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In no particular order... my favourite authors of science-fiction are currently:
The octogenarian godfather of sci-fi, and inventor of the communications satellite. To pick out particular favourite works is an odious task, but don’t go past The City and the Stars, Childhood’s End, Earthlight, and The Fountains of Paradise. For more information see this un-authorised home page.
A young British author who has quickly established a reputation for well-written hard s-f, and has most recently co-authored The Light of Other Days with Arthur C. Clarke. The three novels concerned with space exploration in the solar system, Voyage, Titan, and Moonseed are particularly fine, and in his set of linked novels known as the “Xeelee Sequence” I would recommend Timelike Infinity, probably for the most outrageous “big s-f” plot compressed into the minimum space.
Stephen Baxter Fan Page : a good starting point but doesn’t have any information on Baxter’s most recent books such as Time or The Light of Other Days.
The author of the award winning Startide Rising; I also like Sundiver, Glory Season, and Earth. I found the latter novels in his Uplift cycles did not maintain the level of invention evident in the first two novels mentioned above.
Notable mentions:
Douglas passed away in 2001 of a heart attack, at the tragically early age of 49. I especially like his novel Dirk Gently’s Holistic Detective Agency, which grew out of several Doctor Who stories. You probably already know about the Hitch Hiker’s Guide to the Galaxy books, which developed from a radio series on BBC Radio 4.
The Forge of God and Eon are good books, although their sequels have often been let-downs.
Timescape is an all-time classic, and Benford’s Mars novel The Martian Race is one of the most realistic of the crop.
His novels are pulp-ish but enjoyable. I’ve read the Moon and Mars novels recently which are good escapist fun.
Known for the masterpiece Stand on Zanzibar, but some of his other novels like The Squares of the City have ingenious designs which repay the reader.
His first cyberspace novels are famous, but I particularly like his later writing in novels such as Virtual Light and Idoru.
Looking at the list above, I notice a slight preponderance of novelists surnamed with a “B”. I am at a loss to account for this peculiar reading preference, and therefore I am actively avoiding books by James Blish, John Barnes, Damien Broderick, et cetera... (well, actually, not really – I’ve just given up finishing Blish’s Cities in Flight!)