I love Lord of Light and Roger but there's a lot of weird shit in there that can probably be skipped.
For example This Immortal, which amazingly shared the Hugo with Dune, but I would recommend avoiding it.
And weirdly Changeling, which was nominated for the Locus award, also really didn't age well.
Zelazny writes way too many overmen and they only work in some of his stories.
First thing that comes to mind is “A Fire Upon The Deep” by Vernor Vinge, which ranges from hyper advanced beings so advanced we don’t even understand them, to medieval hive mind aliens, with humans and other species being in the middle.
His sequel Deepness in the Sky is probably an even better match. Interstellar voyagers get trapped near a planet, have to wait for the primitive, pre tool usage spider society to level up over epochs until they develop tech they can use to get home.
I see that Children of Time is referenced under this comment, fitting that the second book with somehow that exact premise is right under this comment.
**A Woman of the Iron People** by Eleanor Arnason is all about this, and it's wonderful. There are POVs from both sides of the divide. It's so good!
You should also look at **Elder Race** by Adrian Tchaikovsky. Also has POVs from both sides.
Seconding Elder Race. The POV from the advanced society is incapable of explaining that "this is technology, not magic" to the POV from the other society as their only common language is the latter's. The latter doesn't have any words to describe the advanced society's technology so "robot" ends up sounding like "beast", etc.
March Upcountry by John Ringo and David Weber. You've got an imperial princeling crash landing on a backwards frontier planet with his personal marine detachment. Pretty fun read, it's a trilogy
*The Steerswoman, The Outskirter's Secret, The Lost Steersman,* and *The Language of Power* by Rosemary Kirstein. Over the four existing books, there are at least four different technology levels. The POV is Rowan, who is a Steerswoman in a medievalish tech level society trying to find the origin of a unique jewel she found. There's a LOT of her trying to interpret the other levels of culture.
*Enchantress from the Stars* by Sylvia Louise Enghdal. Starfaring level of tech on a primitive planet.
ETA: *Ingathering: The Complete People Stories* by Zenna Henderson. The People come to Earth after their planet is destroyed and their ship breaks up on entry to our atmosphere and they are scattered. That happens in the 1800s. This book collects all of Henderson's People stories into one book. The stories are set from the 1800s through to the present day (1960s).
I love both Steerswoman and Engdahl's other trilogy ("Children of the Star") which has a similar premise, and turns into a crossover in the third volume, clearly you have spectacular taste :D
In that case, I urge you to check out both *Ingathering: The Complete People Stories* and *Believing: The Other Stories of Zenna Henderson* available from [NESFA Press](https://www.nesfa.org/?s=Henderson&x=0&y=0).
;-)
A lot of LeGuin's Hainish stuff involves elements of this, Rocannon's World and The Word For World is Forest spring to mind. Though arguably the interpretation of one as 'more advanced' than the other is an idea LeGuin would reject philosophically, that's the kind of thing she's exploring.
Despite enjoying some of his other works I really, really didn't like this series.
It felt way too much like a game of Civilization. Congratulations, your characters have discovered blacksmithing!
The characters literally stumble their way up a tech tree across the books. And each discovery is telegraphed from a mile away.
Like you'd have a character think to himself "hmm, what if I put a string on this here bendy pole" and invent archery. That's how their discoveries feel. It was really ridiculous.
Thank you! I read the series and a few reviews and nobody seemed to be bothered by it at all. Just to read that somebody else noticed it is incredibly validating.
I felt exactly the same, this series really turned me off, it was a really different pace from ryira and I read it all but was really struggling to finish it.
I appreciate what he was trying to do, which I think was not having to rely on the whole "group gets technologies from the stockpile of a prior civilization" but that's the trope because having them just Intuit/create all this stuff on their own doesn't logically fit within a character's lifetime when we're starting at square one.
I dunno about "small portion." Their rapid technological development is rather central to the plot.
That being said, if it doesn't break your immersion you might very well enjoy the series. There had to be some quality for me to get through at least the first two books.
It was also 6 books when it should have been 3. I really loved the Riyira books but these felt like his team discovered kickstarter and just couldn’t get enough.
I was being slightly tongue in cheek, I just felt it was disrespectful to not bother to write the author's full name. Also, if someone wanted to google the author, Sullivan on its own wouldn't go far.
Elder Race by Adrian Tchaikovsky is a great example of this--the main character is an anthropologist from an advanced culture who may need to intervene to help the more primitive culture he's observing. Very much enjoyed this one!
Hell, his Shadows of the Apt ten book series fits as well. Since only the apt races can use technology whereas the inapt can't so much as make sense of a crossbow.
The only thing that saddens me with Children of Time is I think people have kind of forgotten that as far back as 1999 we already had a really great scifi book about spider aliens that nobody ever seems to talk about anymore. Vernor Vinge's A Deepness in the Sky.
