99-Cent Science Fiction Classics for Your Kindle

Looking to stretch that dollar and read some good, old-fashioned science fiction? Here are a few SF classics available in the Kindle store, all priced at $0.99 or less (note, you can probably find these for free at Project Gutenberg and other non-Amazon ebook sites, so if you don't mind a couple extra steps, that's an option too!):

The War of the Worlds by HG Wells

The War of the Worlds is an American classic written by H.G. Wells and published in 1898. No one would have believed in the last years of the nineteenth century that this world was being watched keenly and closely by intelligences greater than man's...' So begins H. G. Wells' classic novel in which Martian lifeforms take over planet Earth. As the Martians emerge, they construct giant killing machines - armed with heatrays - that are impervious to attack. Advancing upon London they destroy everything in their path. Everything, except the few humans they collect in metal traps. Victorian England is a place in which the steam engine is state-of-the-art technology and powered flight is just a dream. Mankind is helpless against the killing machines from Mars, and soon the survivors are left living in a new stone age. 

John Carter of Mars Series by Edgar Rice Burroughs

John Carter of Mars is a series of books written by Edgar Rice Burroughs. It is currently being turned into a film produced by Disney and directed by Andrew Stanton (director of the critically acclaimed WALL-E and Finding Nemo)

The first three books in the series were told from the point of view of John Carter; many books followed the first three, but frequently were written in third person. The entire series is eleven volumes and titled the “Barsoom” series.

This eBook contains the first three books in the series. It also contains an easy to navigate table of contents.

The books included in this collection are as follows:
A Princess of Mars
The Gods of Mars
The Warlord of Mars 

Flatland (Flatland )

Unless you're a mathematician, the chances of you reading any novels about geometry are probably slender. But if you read only two in your life, these are the ones. Taken together, they form a couple of accessible and charming explanations of geometry and physics for the curious non-mathematician. Flatland, which is also available under separate cover, was published in 1880 and imagines a two-dimensional world inhabited by sentient geometric shapes who think their planar world is all there is. But one Flatlander, a Square, discovers the existence of a third dimension and the limits of his world's assumptions about reality and comes to understand the confusing problem of higher dimensions. The book is also quite a funny satire on society and class distinctions of Victorian England.

The further mathematical fantasy, Sphereland, published 60 years later, revisits the world of Flatland in time to explore the mind-bending theories created by Albert Einstein, whose work so completely altered the scientific understanding of space, time, and matter. Among Einstein's many challenges to common sense were the ideas of curved space, an expanding universe and the fact that light does not travel in a straight line. Without use of the mathematical formulae that bar most non-scientists from an understanding of Einstein's theories, Sphereland gives lay readers ways to start comprehending these confusing but fundamental questions of our reality. 

The Island of Doctor Moreau by HG Wells

A shipwreck in the South Seas, a palm-tree paradise where a mad doctor conducts vile experiments, animals that become human and then "beastly" in ways they never were before--it's the stuff of high adventure. It's also a parable about Darwinian theory, a social satire in the vein of Jonathan Swift (Gulliver's Travels), and a bloody tale of horror. Or, as H. G. Wells himself wrote about this story, "The Island of Dr. Moreau is an exercise in youthful blasphemy. Now and then, though I rarely admit it, the universe projects itself towards me in a hideous grimace. It grimaced that time, and I did my best to express my vision of the aimless torture in creation." This colorful tale by the author of The Time Machine, The Invisible Man, and The War of the Worlds lit a firestorm of controversy at the time of its publication in 1896.

In the Year 2889 by Jules Verne

In the Year 2889 was first published in the Forum, February, 1889. It was published in France the next year. Although published under the name of Jules Verne, it is now believed to be chiefly if not entirely the work of Jules Verne's son, Michel Verne. In any event, many of the topics in the article echo Jules Verne's ideas. 

Valley of Dreams by Stanley G. Weinbaum

"Valley of Dreams" is a science fiction novelet by Stanley G. Weinbaum. Originally published in the November 1934 issue of "Wonder Stories," "Valley of Dreams" was Weinbaum's second published story, a sequel to his classic, "A Martian Odyssey".