What are your favourite spaceships from literature?

[BAYLOR]

The Rimfire with it blink drive and blink misses weapons . This ship can be found in the Zach Hughes novel Goldstar.

 

[Rodders]

I quite liked the Voidhawks from Peter F. Hamilton's Nights Dawn Trilogy.

I vaguely remember a chapter early in the Reality Dysfunction of one being born in the atmosphere of a Jovian planet. I may be misremembering, but it was a pretty cool idea to me at the time.

 

[Don]

From the original Star Wars book - the Death Star ("not a moon")

Reminiscent of my own favorite, Perry Rhodan's Stardust II:

Although the Han ship rep-rays radiating from ionomagnetic coils located amidships in Wings over Tomorrow (Nowlan) always captured my imagination, they're anti-gravity and earth bound versus spaceships.

 

[BAYLOR]

Reminiscent of my own favorite, Perry Rhodan's Stardust II:

Although the Han ship rep-rays radiating from ionomagnetic coils located amidships in Wings over Tomorrow (Nowlan) always captured my imagination, they're anti-gravity and earth bound versus spaceships.

Id love to see that one on the big screen !

 

[CupofJoe]

The psychic alive and sentient [or is that sapient?] living ships from Julian May's Saga of the Exiles. They sounded so cool and almost cuddly, even if they were thousands of feet long.

 

[Ray Zdybrow]

IMT, "Insterstellar Masters of Trade", from James Blish. As far as names go, "But The Sky, My Lady! The Sky!" from Ken McLeod's Learning The World.
Looks like Ken was trying to outdo IMB

 

[Ray Zdybrow]

...but the "Heart Of Gold" takes some beating. "Glad to be of ser-vice!"

 

[Rodders]

After reading Iain M. Banks's Surface Detail last year, i think my favourite spaceship from literatiree has to be the Abominator Class Offensive Unit "Falling Outside The Normal Moral Contraints".

 

[psikeyhackr]

The starship from The City and the Stars by Arthur C Clarke. A personal space yacht with a robot pilot.

 

[Fiberglass Cyborg]

Nostalgia for Infinity - "Revelation Space". Magnificently Gothic, and really built to last.
Mercy of Kalr - from the sequels to "Ancillary Justice." An interesting setting / character: her crew all pretend to be slaved meatpuppets to make her feel better.
Rama - A.C. Clarke's giant alien habitat ship.
The Consul's ship from the Hyperion quartet. It has an extendable balcony for his piano. Nuff said.
Not sure it's a favourite as such, but I find Grey Area the most memorable of the Culture ships.
A couple of foundly-remembered juveniles: the rickety old freighter Dragonfall 5, from Brian Earnshaw's series of that name;
and Starstormer, a ship made from a hollowed-out asteroid by kids in Nicholas Fisk's "Starstormers."

 

[Danny McG]

Also Trumpet from Stephen Donaldson's Gap series

 

[AllanR]

Field Circus in Accelerando --because it felt plausible.

 

[Fiberglass Cyborg]

Field Circus in Accelerando --because it felt plausible.

Aye, the coke-can sized embassy ship! Stross has a few interesting ship ideas. I like Rachel Mansour's nuclear lifeboat from "Singularity Sky," and the flying church full of skeletons in "Neptune's Brood."

 

[Pyan]

The Pride of Chanur - CJ Cherryh, for its (probably) realistic portrayal of hyperdrive and the machinery and crew problems in using it.

The Skylark of Space - EE 'Doc' Smith. Well, just because. Nice to see a cover illustration where the artist seems to have actually read the book...

 

[Rodders]

I've been looking through the interwebs for some interpretations for Culture ships. These artworks by Alex Jay Brady on Art Station were pretty cool, I thought. The influence of modern technology is apparent.



I especially liked these ones by Sebastien Garnier were especially nice.

 

[Rodders]

Having just read Inhibitor Phase by Alistair Reynolds, I have to add the Scythe to the list of sexy ship in literature.