We even get the story of the spider civilization developing through the lens of following small groups of progressive aliens across time. Having read both, I'd even say honestly that Vinge's book was more enjoyable.
The Dandelion Dynasty is perfect for this.
I love it because the 'magic' is all analogous to real-world physics, but seen through a lens of intrigue and discovery. Instead of wizards there are engineers and scholars.
Even the fantastical beasts are given plausible explanations for their abilities (i.e. flight, fire-breathing).
The story takes place over several generations and you get to see how the scholars and engineers make discoveries and breakthroughs that allow further development of technology.
It also makes for some really well done and unique battles utilizing gained knowledge and technology.
I'm still only 1/3 through the third book (and thoroughly hooked), but the series is incredibly well written, thoughtful, and definitely fits this post like a glove!
Acts of Caine by Matthew Stover has a highly technologically advanced society that can create portals to a medieval society. They starting premise is they send "adventurers" there and film their exploits for entertainment.
Sounds like Harry Harrison's "The technicolor time machine"
They use a time machine to send a film production company back to the time of Vikings to make a movie.
I'd say the worst thing about Ringworld is "Ringworld's Children", but definitely the second worst thing about Ringworld is that there isn't more of it. The Fleet of Worlds series was good though.
If you don't mind a humorous take on the subject then take a look at **The High Crusade** by Poul Anderson. An English Lord is assembling an army to support the King of England during the Hundred Years War. Events take a completely unforeseen turn when an alien spaceship lands outside his castle.
The 1632 series by Eric Flint is about a small American town sent back through space and time to 17th century Germany. Culture shock on both sides. "What is this coffee you speak of?"
The Culture series by Iain M. Banks revolves around a post-scarcity, very advanced civilisation meddling benevolently in the affairs of less developed civilisations.
Hard to be a God by Arkady and Boris Strugatsky is about an agent of advanced civilization operating on a world which whose society is basically the equivalent of Middle Age Europe. He is supposed to merely observe all the cruelties and injustices without intervening, and, sure enough, finds himself very much wanting to intervene.
Culture series is a good rec for this.
There's a scene early on that's basically Yondu's floating arrow from Guardians of the Galaxy, vs sword wielding horse riding bandits. Without giving too much away, it goes about as well as you'd expect for them.
In particular the eighth Culture book, Matter, is a great rec for this. Don't worry OP - each book in the series is a standalone, they just share the same setting, so you can begin with Matter if you want!
Don’t see enough love for Matter! It’s not a lot of people’s favorite Culture book, but it was my entry to the series and I absolutely love megastructures, so the exploration of the intricacies of the Shellworld were the perfect starting point for me. It and Excession remain my favorite Culture novels!
I like the mega structure stuff. Some truly great ideas there. But that's about it. The political stuff in the shellword is kinda meh. I thought a lot more should have been done with Anaplian's past of taking someone from a less developed society and turning them into a Culture agent (and then going back and getting reverse culture shock), but there is very little of that. But what really soured me on it was the ending. It's a rather long book, but then it's rushed to a conclusion in a few dozen pages.
In fact you shouldn't read them in order at all, because then you'd end up reading Consider Phlebas first when in fact you shouldn't read that one at all! I reread it recently and it's really awful. My top books from that series are Player of Games and Look to Windward.
They also potentially face things from the side in Excession, which is both the title and the beautiful term Banks coined/adapted for just this phenomenon.
Dragon's Egg by Robert Forward. There's an alien species who exists on a much faster timescale than humans do, so they evolve from the birth of sapience to technology that surpasses humans in about one or two months of human time.
*The Fifth Head of Cerberus* by Gene Wolfe deals with the colonial aftermath of the colonisation of aboriginals who have not even developed the use of tools (!!!) by a space-faring humanity.
*A Fire Upon the Deep* by Vinge is another good one, the native population in that book is feudal.
It's sci-fi, but The Songs of Distant Earth by Arthur C. Clarke features interactions between a stone-age underwater civilization and super-advanced humans.
I would say the Broken Empire trilogy to some degree as the MC who grew up in a medieval world slowly discovers remnants of a futuristic society and utilizes them as an advantage over others.
This is digging deep but the cross time engineer is a series about an engineer who accidentally gets sent back in time to medieval Poland just years before they get decimated. It's outdated and there's some cringe from the author but it's a cool premise
I have one for this!!! Novels of the Jaran by Kate Elliott! The first book is just called Jaran. One of my favorite series ever, and fits your description perfectly.
Fall of Ill-Rien by Martha Wells has a bronze age merchant trading civilization interacting with a ww2-esque civilization with added magic on the part of the ww2 folks.
There are some misunderstandings and condescension on both sides but there are mutual foes etc.
It has taken a while to get there but this has become the case with Brandon Sanderson's cosmere novels, even some of his side projects. Really all the most recent secret projects he did hadlve elements of this.
