Talk about foundational stuff, I can't get past 'Neuromancer'. Gibson basically wrote the dictionary for cyberpunk before the internet was even a thing people knew. The concepts of cyberspace, jacking in, AI gods... it's less about predicting the exact gadget and more about nailing the vibe of tech corporations running everything and that grimy, spliced human-machine reality. It's dense and the prose is like a punch to the face sometimes, but the societal shift it captures—where your consciousness is just another piece of data to be hacked—feels more relevant now than in the 80s.
For a totally different angle, I recently read 'The Ministry for the Future' by Kim Stanley Robinson. It's almost a manual for climate change adaptation, full of speculative tech like carbon-sucking drones and geoengineering, but it's really about the brutal social and political upheaval required to implement it. The chapters are a chaotic mix of narrative, dry reports, and hypotheticals. It's not a sleek, fun read, but it sticks with you because it feels like homework for a future we might actually get.