Ask Lemmy

Pretty much anything in the "Known Space" series by Larry Niven (et al - there are works by some other authors in that space).

The End of Eternity (Asimov) might be short enough for you, and has some interesting ideas about the implications of time travel.

Two for you:

《The Wild Girls》 - Ursula K Le Guin

《Piranesi》 - Susanna Clarke

And if you read fast I reckon you could do China Miévilles 《The City and the City》 or Tade Thompson's 《Rosewater》 in a day.

Edit bonus: anything by Douglas Adams.

I reccomend hopping on [email protected]

The Locked Tomb series is refreshing. It’s weird, it’s fun, it’s dark, and it’s trash, but it’s trash that the author is having fun with.

Discworld is also just amazing

I would recommend checking out audio books as a medium for reading. It allows you to increase the speed to whatever works for you, so 2x for me, and listen to a lot more in a day. It also frees you to listen at any times you have nothing cognitive happening, so dishes, washing, cleaning, etc.

As for single day books, the first book of the Bobiverse series by Dennis E Taylor. I loved the whole series including the recently released 5th book and the first is only 9.5 hours at normal speed, so about 4.75 at double speed.

Also All Systems Red is the first book in the Murderbot series by Martha Wells. The perspective of a SecUnit, a type of sentient cyborg, which has hacked its own programming and removed its limiters so it can act freely. This means no guard rails, no rules, no limits, which results in lots of TV shows being watched and avoiding humans. It is snarky, fun, and interesting. It comes in at 3.5 hours normal time, so 1.75 at double speed.

Recommend high quality short stories. Edgar Allen Poe has a collection that is some of the most thrilling, mysterious and fun, imaginative, adventurous, grotesque and other depending on the story. https://www.amazon.com/Edgar-Allan-Poe-Complete-Collection/dp/1453643141

Robert Louis Stevenson was also a fantastic writer of short stories.https://www.amazon.com/Complete-Short-Stories-Robert-Stevenson/dp/030680882X

I like short stories sometimes as I can't commit to a larger read.

"The Theory and Practice of Oligarchical Collectivism" is a hell of read, as well as "The Navidson Record".

But "The Necronomicon" is my favorite fictional book, I think.

Others may have mentioned it (happy to see Terry Pratchett getting a lot of love), but would definitely recommend anything by Vonnegut! Love his writing style and his approaches to humor and world building. Slaughterhouse Five is a great one, as is Sirens of Titan.

Also, not certain how well they hold up, but I really enjoyed the Redwall series back in the day! I was much younger at the time, though.

I second someone else suggestion: the murderbot diaries. It's great.
Most of the books people here are recommending are fairly lengthy, but you can get through the first murderbot book in a dedicated evening.

If you're into short stories the Illustrated Man by Ray Bradbury is a good one.

And while I didn't read much Issac Asimov myself my wife, who loves reading but dislikes sci-fi, read one of his books (Foundation) in a day and said he's an excellent writer.

Any early Alistair MacLean...

Guns of Navaronne

Where Eagles Dare

When Eight Bells Toll

Night Without End

Puppet on a String

Louis Lamour's westerns are complete popcorn and fun to read

C. S. Forester's Horatio Hornblower books

Not sure about the length, but Vernor Vinge's Rainbows End is one of my favorite works of speculative fiction that really aged well so far.

Robert Silverberg's "The man in the maze" is a cool science-fiction book based on the Greek play Philoctetes. Iirc it's a very short story (maybe about one or two hundred pages), I don't remember the exact length but I recall reading it in one sitting. It is a very character-driver story where the "maze" itself is an allegory about mankind, isolation and disability, but it is very much enjoyable as a casual read as well.

The protagonist ("man in the maze") is an astronaut who has been somehow cursed to always radiate its emotions in such a way that others, even his family, find repulsive, so he self-exiles to a remote and long-dead planet to live the rest of his life in isolation. But when an alien species makes hostile contact with humans, he is needed again, as his "curse" is the only way to properly communicate with them and maybe convince them that humans are sentient beings and thus their equals.

"Short enough to finish in a day" seems pretty tough for me, but maybe I read slowly.

Short story books are good for casual reading in short sessions. Robot Dreams by Asimov, or Welcome to the Monkey House by Vonnegut. I used to carry each of those around and read a short story while waiting at a restaurant or at the DMV or whatever.

I really liked Altered Carbon. Approachable sci fi with drugs, violence, sex, politics, and of course high tech ideas like flying cars, AI hotels, digital consciousness.

The Broken Earth series, Enders game series (the first 5 books about Ender), American Gods, An Absolutely Remarkable Thing and the follow up A Beautifully Foolish Endeavor, The Kingkiller Chronicle (we've been waiting 10+ yrs for the final book 3, some folks are pretty irked atp, but it will be ok). If you want YA beach reading, anything by Seanan McGuire / Mira Grant for easy fun books about fairies, cryptids, and zombies.

My favorite easy fiction that helps me unwind is Agatha Christie mysteries. There is a reason she is the greatest mystery ŵritwr of all time. She sets up compelling situations and makes her way to a damn satisfying conclusion by the end.

A few of her shorter but still excellent stories: The Secret Adversary N or M The Unexpected Guest 3 Blind Mice Halloween Party Murder of Roger Akcroyd

Also if you like Mysteries I have to plug my all time favorite: 7 1/2 Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle

It is a great mystery in which the protagonist wakes up with no memories and has 8 chances to solve a murder.

A couple of my favorite books are probably longer than a day’s read:

• Sirens of Titan - Kurt Vonnegut (319p)
• The Watermelon King - Daniel Wallace (240p)

"Best" often is a literary work that can be slow to read and/or very long. You want stuff that is short and quick, which is fine, I read a lot of fanfiction for that purpose. But I'm going to recommend Pohl and Kornbluth's "The Space Merchants" and their other short novels from that era (1950s). Their cynicism is absolutely prescient. The Space Merchants is about a world run by advertising agencies. A quick read while hard hitting.

I have just the book for you!... Ah, finish in a day, nevermind.

The Lady Astronaut series by Mary Robinette Kowal. The first book is called The Calculating Stars. Basically, an alternate history where (spoiler for the opening chapter)

spoiler

a meteor wipes out the east coast and kick-starts climate change, causing the Space Age to start 10 years early.

It follows a Jewish computer (a woman who literally runs calculations for NASA, as seen in Hidden Figures) who wants to become an astronaut, and her struggles with the racism and misogyny of the 1950s.