Aliens and Alien Societies (Science Fiction Writing Series)

Rating:
Summary: Fascinating guide to help any science fiction writer.
Review: Excellent review of important considerations that every science fiction writer should think about before creating aliens and their societies. The book provides guidelines to ensure the the writer's creations conform to known science and tips on how to "create" pausible science to support the science fiction writer's intentions. Included is a biography of fiction and non-fiction to support the author's points and provide the reader with background research

Rating:
Summary: What is Alien?
Review: I don't feel this is the strongest book in the Science Fiction Writing Series, but it is still a good resource. The book isn't a step-by-step "How to Create Aliens" guide, so you might be disappointed if you buy it for that reason. It is more a book to help you "rethink" what you consider alien and opens you up to ideas about what makes a being/society alien to us as humans.

Rating:
Summary: What is Alien?
Review: I don't feel this is the strongest book in the Science Fiction Writing Series, but it is still a good resource. The book isn't a step-by-step "How to Create Aliens" guide, so you might be disappointed if you buy it for that reason. It is more a book to help you "rethink" what you consider alien and opens you up to ideas about what makes a being/society alien to us as humans.

Rating:
Summary: Light on useful information
Review: I wanted this book in order to help me design alien races that would appear scientifically credible in a science-fiction universe. After having read its 220 pages what can I say? All the useful info could take a mere dozen pages.

There is lot of advice that could really be summarized like this: 1) be logical and think about the environment before inventing your race's characteristics; 2) read all you can about ethology; 3) Humans are obviously a scientifically credible race, thus in creating humanoid races you cannot be wrong. Ah great! I am glad to have read a whole book to learn just that. Then, here and there are a few tid bits of info really interesting, but in the end most of the text teach you very little on this subject.

Overall, I found this book disappointing.

Rating:
Summary: hooked on aliens worked for me!
Review: I was haveing the hardest time trying to my Alien species believable. This book helped. It is not inteded to be mythical or fantastical, but a referance. If take as that it is a very helpful guidline to building alien lifeforms and societys.

Rating:
Summary: hooked on aliens worked for me!
Review: I was haveing the hardest time trying to my Alien species believable. This book helped. It is not inteded to be mythical or fantastical, but a referance. If take as that it is a very helpful guidline to building alien lifeforms and societys.

Rating:
Summary: Hmm...Interesting
Review: It's generally considered impossible and absurd to write the perfect book on imagination. That's exactly what "Aliens and Alien Societies" is all about. This should not be taken as a book of guidelines on how to use your imagination. It simply gives you scientifically-believable ideas on how to make aliens that you come up with a bit more plausible.

Rating:
Summary: A great book for fans and would be authors.
Review: The book is not just about aliens and alien societies. It also deals with making proper stars and planets and what alien science might be like. Could of used more details on the subject of planet building, but there are other works that get into the nuts-and-bolts of that subject. This book touches lightly on alien culture, view points and history, not just the science of building an alien creature. Also, some of it might be outdated with our increasing knowledge of other planets and solar systems. It looks more and more like our idea of planet forming and how systems form might be slightly incorrect (if not out right wrong). That is why I held back a star.

Rating:
Summary: Over detailed book bogs down writers
Review: This book, though well writen, has to be one of the worst on the subject of writing. I must say it does go into a great deal of detail, but that is where it stops. The book is long and drawn out- definitely one to put you asleep at night. It goes into far to much detail on creating "believeable" species, leaving little to the imagination. This is not a good book if you are into using your imagination while you write

Rating:
Summary: Worthwhile but short on detail
Review: This is a good overview of the basics of realistic SF aliens. However, I found it a bit too basic, and wished for more specifics. But the subject matter is just so broad and protean that anything more than a general overview like this would be very hard to achieve. Perhaps the most valuable portion of the book is its bibliography, referring the reader to numerous fiction and nonfiction works offering more detail. In many ways, this is as much a guide to the mechanics of writing about aliens as to the physics, psychology etc. of designing them, and it contains some good insights. I found the chapter on alien languages pretty interesting. Overall, it's certainly a useful reference, though I'm sure that supplementing it with works from the bibliography is necessary to get a fuller picture.