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Unanswered Questions

7,291 questions with no upvoted or accepted answers
52 votes
0 answers
3k views

Looking for science fiction assassination story with mysterious girl

For years I've been looking for a short science fiction story about a man who was released from a prison planet in order to assassinate a candidate for galactic president. He does this on a space ...
49 votes
1 answer
3k views

Novel about an immortal man exposed by world government relates his life through history

I read the book from my local library in the early- to mid- seventies. It was hardcover (library bound) and the dust jacket had a printed burlap or canvas background. The back flap mentioned that the ...
43 votes
1 answer
1k views

Story about Galactic authorities confining humanity to the solar system

I'm looking for a story I once read, in which Humanity sends out a space ship to try leaving the Solar System, and it is promptly destroyed by a military ship belonging to the Galactic Empire, which ...
41 votes
0 answers
2k views

Humorous sci-fi book with a quirky space captain where everyone is turning into "glass"

I posted this question on another website, but I've yet to find the name of the book. I remember some very specific details, but nothing I can type into a search engine (I've tried). Here are the ...
40 votes
0 answers
587 views

Short story where the stars are eyes

A short story I read several years ago in either Analog or Asimov's Science Fiction, probably between 2011 and 2013. In the story there's a 4th spatial dimension whose axes are skew, so that things ...
39 votes
0 answers
1k views

Story about man unable to wake up from dream

I am looking for a story which I read a long time back but cannot recall the name. The plot line was: In a futuristic world, there are dream parlors which provide sleep with dream services. The ...
37 votes
0 answers
1k views

Futuristic world where reality is humanity's plaything and God is in a zoo

This is a novel I read in 2015. It was an older book. The cover was black and hardcover. Don't remember any specific details. The book was in English. I believe it was from the 1980s or ‘90s. It was ...
36 votes
0 answers
2k views

A space story about a desert planet and a cup of water

I read this story over 15 years ago. It is probably a lot older. I read it in Serbian magazine (Politikin Zabavnik) but I think that the language of the original is in English. It's a short story, ...
36 votes
0 answers
1k views

Old SF novel, set on a military ship, one character can't order spaghetti and meatballs because of sudden mid-voyage rationing?

This one is a real longshot. I won't be surprised if nobody can identify it. I read this book sometime in the early-to-mid-1980s. Science fiction novel, checked out from a public library, written in ...
36 votes
1 answer
1k views

Does the movie described in Flowers for Algernon actually exist?

In Flowers for Algernon (by D. Keyes) (1966) there is a passage describing a movie that main protagonist was watching: A psychological film about a man and woman apparently in love but actually ...
34 votes
0 answers
713 views

Short story about a man in a madhouse who asks the guard for a cigarette and tells him his story about having swapped bodies before

I am searching for a short story about a man locked in a madhouse who swaps his body with the guard/doctor while he tells him the story about his own body being swapped. I remember the following: ...
29 votes
0 answers
720 views

What species are the skulls seen in Dr. McCoy's office from?

Dr. McCoy, aka Bones, has a couple of weird skulls in his office, as seen in the following picture from the episode "Is There in Truth No Beauty?" (they are highlighted with red arrows and ...
29 votes
0 answers
898 views

What is the Galactic Senate emblem meant to depict?

Most of the emblems used throughout Star Wars are abstract geometric symbols, often with a radial symmetry pattern. According to the answers to this question, they have a spiritual/religious origin. ...
29 votes
0 answers
547 views

Short story about an elite that has mentally regressed due to assistive AI technologies

I came upon a comment describing a scifi short story where reliance on technology meant to improve appearance and demeanor has led to mental regression and AI control of the upper class that employs ...
29 votes
0 answers
757 views

SciFi Short Story about an immortal man digging through an asteroid to meet a woman

Short story from the 80's or 90's, I saw someone asking about this on another forum but never got an answer. I've been curious ever since. The story is set in a decadent future where everyone lives ...

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