The Cyberpunk franchise is the ultimate comeback story. After being nearly sued into the ground for releasing a broken game, Cyberpunk 2077 slowly rebuilt its reputation with the help of a series of bug-fixes, aided by the modding community. Just when it seemed that the game’s shelf life was set to expire, the franchise released Cyberpunk: Edgerunners, a groundbreaking anime miniseries from Studio Trigger. The 10 episode series left viewers with broken hearts, whirling imaginations, and a hunger for more. If you or an anime studio you know is looking for the next Cyberpunk: Edgerunners material, check out these 10 sci-fi books.
Neuromancer
Spoiler alert: William Gibson’s Neuromancer already IS Cyberpunk: Edgerunners. It’s also Ghost In The Shell, Akira, and basically every other cyberpunk title in recent memory. While Gibson didn’t singlehandedly code the genre into being, his Sprawl Trilogy hacked into pop culture consciousness and spread the cyperpunk virus far and wide. Set in Night City (sound familiar?) the first of the trilogy concerns a washed up hacker named Case who is contracted for a “one last job” style digital heist by a mysterious ex-military figure. He’s accompanied by a “razorgirl” named Molly Millions, with cybernetic blades grafted beneath her fingers. The pair strike up a stilted romance while embarking on their chaotic neutral jaunt across the metaverse, haunted by the voice of a strange AI that may be pulling the digital strings from afar.
This Is How You Lose The Time War
While not cyberpunk per-se, This Is How You Lose The Time War by Amal El-Mohtar and Max Gladstone is a sprawling techno-romance sure to break your recently healed heart – patchworked together after the devastation that was David and Lucy’s love. The novel starts with a similar enemies to lovers vibe, as Red and Blue are two agents on opposite sides of a temporal war. As they vault across time spoiling each other’s plans to secure future victories for their respective side, they begin to leave little notes for one another. Notes that begin as taunts, evolve into casual conversation, and finally bloom into scorching declarations of love. Should Studio Trigger be in the market for another tender, tech-centric, and ultimately tragic tale of doomed romance between agents of chaos – this story is the obvious choice.
Transmetropolitan
If you thought Edgerunners was pessimistic, Warren Ellis’ Transmetropolitan turns the cynical dial up to eleven through the tale of Spider Jerusalem – a cracked out journalist with a penchant for sniffing out stories and hard drugs. In a not so distant future world of social decay and excess, Spider attempts administer muck-slinging justice against the movers and shakers who suck civilization dry. Armed with a bizarre array of weaponry including a gun that makes any target literally loosen their bowels, Spider wades through the a 23rd century societal swamp – high on his own supply of black humor, existential ennui, and desire to watch the modern world burn.
Synners
Synners by Pat Cardigan is the story of a future drowned in media, where the masses tread the digital waters of an endless stream of content downloaded straight into their brains. Humanity has fallen victim to a meta-verse on steroids, where plugging in and dropping out are the only two ways that people spend their time. Unless of course you’re one of the “synners” a group of hackers that get their cyber kicks by digitally twisting downloaded media, causing corrupted content to spread across society’s hive mind like a computer virus. The synners and David’s crew of technological misfits are birds of a digital feather.
Blackfish City
Sam J. Miller’s Blackfish City is Cyberpunk: Edgerunners if you freeze dried it, smashed its tech to bits, and shipped it off to the frozen shores of the Arctic. After global society is undone by a series of climate disasters, the remnants of civilization build themselves a floating city in the Arctic Circle. While the metropolis represents leaps and bounds in terms of human technology, the people within it have regressed back to the dark days of a resource hungry past. Ruled by oligarchs and crime lords, the city soon becomes a cyberpunk republic based around social class, but hope soon arrives in the strangest of forms: a woman riding an orca with a polar bear by her side. The mysterious orcamancer spurs on dramatic societal changes, leading a resistance movement that will turn the frigid city on its frostbitten ear. If Edgerunners‘ Lucy rode into Night City on a whale and staged a resistance, you’d have this novel.
The Space Between Worlds
The Space Between Worlds by Micaiah Johnson is the story of a parallel world – multiple in fact. Humanity has uncovered a way to traverse between realities, provided that the traveler’s alternate is dead in the world they intend to visit. Cara has a cushy corporate job collecting data from other worlds – uniquely qualified because 372 of her alternate selves are dead already in their respective, war torn realities. After one of her last remaining doppelgängers dies mysteriously, Cara is drawn into a corporate conspiracy that rocks her class-divided world. Imagine an alternate Cyberpunk reality where Lucy made a living as a corpo, only to launch into a full blown identity crisis and tender her resignation, effective immediately – because her life depends on it.
Autonomous
Autonomous by Annalee Newitz is the story of a pill slinging pirate named Jack, who sells black market drugs out of the back of a submarine (as one does). While Jack has noble intentions, her actions result in less than stellar consequences: one of her stolen drugs is causing a serious case of workaholism in its takers – an affliction that is causing many to literally work themselves to death. Meanwhile, Jack is being hunted down by a buddy-cop duo that consists of a military robot and its handler – who are secretly falling in love. Wild, whacky, and ultimately stitched together by the fiberoptic cables of heart’s devotion, Autonomous needs an anime adaptation as fast as internet connection allows.
Hard Reboot
Hard Reboot by Django Wexler is part Edgerunners, part Gundam – all mecha cyberpunk chaos. The stage is set on old-Earth, made irrelevant by humanity’s ventures across the stars. Researcher Kas has been tasked by her university to mine Earth’s date, but things go awry when she’s sucked into the world of mecha arena battles instead. After loosing her alma mater’s money betting on giant robot bout, Kas embarks on a quest across old Earth’s criminal underworld to make ends – both financial and plot-related – meet. Seriously, how has no one adapted this into an anime yet?
Snow Crash
Love Cyberpunk: Edgerunners but find “David” to be an underwhelming name for a main character? Allow me to introduce you to Hiro Protagonist, the hero protagonist of the cyberpunk epic Snow Crash. When not working as a pizza delivery guy for the mob, Hiro moonlights as a freelance hacker. After discovering a mysterious virus called Snow Crash, Hiro becomes obsessed with cracking the code – which is based on strings of ancient Sumerian script. David could have learned a thing or two from Hiro Protagonist, for starters, maybe he should have used his head to solve problems instead of body destroying cybernetic modifications that slowly drove him insane while his loved ones helplessly watched? Just a thought.
Infomocracy
Winston Churchill once said that the best argument against democracy is a five minute conversation with the average voter, but Malka Ann Older’s Infomocracy might make an even more compelling case. Her novel’s world is governed via “microdemocracy” – where global citizens vote in political blocks tallied by a “neutral” tech company. Sounds like a bad idea to trust Meta with your vote? You’d be right. The plot revolves around three separate political agents colored various shades of morality – that somehow all mix into grey. Ken is an idealist who wants to rework the political system to support transparency and fairness. Mishima is a tech company operative working to control election outcomes for her corporate handlers. Domaine wants to tear the whole broken system down and build it anew. Imagine if David, Kiwi and Rebecca all belonged to separate political factions and turned their intellectual guns on each other – then you’d have this novel.
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