Speculative fiction: yes! Do you have any absolute favorites you could rec? Fantasy, especially. For my part, I’ll rec Niven and Pournelle’s The Mote in God’s Eye; this book definitely falls down on the more sf end of the spectrum, of course, but I don’t often hear about it. IT’S OLD.

I imagine, per your description, that Going Nucular is indeed spelt that way. Heh!