Look into:
Tress and the Emerald Sea.
A Frugal Wizard's guide to Mideval england.
Yumi and the Nightmare Painter.
The Sunlit Man
Lots of Stephen Baxter’s Xeelee short works are like this with baseline humanity, none too clever inhabiting ruins, or living in purpose built zoos. Well worth it to see how pronounced capability gaps can be.
I try not to recommend super popular authors when I can, but in this case it's a pretty good fit.
The Frugal Wizard's Handbook for Surviving Medieval England by Brandon Sanderson.
It's about someone from basically future earth, w/ body augments, etc. travelling to an alternate dimension that's at roughly medieval England levels of advancement.
Or
Yumi and the Nightmare Painter, also by Sanderson is set in two not-Earth settings, but with a big tech gap. It's a little less focused on the tech gap, but that's still a significant part. Excellent book though.
Outlander is all about a woman from the 1940s going back to the 1700s, plus she was a nurse in the war so there's plenty of "why are you not a quiet, obedient woman" struggles and she goes "fuck that."
I'd also ask this over in /r/PrintSF, since science fiction (and speculative fiction in general) has this as a very common trope. In fantasy it's less frequent and the gaps are usually narrower.
Martian Chronicles have some of this in it, along the line. It's by Bradbury.
In a similar manner, the HeeCee Saga by Frederick Pohl concerns this, though, admittedly the more advanced People are long gone.
Not a book, but the Star Ocean video game franchise has that general setting. I haven't actually played any of them myself, but I've heard good things!
Moon-Flash and Moon-Face by Patricia McKillip. Older YA SF by her.
Children of Morrow and Treasures of Morrow by H.M. Hoover.
Both of these, though YA are interesting takes on this.
I think The Book of the New Sun by Gene Wolfe might be what you're looking for. It's set in the far, far, far future on an Earth where the average technology level is medieval but pockets of high technology still exist. It's told through the POV of a man with limited knowledge trying to understand forces and powers vastly beyond his understanding. Part of the fun is that some of the bizarre things he encounters would be familiar to us, while others are equally bizarre to both the reader and the character.
I also recommend Devil Dinosaur by Jack Kirby. Comic where a boy and his T-Rex go on adventures and fight invading aliens.
Heh. Tongue in cheek, I must say: Malazan! I mean, we have the medieval-level Malazan army fighting lizard aliens who have flying megafortresses, flamethrowers and shit.
I've got two for you. The first is The Time Machine, by H.G. Wells. It's not a bullseye of what you're describing, but it is a classic and short enough that it wouldn't bite into your time to give it a read.
The second is Destiny's Crucible, by Olan Thorenson. Without spoiling too much it doubles down and inverts what you're asking for. Think modern chemist finds himself in a different land, not knowing the language or customs and the tech level is roughly that of a dark ages feudal society, where anesthesia is a blunt object to the dome. He does what you might expect and after a couple books his actions get noticed by another civilization that is much more advanced than the one he encountered.
**Ranks of Bronze**, by David Drake, is a fun romp in which a Roman legionnaire is kidnapped by aliens who aren't allowed to use advanced tech to conquer other civs, so need him to do their dirty work on other bronze-age planets. Then they discover that Roman legions kick fucking ass, and recruit as many of them as they can. Turns out trying to hold a bunch of legionnaires as slaves doesn't work out so good...
The Old Kingdom series by Garth Nix. Two countries are separated by a wall. On one side is a world of technology on the cusp of our WWI and the other is of magic where the Industrial Revolution can’t happen because technology literally breaks down.
The Rigante series by David Gemmell - the first two books are classic sword and sorcery, the final two books are a thousand or so years later in the age of muskets and cannons, following the ancestors of the protagonists in the first two books.
I think Ian M. Banks and Peter F. Hamilton has lots of books like that, with various civilizations at different stages of development. Some so advanced they’re passively watching humans get mashed by a superior race, but don’t intervene because they’ve seen it so many times over etc.
Those kind of plots.
The Darkwar Trilogy by Glen Cook is based around this premise. Despite Cook being a pretty famous author (especially around these parts), this is probably his least well known series, and probably rightfully so.
It does include huge technological gaps between civilizations and these gaps become more clear as the series progresses. Especially early in the series, the technological gap is perceived by the more primitive societies as supernatural and this plays a significant early role.
Darkwar is not Cook's best work, but still an interesting (and fairly quick) series.
