Laurence van Cott Niven is an American science fiction writer. His 1970 novel Ringworld won the Hugo, Locus, Ditmar, and Nebula awards. With Jerry Pournelle he wrote The Mote in God's Eye (1974) and Lucifer's Hammer (1977). The Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America gave him the 2015 Damon Knight Memorial Grand Master Award.
Known Space is the fictional setting of about a dozen science fiction novels and several collections of short stories by American writer Larry Niven. It has also become a shared universe in the spin-off Man-Kzin Wars anthologies. The Internet Speculative Fiction Database (ISFDB) catalogs all works set in the fictional universe that includes Known Space under the series name Tales of Known Space, which was the title of a 1975 collection of Niven's short stories. The first-published work in the series, which was Niven's first published piece, was "The Coldest Place", in the December 1964 issue of If magazine, edited by Frederik Pohl. This was the first-published work in the 1975 collection.
Ringworld is a 1970 science fiction novel by Larry Niven, set in his Known Space universe and considered a classic of science fiction literature. Ringworld tells the story of Louis Wu and his companions on a mission to the Ringworld, an enormous rotating ring, an alien construct in space 186 million miles in diameter. Niven later wrote three sequel novels and then cowrote, with Edward M. Lerner, four prequels and a final sequel; the five latter novels constitute the Fleet of Worlds series. All the novels in the Ringworld series tie into numerous other books set in Known Space. Ringworld won the Nebula Award in 1970, as well as both the Hugo Award and Locus Award in 1971.
A space settlement is a settlement in outer space, sustaining more extensively habitation facilities in space than a general space station or spacecraft. Possibly including closed ecological systems, its particular purpose is permanent habitation.
The Integral Trees is a 1984 science fiction novel by American writer Larry Niven. Like much of Niven's work, the story is heavily influenced by the setting: a gas torus, a ring of air around a neutron star. A sequel, The Smoke Ring, was published in 1987.
A megastructure is a very large artificial object, although the limits of precisely how large vary considerably. Some apply the term to any especially large or tall building. Some sources define a megastructure as an enormous self-supporting artificial construct. The products of megascale engineering or astroengineering are megastructures.
Schismatrix is a science fiction novel by Bruce Sterling, originally published in 1985. The story was Sterling's only novel-length treatment of the Shaper/Mechanist universe. Five short stories preceded the novel and are published together with it in a 1996 edition entitled Schismatrix Plus. Schismatrix was nominated for the Nebula Award for Best Novel in 1985, and the British Science Fiction Award in 1986.
"Neutron Star" is an English language science fiction short story by American writer Larry Niven. It was originally published in the October 1966 issue of Worlds of If. It was later reprinted in the collection of the same name and Crashlander. The story is set in Niven's fictional Known Space universe. It is notable for including a neutron star before their existence was widely known.
Protector is a 1973 science fiction novel by American writer Larry Niven, set in his Known Space universe. It was nominated for the Hugo in 1974, and placed fourth in the annual Locus poll for that year.
A World Out of Time is a science fiction novel by Larry Niven and published in 1976. It is set outside the Known Space universe of many of Niven's stories, but is otherwise fairly representative of his 1970s hard science fiction novels. The main part of the novel was originally serialized in Galaxy magazine as "Children of the State"; another part was originally published as the short story "Rammer". A World Out of Time placed fifth in the annual Locus Poll in 1977.
The Ringworld Engineers is a 1979 science fiction novel by American writer Larry Niven. It is the first sequel to Niven's Ringworld and was nominated for both the Hugo and Locus Awards in 1981.
The Ringworld Throne is a science fiction novel by American writer Larry Niven, first published in 1996. It is the direct sequel to his previous work The Ringworld Engineers (1980). He wrote it as a replacement after being unable to finish his contracted novel The Ghost Ships, the sequel to The Integral Trees and The Smoke Ring.
This is a list of occurrences of space elevators in fiction. Some depictions were made before the space elevator concept became fully established.
World of Ptavvs is a science fiction novel by American writer Larry Niven, first published in 1966 and set in his Known Space universe. It was Niven's first published novel and is based on a 1965 magazine story of the same name.
Starquake is a science fiction novel by American writer Robert L. Forward, published in 1985. It is a sequel to his novel Dragon's Egg. It is about the life of the Cheela civilization, creatures who live on a neutron star named Dragon's Egg, struggling to recover from a disastrous starquake.
The State is a fictional totalitarian world government in a future history that forms the back-story of three of Larry Niven's novels: A World Out of Time (1976), The Integral Trees (1984), and The Smoke Ring (1987). It is also the setting of two short stories, "Rammer" and "The Kiteman", as well as a stalled fourth novel, The Ghost Ships. After several years in development, Niven announced that The Ghost Ships would never be made and wrote The Ringworld Throne instead. The novel would have focused on a race of self-aware natural Bussard ramjets birthed in the supernova that created Levoy's Star and were returning to their place of birth to mate. According to Playgrounds of the Mind, Kendy and the kite-fliers from "The Kiteman" would have returned also.
An O'Neill cylinder is a space settlement concept proposed by American physicist Gerard K. O'Neill in his 1976 book The High Frontier: Human Colonies in Space. O'Neill proposed the colonization of space for the 21st century, using materials extracted from the Moon and later from asteroids.
A list of works by, or about, the American science fiction author Larry Niven.
Neutron stars—extremely dense remnants of stars that have undergone supernova events—have appeared in fiction since the 1960s. Their immense gravitational fields and resulting extreme tidal forces are a recurring point of focus. Some works depict the neutron stars as harbouring exotic alien lifeforms, while others focus on the habitability of the surrounding system of planets. Neutron star mergers, and their potential to cause extinction events at interstellar distances due to the enormous amounts of radiation released, also feature on occasion. Neutronium, the degenerate matter that makes up neutron stars, often turns up as a material existing outside of them in science fiction; in reality, it would likely not be stable.
