Why was American space adventure fiction so bland in the 2000s?

[CmdrShep2154]

Back in the 2000s much American space adventure literature was bland gung ho bug hunt stuff with 1 dimensional characters and a cringe worthy worldview.

The best space adventures during the 2000s were from British Authors. Alastair Reynolds, Iain M. Banks, Neal Asher, Peter F. Hamilton, etc.

The British dared to dream of space and the future in the 2000s! The British dared to see outer space as a place filled with wonder, awe, and unique alien lifeforms rather than a place filled with war and bugs!

But since James S.A. Corey's "The Expanse" series shown up back in 2011 there has been a boom in space adventure by American authors set in new and creative sci fi futures.

The characters are better. The science is better. The worlds are much more imaginative. They are far less overboard with the excessive worldview of Baen. The worldviews of these new sci fi authors are much more nuanced.


I wish we had stuff like this during the 2000s. It would have been nice if an American author had given the book world it's own equivalent of "Mass Effect" back during the 2000s.

 

[Looney]

I wish we had stuff like this during the 2000s. It would have been nice if an American author had given the book world it's own equivalent of "Mass Effect" back during the 2000s.

I'm sure hundreds of American authors tried. I mean you can't force a publisher to put your book out. As a matter of fact I'm certain most of the more recent titles you mentioned could have been published at any point during the .... a... dark time period you mentioned. But like everything, the money wasn't in the genre because the mindset of those whom might have been able to do something about it.

OMG I wish I was a reader. I've just never been able to get into reading because 1. my eyes don't work well as a team and 2. I just fall asleep when I try. And I'm going to throw in a 3. I've recently decided is a big part of it - I just can't get in a comfortable position.

 

[Springer]

There were plenty of great American sf authors around in the 2000s. Vernor Vinge, Robert Sawyer, Neal Stephenson, Kim Stanley Robinson, Walter Jon Williams and others. Ok, maybe they didn't always write space opera (well, Walter Jon Williams did, check out his Dread Empire Trilogy) but SF has always come in waves and trends, and maybe in the 2000s American writers were less interested in space opera and more into cyberpunk, thrillers, and social questions to do with technology. Those British authors you mention mostly started out in the 90s, but look at younger British SF writers and it feels like there's a lot less space opera whereas the American authors are taking over in that department.

I think for me, the main difference between British and American space opera is that the American stuff is often more militarised, and indeed military science fiction is its own genre. Even B5 is militarised. The Expanse is an exception to that, though there is some militarisation in it with Bobbie and the Martian navy.

 

[KoshFan]

There were plenty of great American sf authors around in the 2000s. Vernor Vinge, Robert Sawyer, Neal Stephenson, Kim Stanley Robinson, Walter Jon Williams and others.

Octavia Butler springs to mind.