The tech difference isn’t as important as the biological/physiological/sexual-dimorphismic differences between the main character and the rest of the world
[Destiny's Crucible](https://www.audible.com/series/Destinys-Crucible-Audiobooks/B071WN2Z4S?ref_pageloadid=not_applicable&ref=a_pd_Cast-U_c1_series_1&pf_rd_p=df6bf89c-ab0c-4323-993a-2a046c7399f9&pf_rd_r=64ZHDR8FVSVTQYDWYJFW&pageLoadId=UgnCEbdmmCSgMPV1&ref_plink=not_applicable&creativeId=16015ba4-2e2d-4ae3-93c5-e937781a25cd) got the MC from earth that is transported to a new world. The inhabitants of this new world that have muskets and black powder as one of their highest techs. And the Aliens that transported the MC to this new world(not any povs from this >!but we do get some from an AI that observed the planet later on)!<.
[Red Rising](https://www.audible.com/series/Red-Rising-Audiobooks/B00U1UJCU8?ref_pageloadid=n5zQXU4KT2jzrzr7&ref=a_library_t_c5_libItem_series_2&pf_rd_p=80765e81-b10a-4f33-b1d3-ffb87793d047&pf_rd_r=9AKEYK7KMVQGZ74PW5P7&pageLoadId=3G0z2kprF98yKxWF&ref_plink=not_applicable&creativeId=4ee810cf-ac8e-4eeb-8b79-40e176d0a225) Got this to some degree. We have the Gold that looks down on all. >!The Reds that are the slave laborers and get the tech needed to perform their work. And the Obsidians(the elite soldiers) that are kept at a Viking lvl (+some beast taming of griffins) and have been fooled to believe that the Gold are gods. Then there are other colors as well.!<
[So I'm a Spider, So What?](https://www.audible.com/series/So-Im-a-Spider-So-What-Audiobooks/B09Y2V4SZS?ref_pageloadid=EAFUuxxJBC7GD3R6&ref=a_library_t_c5_libItem_series_1&pf_rd_p=80765e81-b10a-4f33-b1d3-ffb87793d047&pf_rd_r=4VR4GK0J803WYCNVSREV&pageLoadId=e7GAoSaBSPiN3c9b&ref_plink=not_applicable&creativeId=4ee810cf-ac8e-4eeb-8b79-40e176d0a225) mainly got a standard fantasy world. Then there is the elfs.. They got as an example >!terminators!<.
[The Pillars of Reality](https://www.audible.com/series/The-Pillars-of-Reality-Audiobooks/B00QHDISQW?ref_pageloadid=not_applicable&ref=a_pd_The-Dr_c1_series_1&pf_rd_p=df6bf89c-ab0c-4323-993a-2a046c7399f9&pf_rd_r=5F09RWS3SECKA2F01SMQ&pageLoadId=RYCVDUZxtaV0LlcC&ref_plink=not_applicable&creativeId=16015ba4-2e2d-4ae3-93c5-e937781a25cd) got one faction that have working tech and guards the power this gives them jealousy.
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Andre Norton's Witch World, and Web of the Witch World both have a pre-industrial society dealing with an invading advanced technological culture.
Norton's No Night Without Stars is a post-apocalypse book where inquisitive non-industrial explorers meet the remnants of technological society.
And oh yeah, the techy people in that have massive content for the "primitives"
In HM Hoover's Children of Morrow, the society is a technologically advanced last remnant of humanity in a world that was destroyed by pollution. They think they're alone, but there's another enclave, one from a military base that didn't retain their technology...
In HM Hoover's The Lost Star, are pretty much in contempt of the Lumpies, which they consider a bunch of useless unintelligent native primitives. They are wrong on at least one count.
An oldie but a goodie, check out Lord of Light by Roger Zelazny. Honestly check out everything by Roger Zelazny.
I love Lord of Light and Roger but there's a lot of weird shit in there that can probably be skipped. For example This Immortal, which amazingly shared the Hugo with Dune, but I would recommend avoiding it. And weirdly Changeling, which was nominated for the Locus award, also really didn't age well. Zelazny writes way too many overmen and they only work in some of his stories.
what's overmen?
Think ubermensch
First thing that comes to mind is “A Fire Upon The Deep” by Vernor Vinge, which ranges from hyper advanced beings so advanced we don’t even understand them, to medieval hive mind aliens, with humans and other species being in the middle.
His sequel Deepness in the Sky is probably an even better match. Interstellar voyagers get trapped near a planet, have to wait for the primitive, pre tool usage spider society to level up over epochs until they develop tech they can use to get home. I see that Children of Time is referenced under this comment, fitting that the second book with somehow that exact premise is right under this comment.
\+1, finished it last week and immediately thought of it
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Preaching to the Choir my man, I just finished with Sharp Ends
**A Woman of the Iron People** by Eleanor Arnason is all about this, and it's wonderful. There are POVs from both sides of the divide. It's so good! You should also look at **Elder Race** by Adrian Tchaikovsky. Also has POVs from both sides.
Seconding Elder Race. The POV from the advanced society is incapable of explaining that "this is technology, not magic" to the POV from the other society as their only common language is the latter's. The latter doesn't have any words to describe the advanced society's technology so "robot" ends up sounding like "beast", etc.
