Ask HN: Do you know any amazing space epics?

Neil Stephenson's Anathem. Maybe not tons of actual space bits, but most of the rest of it matches what you want.

"A Fire Upon The Deep" by Vernor Vinge.

The Foundation series.

I'd recommend the Great Three : Asimov, Clarke, Heinlein

Alastair Reynolds "Revelation Space" series is fantastic. He also writes some great stand alone pieces (House of Suns for example). He is also quite strict about being hard sci-fi (no faster than light travel for example).

Also The Culture series by Iain M. Banks is pretty amazing but tends to be multiple independent stories within the same universe. He is also much softer on the science (quite a lot How does it work? Quite well thank you descriptions).

Ahhh, I've only ever read one SF series that left me with the same sense of wonder as the Lord of the Rings. You just have to try Hyperion/Fall of Hyperion, by Dan Simmons. At first I thought it was ridiculous space opera, with loads of jargon and technical impossibilities that just made it read like 3rd-rate SF. That is right up until the point where Simmons blindsighted me by making all of that stuff an absolutely necessary part of the story. I can be more explicit without giving out a few spoilers, but I've read a lot of SF, and this is really a cut above the rest.

thoughtful, accurate and spiritual? Sounds like battlefield earth to me.

William Gibson: Neuromancer, Count Zero, Mona Lisa Overdrive Orson Scott Card: Enders Game Neil Stephenson: Snowcrash Isaac Asimov: The Foundation (series)

I am not sure these qualify as space epics, but they are all good reads.

Ian M. Banks "Culture" series.

"Matter" might be a good one to start with if you're looking for something similar to LotR.

Read Emphyrio by Jack Vance. It's just one book, but it's a fantasy book set in space. The main character is a woodcarver, but there are spaceships that travel to many inhabited worlds. Vance is one of the best authors I know to make a world feel worn, unlike the sci-fi of many other authors.

I'm a fan of Charles Stross's Accelerando. It's epic to the point where it takes place across generations. It also has the nice benefits of being free online, and you'll occasionally see cstross post here.

The Night's Dawn trilogy by Peter F Hamilton will absolutely rock your world, going by what you are asking for. After this, go for The Commonwealth Saga by the same author. You really, really are missing out on a treat, but the best thing is that you have around 6,000 pages worth of epic space opera waiting for you in those books, and I envy the fact that you have all of them still to read - as quickly as you want!

Future History series - Heinlein

Known Space series - Niven

Uplift series - Brin

Dune series - Herbert

Mars trilogy - Robinson

This isn't a series, but a set of fiction that I think fits the bill. Conveniently all of these works are available free online:

After Life: http://sifter.org/~simon/AfterLife Blindsight: http://www.rifters.com/real/Blindsight.htm Passages in the Void: http://localroger.com/

The Metamorphosis of Prime Intellect (from localroger.com) is also pretty good in the imagination expanding department but be forewarned: parts of it are very hard to read (quite gruesome).

thanks everyone. I have a few year's worth of great books to read. Thank God for HN.

For epic science fiction with huge space battles, depth of story and interesting characters you cannot miss books by David Weber, especially the Honor Harrington series