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I'll search for highly-reviewed recent science fiction novels to give you the best current recommendations.Based on the recent reviews and awards, here are some excellent science fiction novels to recommend to your friend: ## Top Picks from 2024: **The Ministry of Time** by Kaliane Bradley A debut novel combining time-travel romance with workplace comedy, roommate drama, espionage, and temporal physics. The Los Angeles Times praised it as a smart, gripping work that's also a feast for the senses, calling it edgy, playful and thought-provoking. **Translation State** by Ann Leckie This complete collection of short fiction includes both fantasy and science fiction stories, featuring everything from flash fiction to creation myths from the Imperial Radch universe. Leckie is a multiple Hugo and Nebula Award winner. **In Ascension** by Martin MacInnes Described as glorious, this novel explores humanity's existence as the original science-fiction story full of wonder and awe. **The Water Outlaws** by S.L. Huang A Hugo Award winner that combines a boisterous martial-arts epic with an intricate heist story and tale of resistance against tyrannical institutions, with scenes of intricate combat written with effortless clarity and breathless pacing. **Master Slave Husband Wife** by Andrea Hairston Set in a future with nostalgia militias and darknet lords, this novel follows Cinnamon Jones as she runs the Next World Festival with help from AI creations trained on her ancestors' memories. These books showcase diverse approaches to SF—from time travel to space opera to near-future speculation—all with strong critical reception from 2024.