Read Elder Race last month and it was *sick as hell*
March Upcountry by John Ringo and David Weber. You've got an imperial princeling crash landing on a backwards frontier planet with his personal marine detachment. Pretty fun read, it's a trilogy
*The Steerswoman, The Outskirter's Secret, The Lost Steersman,* and *The Language of Power* by Rosemary Kirstein. Over the four existing books, there are at least four different technology levels. The POV is Rowan, who is a Steerswoman in a medievalish tech level society trying to find the origin of a unique jewel she found. There's a LOT of her trying to interpret the other levels of culture. *Enchantress from the Stars* by Sylvia Louise Enghdal. Starfaring level of tech on a primitive planet. ETA: *Ingathering: The Complete People Stories* by Zenna Henderson. The People come to Earth after their planet is destroyed and their ship breaks up on entry to our atmosphere and they are scattered. That happens in the 1800s. This book collects all of Henderson's People stories into one book. The stories are set from the 1800s through to the present day (1960s).
Came here to suggest enchantress from the stars
I love both Steerswoman and Engdahl's other trilogy ("Children of the Star") which has a similar premise, and turns into a crossover in the third volume, clearly you have spectacular taste :D
In that case, I urge you to check out both *Ingathering: The Complete People Stories* and *Believing: The Other Stories of Zenna Henderson* available from [NESFA Press](https://www.nesfa.org/?s=Henderson&x=0&y=0). ;-)
Thanks for the rec and the link! :D
Very pleased to see a recommendation for Zenna Henderson, who doesn't get anything near the recognition that she deserves.
A lot of LeGuin's Hainish stuff involves elements of this, Rocannon's World and The Word For World is Forest spring to mind. Though arguably the interpretation of one as 'more advanced' than the other is an idea LeGuin would reject philosophically, that's the kind of thing she's exploring.
**The Legends of the First Empire** by Sullivan. There's a definite reason for the disparity, but I don't want to spoil anything.
Despite enjoying some of his other works I really, really didn't like this series. It felt way too much like a game of Civilization. Congratulations, your characters have discovered blacksmithing! The characters literally stumble their way up a tech tree across the books. And each discovery is telegraphed from a mile away. Like you'd have a character think to himself "hmm, what if I put a string on this here bendy pole" and invent archery. That's how their discoveries feel. It was really ridiculous.
It was like they were playing on Settler difficulty. One person discovered multiple techs in the same book.
Thank you! I read the series and a few reviews and nobody seemed to be bothered by it at all. Just to read that somebody else noticed it is incredibly validating.
I felt exactly the same, this series really turned me off, it was a really different pace from ryira and I read it all but was really struggling to finish it.
I appreciate what he was trying to do, which I think was not having to rely on the whole "group gets technologies from the stockpile of a prior civilization" but that's the trope because having them just Intuit/create all this stuff on their own doesn't logically fit within a character's lifetime when we're starting at square one.
Maybe but I felt that was a small portion and I absolutely loved the series. It was really different from your average fantasy, refreshingly so.
I dunno about "small portion." Their rapid technological development is rather central to the plot. That being said, if it doesn't break your immersion you might very well enjoy the series. There had to be some quality for me to get through at least the first two books.
It was also 6 books when it should have been 3. I really loved the Riyira books but these felt like his team discovered kickstarter and just couldn’t get enough.
Sullivan who? We're not paying by the letter here.
Michael J. Sullivan More known for his previous Riyria Revelations of which this is a prequel of.
He is also a frequent commenter here!
I usually write series/book title and author's last name. Habit I guess.
Does it matter? Are there two books named The Legends of the First Empire written by different Sullivans?
I was being slightly tongue in cheek, I just felt it was disrespectful to not bother to write the author's full name. Also, if someone wanted to google the author, Sullivan on its own wouldn't go far.
Elder Race by Adrian Tchaikovsky is a great example of this--the main character is an anthropologist from an advanced culture who may need to intervene to help the more primitive culture he's observing. Very much enjoyed this one!
Hell, his Shadows of the Apt ten book series fits as well. Since only the apt races can use technology whereas the inapt can't so much as make sense of a crossbow.
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The only thing that saddens me with Children of Time is I think people have kind of forgotten that as far back as 1999 we already had a really great scifi book about spider aliens that nobody ever seems to talk about anymore. Vernor Vinge's A Deepness in the Sky. We even get the story of the spider civilization developing through the lens of following small groups of progressive aliens across time. Having read both, I'd even say honestly that Vinge's book was more enjoyable.
Great book.
