AKICOLJ: A book for tom

[coalescent]

The esteemed Mr Anderson passes on this request for book recommendations:

... an SF book for a reading group - needs to be something that non-SF readers would appreciate, not too hard to read, something to get them started with SF. Any ideas? Also needs to be in cheap-ish paperback I suppose.

The need for it to be readily available in paperback probably implies something fairly recent; it needs to be science fiction, not fantasy; and obviously, it needs to be good. Tom is already suggesting The Separation, The Prestige, and ("through gritted teeth") Cloud Atlas. What else should be on this list? (Tom notes that he will find and kill, horribly, anyone who suggests Air.)

(On a separate note, for anyone who might be interested my books-read-in-2006 roundup is here.)

EDIT: Tom has listed the suggestions so far here.

Comments

[despotliz.livejournal.com]

Spares uses one of the same central ideas, ie clones who exist only to provide spare organs for donation. Not really a revolutionary idea, and the rest of the book is completely different.

Never Let Me Go I thought was shite as far as the SF went, and pretty rubbish otherwise, yes.

[i-ate-my-crusts.livejournal.com]

I read the two last year with barely a pause between. Despite liking MMS's other stuff, I thought Spares was ...well, not terribly well written. I though NLMG was tightly controlled, but still not uite controlled enough to stop me googling and asking questions of the air at random intervals.