Whereas fiction grounded in reality can skate by on the strength of its prose, characters, and plot alone, science fiction is measured by another criteria in addition to those: the strength of its concept. Without a concept, after all, it wouldn't be science fiction.

What I wouldn't give to know how the Strugatsky brothers came up with Roadside Picnic. This is a brilliant novel with a brilliant concept. Aliens have come to Earth and left without being seen or detected, leaving behind evidence of their visit in the form of artifacts and little more. Those artifacts are at turns lucrative, lethal, and mystical. Some people want to protect them. Some want to destroy them. Some want to possess them. Enter the stalkers, who procure artifacts for a price.

The Zone is the novel's center, and the Strugatskys orbit it, examining it from many different angles. Or perhaps it's more appropriate to say they stand within the Zone, examining everything that surrounds it. Indeed, only two brief sections of the novel actually take place within the Zone; most of the story takes place beyond its walls, where life goes on as always, but changed forever. Scientism, faith, automation, industry, spectacle, poverty, compassion, exploitation, and more are all touched upon in a relatively skimpy 200-odd pages. The novel's efficiency is somewhat remarkable; that it uses that efficiency to deliver a beautifully human story, even more so. What we want from life, for ourselves, is seemingly less important than what we want from ourselves – but the human heart may be the most mysterious artifact of all.

(A parting note: I read the translation by Olena Bormashenko, and thought her prose was fairly clunky when it came to dialogue and interior monologue. If you're going to pick this up, I suggest finding another translation.)