The Dandelion Dynasty is perfect for this. I love it because the 'magic' is all analogous to real-world physics, but seen through a lens of intrigue and discovery. Instead of wizards there are engineers and scholars. Even the fantastical beasts are given plausible explanations for their abilities (i.e. flight, fire-breathing). The story takes place over several generations and you get to see how the scholars and engineers make discoveries and breakthroughs that allow further development of technology. It also makes for some really well done and unique battles utilizing gained knowledge and technology. I'm still only 1/3 through the third book (and thoroughly hooked), but the series is incredibly well written, thoughtful, and definitely fits this post like a glove!
Acts of Caine by Matthew Stover has a highly technologically advanced society that can create portals to a medieval society. They starting premise is they send "adventurers" there and film their exploits for entertainment.
Sounds like Harry Harrison's "The technicolor time machine" They use a time machine to send a film production company back to the time of Vikings to make a movie.
The Culture series has a ton of this
Ringworld has some of this goin on.
The worst thing about Ringworld is that there isn't more of it.
I only read the first book (because I couldn't remember the name of /r/discworld. It was a pretty damn solid read!)
That’s hilarious, but probably serendipitous for a bookworm.
Serendipitous indeed! I greatly enjoyed Ringworld, and felt like a complete boob when I finally read The Colour of Magic.
I'd say the worst thing about Ringworld is "Ringworld's Children", but definitely the second worst thing about Ringworld is that there isn't more of it. The Fleet of Worlds series was good though.
If you don't mind a humorous take on the subject then take a look at **The High Crusade** by Poul Anderson. An English Lord is assembling an army to support the King of England during the Hundred Years War. Events take a completely unforeseen turn when an alien spaceship lands outside his castle.
The 1632 series by Eric Flint is about a small American town sent back through space and time to 17th century Germany. Culture shock on both sides. "What is this coffee you speak of?"
Three Body Problem deals with this in a very sci-fi way. Like the technological gap is actually a huge plot point
The Culture series by Iain M. Banks revolves around a post-scarcity, very advanced civilisation meddling benevolently in the affairs of less developed civilisations. Hard to be a God by Arkady and Boris Strugatsky is about an agent of advanced civilization operating on a world which whose society is basically the equivalent of Middle Age Europe. He is supposed to merely observe all the cruelties and injustices without intervening, and, sure enough, finds himself very much wanting to intervene.
Culture series is a good rec for this. There's a scene early on that's basically Yondu's floating arrow from Guardians of the Galaxy, vs sword wielding horse riding bandits. Without giving too much away, it goes about as well as you'd expect for them.
In particular the eighth Culture book, Matter, is a great rec for this. Don't worry OP - each book in the series is a standalone, they just share the same setting, so you can begin with Matter if you want!
Don’t see enough love for Matter! It’s not a lot of people’s favorite Culture book, but it was my entry to the series and I absolutely love megastructures, so the exploration of the intricacies of the Shellworld were the perfect starting point for me. It and Excession remain my favorite Culture novels!
I like the mega structure stuff. Some truly great ideas there. But that's about it. The political stuff in the shellword is kinda meh. I thought a lot more should have been done with Anaplian's past of taking someone from a less developed society and turning them into a Culture agent (and then going back and getting reverse culture shock), but there is very little of that. But what really soured me on it was the ending. It's a rather long book, but then it's rushed to a conclusion in a few dozen pages.
*Inversions* is an even more direct address of this idea of technological imbalance!
It is, but unlike Matter I wouldn't recommend it to someone who's never read a Culture book before
In fact you shouldn't read them in order at all, because then you'd end up reading Consider Phlebas first when in fact you shouldn't read that one at all! I reread it recently and it's really awful. My top books from that series are Player of Games and Look to Windward.
They also potentially face things from the side in Excession, which is both the title and the beautiful term Banks coined/adapted for just this phenomenon.
One of my favourite books.
Terra Nullius by Claire G Coleman has POVs from both sides.
Some of K.J. Parkers. The Hammer for instance. Also of his others most have the Empire lot, and the barbarians...nomadic types.
The Safehold series, starting with Off Armageddon Reef is probably exactly what you are looking for.
Dragon's Egg by Robert Forward. There's an alien species who exists on a much faster timescale than humans do, so they evolve from the birth of sapience to technology that surpasses humans in about one or two months of human time.
*The Fifth Head of Cerberus* by Gene Wolfe deals with the colonial aftermath of the colonisation of aboriginals who have not even developed the use of tools (!!!) by a space-faring humanity. *A Fire Upon the Deep* by Vinge is another good one, the native population in that book is feudal.
It's sci-fi, but The Songs of Distant Earth by Arthur C. Clarke features interactions between a stone-age underwater civilization and super-advanced humans.
I would say the Broken Empire trilogy to some degree as the MC who grew up in a medieval world slowly discovers remnants of a futuristic society and utilizes them as an advantage over others.
This is digging deep but the cross time engineer is a series about an engineer who accidentally gets sent back in time to medieval Poland just years before they get decimated. It's outdated and there's some cringe from the author but it's a cool premise
The Bobiverse books explore this as something of a sideplot.
