Cyborgs in Fiction - Written Fiction

Written Fiction

• In the story The Ablest Man in the World (1879), by Edward Page Mitchell, a computer is inserted into a man's head, turning him into a genius.
• The Tin Woodman from L. Frank Baum's Oz books (at least before he became entirely metal).
• The Mi-go aliens in the Cthulhu Mythos of H. P. Lovecraft, first appearing in the story "The Whisperer in Darkness" (1931), can transport humans from Earth to Pluto (and beyond) and back again by removing the subject's brain and placing it into a "brain cylinder", which can be attached to external devices to allow it to see, hear, and speak.
• Deirdre, a famous dancer who was burned nearly completely and whose brain was placed in a faceless but beautiful mechanical body, in C. L. Moore's short story of 1944, "No Woman Born". Collected in "The Best of C. L. Moore" in 1975
• Jonas the (star) sailor in Gene Wolfe's Book of the New Sun novels. His near light speed ship had been gone so long that on its return to Urth, there were no space port facilities any more, and it crashed. Other crew members patched him up from available parts. (However, he started out as fully robotic, and was repaired with human parts, rather than the more usual reverse).
• Molly Millions, Henry Dorsett Case, and Peter Riviera all have some sort of cybernetic augmentation in William Gibson's Sprawl trilogy.
• Professor Jameson, a cyborg pulp hero by Neil R. Jones, and his allies and benefactors, the Zoromes.
• Marge Piercy's He, She and It presents a rather feminist view on the cyborg issue with Yod who, however, is provided with some male attributes.
• Anne McCaffrey wrote short stories and novels known as The Ship Series (1961-) where otherwise crippled humans live on as the brains of starships and large space stations.

• The genetically engineered and prosthetics-ready warriors of the planet Sauron in the CoDominium series of short stories and novels initiated by Jerry Pournelle and also written by guest authors.
• In Martin Caidin's novel, Cyborg, a test pilot is rebuilt after a horrendous crash, given new "bionic" limbs, and becomes a superspy. Followed by several sequel novels and also adapted as the TV series The Six Million Dollar Man.
• Angus Thermopyle, The Gap Cycle.
• Haberman and Scanners from Scanners Live in Vain by Cordwainer Smith.
• The Comprise, a computer-mediated hive mind which has taken over Earth, in the novel Vacuum Flowers by Michael Swanwick.
• Rat Things in Neal Stephenson's Snow Crash. They are attack-programmed guard dogs whose long hairless tails make them look less like dogs and more like rats. They are powered by nuclear engines that will fatally over-heat if they stop. Technology invented by Mr. Ng and, evidently, made exclusively for the defense of the franchise Mr. Lee's Greater Hong Kong.
• In William C. Dietz's Legion of the Damned the Legion is made up of a combination of humans and heavily armed cyborgs.
• Kage Baker has written a series of novels about The Company in which orphans from various eras (who fit certain physical requirements) are recruited by a time-traveling corporation, augmented and turned into immortal cyborgs, and trained to rescue valuable artifacts from history.
• Hannes Suessi from David Brin's Uplift novels is transformed into a cyborg by the time he re-appears in Infinity's Shore
• Catherine Asaro's Saga of the Skolian Empire prominently features cyborgs called "Jagernauts", who are empaths or even telepaths, who serve as elite fighter pilots. Many prominent members of the Ruby Dynasty ruling the Skolian Empire are jagernauts.
• Linda Nagy, aka Ellen Troy, who has wetware in her brain, spines in her fingers (for linking with computers) and an antenna that lets her shut down machine remotely from the Venus Prime series by Arthur C. Clarke and Paul Preuss