things and then shoved in the random wandering of a bunch of characters to justify its creation. The trouble for me was that they didn't. There was no central question or problem in the book, no main issue that was driving the narrative forward. Instead it felt like a series of vignettes of different characters and the way they used this new tech.
Writers might have been able to get away with this in the Golden Age, but today we've seen what nuclear and chemical weapons can do. We're still living with the fall out of some of that tech.
So when I read an SF story I want to see the world beyond the tech. How the people use it, and how it's shaped the way they live. Only that way lies fully-rounded and satisfying AF.
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