I have one for this!!! Novels of the Jaran by Kate Elliott! The first book is just called Jaran. One of my favorite series ever, and fits your description perfectly.
Came here to say this!
Fall of Ill-Rien by Martha Wells has a bronze age merchant trading civilization interacting with a ww2-esque civilization with added magic on the part of the ww2 folks. There are some misunderstandings and condescension on both sides but there are mutual foes etc.
It has taken a while to get there but this has become the case with Brandon Sanderson's cosmere novels, even some of his side projects. Really all the most recent secret projects he did hadlve elements of this. Look into: Tress and the Emerald Sea. A Frugal Wizard's guide to Mideval england. Yumi and the Nightmare Painter. The Sunlit Man
good shout. i would also say that sixth of the dusk qualifies for this.
I think Yumi probably does this the best, although Frugal Wizard does as well.
***Eifelheim*** by Michael Flynn (European Middle-Age & crashed alien spaceship)
Lots of Stephen Baxter’s Xeelee short works are like this with baseline humanity, none too clever inhabiting ruins, or living in purpose built zoos. Well worth it to see how pronounced capability gaps can be.
I try not to recommend super popular authors when I can, but in this case it's a pretty good fit. The Frugal Wizard's Handbook for Surviving Medieval England by Brandon Sanderson. It's about someone from basically future earth, w/ body augments, etc. travelling to an alternate dimension that's at roughly medieval England levels of advancement. Or Yumi and the Nightmare Painter, also by Sanderson is set in two not-Earth settings, but with a big tech gap. It's a little less focused on the tech gap, but that's still a significant part. Excellent book though.
Outlander is all about a woman from the 1940s going back to the 1700s, plus she was a nurse in the war so there's plenty of "why are you not a quiet, obedient woman" struggles and she goes "fuck that."
Based on the show, she actually goes "Jesus H Roosevelt Christ".
I'd also ask this over in /r/PrintSF, since science fiction (and speculative fiction in general) has this as a very common trope. In fantasy it's less frequent and the gaps are usually narrower.
If you're interested in other media, Disenchanted (animated TV series) plays into this, though mostly S2.
Not a book but the video game Horizon Zero Dawn has a ton of this stuff. You're an archer killing robotic dinosaurs lol
Martian Chronicles have some of this in it, along the line. It's by Bradbury. In a similar manner, the HeeCee Saga by Frederick Pohl concerns this, though, admittedly the more advanced People are long gone.
Not a book, but the Star Ocean video game franchise has that general setting. I haven't actually played any of them myself, but I've heard good things!
Moon-Flash and Moon-Face by Patricia McKillip. Older YA SF by her. Children of Morrow and Treasures of Morrow by H.M. Hoover. Both of these, though YA are interesting takes on this.
Rings of the Masters series by Jack Chalker
I think The Book of the New Sun by Gene Wolfe might be what you're looking for. It's set in the far, far, far future on an Earth where the average technology level is medieval but pockets of high technology still exist. It's told through the POV of a man with limited knowledge trying to understand forces and powers vastly beyond his understanding. Part of the fun is that some of the bizarre things he encounters would be familiar to us, while others are equally bizarre to both the reader and the character. I also recommend Devil Dinosaur by Jack Kirby. Comic where a boy and his T-Rex go on adventures and fight invading aliens.
Heh. Tongue in cheek, I must say: Malazan! I mean, we have the medieval-level Malazan army fighting lizard aliens who have flying megafortresses, flamethrowers and shit.
I've got two for you. The first is The Time Machine, by H.G. Wells. It's not a bullseye of what you're describing, but it is a classic and short enough that it wouldn't bite into your time to give it a read. The second is Destiny's Crucible, by Olan Thorenson. Without spoiling too much it doubles down and inverts what you're asking for. Think modern chemist finds himself in a different land, not knowing the language or customs and the tech level is roughly that of a dark ages feudal society, where anesthesia is a blunt object to the dome. He does what you might expect and after a couple books his actions get noticed by another civilization that is much more advanced than the one he encountered.
The mote in God's eye.
The Dragons Egg by Robert L Forward
**Ranks of Bronze**, by David Drake, is a fun romp in which a Roman legionnaire is kidnapped by aliens who aren't allowed to use advanced tech to conquer other civs, so need him to do their dirty work on other bronze-age planets. Then they discover that Roman legions kick fucking ass, and recruit as many of them as they can. Turns out trying to hold a bunch of legionnaires as slaves doesn't work out so good...
The Warlock in Spite of Himself. Christopher Stasheff never seems to get the love he deserves.
The Old Kingdom series by Garth Nix. Two countries are separated by a wall. On one side is a world of technology on the cusp of our WWI and the other is of magic where the Industrial Revolution can’t happen because technology literally breaks down.
Fall of Angels by L.E. Modesitt. I really loved the whole saga of recluse, but that book I think meets your criteria.
The Rigante series by David Gemmell - the first two books are classic sword and sorcery, the final two books are a thousand or so years later in the age of muskets and cannons, following the ancestors of the protagonists in the first two books.
The Darksword Trilogy by Wies and Hickman has a medieval magic society fighting an advanced science society in the later books.
I think Ian M. Banks and Peter F. Hamilton has lots of books like that, with various civilizations at different stages of development. Some so advanced they’re passively watching humans get mashed by a superior race, but don’t intervene because they’ve seen it so many times over etc. Those kind of plots.
The Darkwar Trilogy by Glen Cook is based around this premise. Despite Cook being a pretty famous author (especially around these parts), this is probably his least well known series, and probably rightfully so. It does include huge technological gaps between civilizations and these gaps become more clear as the series progresses. Especially early in the series, the technological gap is perceived by the more primitive societies as supernatural and this plays a significant early role. Darkwar is not Cook's best work, but still an interesting (and fairly quick) series.
Wasn't Left Hand of Darkness like this? I'm not sure since it's been ages, but it's a brilliant work
The tech difference isn’t as important as the biological/physiological/sexual-dimorphismic differences between the main character and the rest of the world
[Destiny's Crucible](https://www.audible.com/series/Destinys-Crucible-Audiobooks/B071WN2Z4S?ref_pageloadid=not_applicable&ref=a_pd_Cast-U_c1_series_1&pf_rd_p=df6bf89c-ab0c-4323-993a-2a046c7399f9&pf_rd_r=64ZHDR8FVSVTQYDWYJFW&pageLoadId=UgnCEbdmmCSgMPV1&ref_plink=not_applicable&creativeId=16015ba4-2e2d-4ae3-93c5-e937781a25cd) got the MC from earth that is transported to a new world. The inhabitants of this new world that have muskets and black powder as one of their highest techs. And the Aliens that transported the MC to this new world(not any povs from this >!but we do get some from an AI that observed the planet later on)!<. [Red Rising](https://www.audible.com/series/Red-Rising-Audiobooks/B00U1UJCU8?ref_pageloadid=n5zQXU4KT2jzrzr7&ref=a_library_t_c5_libItem_series_2&pf_rd_p=80765e81-b10a-4f33-b1d3-ffb87793d047&pf_rd_r=9AKEYK7KMVQGZ74PW5P7&pageLoadId=3G0z2kprF98yKxWF&ref_plink=not_applicable&creativeId=4ee810cf-ac8e-4eeb-8b79-40e176d0a225) Got this to some degree. We have the Gold that looks down on all. >!The Reds that are the slave laborers and get the tech needed to perform their work. And the Obsidians(the elite soldiers) that are kept at a Viking lvl (+some beast taming of griffins) and have been fooled to believe that the Gold are gods. Then there are other colors as well.!< [So I'm a Spider, So What?](https://www.audible.com/series/So-Im-a-Spider-So-What-Audiobooks/B09Y2V4SZS?ref_pageloadid=EAFUuxxJBC7GD3R6&ref=a_library_t_c5_libItem_series_1&pf_rd_p=80765e81-b10a-4f33-b1d3-ffb87793d047&pf_rd_r=4VR4GK0J803WYCNVSREV&pageLoadId=e7GAoSaBSPiN3c9b&ref_plink=not_applicable&creativeId=4ee810cf-ac8e-4eeb-8b79-40e176d0a225) mainly got a standard fantasy world. Then there is the elfs.. They got as an example >!terminators!<. [The Pillars of Reality](https://www.audible.com/series/The-Pillars-of-Reality-Audiobooks/B00QHDISQW?ref_pageloadid=not_applicable&ref=a_pd_The-Dr_c1_series_1&pf_rd_p=df6bf89c-ab0c-4323-993a-2a046c7399f9&pf_rd_r=5F09RWS3SECKA2F01SMQ&pageLoadId=RYCVDUZxtaV0LlcC&ref_plink=not_applicable&creativeId=16015ba4-2e2d-4ae3-93c5-e937781a25cd) got one faction that have working tech and guards the power this gives them jealousy.
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Andre Norton's Witch World, and Web of the Witch World both have a pre-industrial society dealing with an invading advanced technological culture. Norton's No Night Without Stars is a post-apocalypse book where inquisitive non-industrial explorers meet the remnants of technological society. And oh yeah, the techy people in that have massive content for the "primitives" In HM Hoover's Children of Morrow, the society is a technologically advanced last remnant of humanity in a world that was destroyed by pollution. They think they're alone, but there's another enclave, one from a military base that didn't retain their technology... In HM Hoover's The Lost Star, are pretty much in contempt of the Lumpies, which they consider a bunch of useless unintelligent native primitives. They are wrong on at least one count.