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General Discussion => The Speakeasy: OOG/Off-topic Discussion => Topic started by: Laria Raven on 04 Jun 2013, 11:39
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So, I was asked for a list of the greatest(1) Science Fiction and Fantasy (2) books, and was interested to see what others would put on such a list.
I set myself some ground rules - one book per author, trying to avoid "the whole series" thing - there is someone who is going to read these whose a bit of an obsessive completist, so all of "The Wheel Of Time" might just make them miserable. I've also got nothing after about 1992, because I define greatness as including influence. Also, I got bored.
(1) whatever that means
(2) whatever that means
Here's my list:
20000 Leagues Under The Sea Jules Verne
A Canticle For Leibowitz Walter Miller
A Princess Of Mars Edgar Rice Burroughs
A Rag, A Bone, and a Hank Of Hair Nicholas Fisk
A Stainless Steel Rat Is Born Harry Harrison
Andromeda Nebula Ivan Efremov
Briar Rose Jane Yolen
Brown Girl In The Ring Nalo Hopkinson
Cities In Flight James Blish
Dracula Bram Stoker
Dragonflight Anne McCaffrey
Dune Frank Herbert
Dying Inside Robert Silverberg
Ender's Game Orson Scott Card
Flatland Edward Abott Abott
Flowers For Algernon Daniel Keyes
Foundation Isaac Asimov
Frankenstein Mary Shelley
Gateway Frederik Pohl
Hyperion Dan Simmons
In A Glass Darkly J.S. Le Fanu
Kindred Octavia Butler
Lud-In-The-Mist Hope Mirrlees
Magician Raymond Feist
Neuromancer William Gibson
Nine Princes In Amber Roger Zelazny
Rendezvous With Rama Arthur C Clarke
Replay Ken Grimwood
Shikasta Doris Lessing
Slaughterhouse Five Kurt Vonnegut
Tales Of The Dying Earth Jack Vance
Tea With The Black Dragon R.A. MacAvoy
The Day Of The Triffids John Wyndham
The Dispossessed Ursula Le Guin
The Forever War Joe Haldeman
The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe C. S. Lewis
The Lord Of The Rings J.R.R. Tolkien
The Man In The High Castle Philip K. Dick
The Moon Is A Harsh Mistress Robert A Heinlein
The Mote In God's Eye Larry Niven and Jerry Pournelle
The Skylark Of Space E.E. "Doc" Smith
The Stars My Destination Alfred Bester
The Time Machine H.G. Wells
The Voyage Of The Space Beagle A. E. Van Vogt
The Zanzibar Cat Joanna Russ
Titan John Varley
Trouble On Triton Samuel R. Delany
Warm Worlds and Otherwise James Tiptree Jr
Where Late The Sweet Birds Sang Kate Wilhelm
Witch World Andre Norton
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The Hitchhiker's Guide To The Galaxy, by Douglas Adams
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Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell, by Susanna Clarke.
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Y NO IAIN M BANKS
So.
The Player of Games by Iain M Banks
Excession by Iain M Banks
and a rare bird to the mix
The Dragon Never Sleeps by Glen Cook
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Childhood's End, by Arthur C. Clarke
Scifi from the 50's has quite a different feel to it. I oh-so-love the plot and themes of this fairly short novel, though.
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Childhood's End, by Arthur C. Clarke
Over Rendezvous With Rama?
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I wrote a paragraph long Hyperion advertisement before I noticed it in your list. :P
Personally I think any sci-fi list that has Ender's Game should also have Speaker for the Dead, unless there's a strict rule against sequels or multiples, because in my opinion its the best in the series. Even if no multiples, I'd argue for it personally over EG. This is all assuming you can get over OSC being pathologically homophobic.
Also, when it comes to Philip K. Dick, your kung fu is weak. I LOVE The Man in the High Castle, but if this list were to include multiples by a single author I would argue for Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? and VALIS as additions to the list, with Androids being a candidate for replacing Man in the High Castle for top PKD book in my opinion.
Obviously lists like these are subjectives, and I tried to qualify personal preferences where possible. OP is feel to disagree completely, of course.
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Alice's Adventures in Wonderland and Through the Looking-Glass - Lewis Carroll
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A lot of them have already been mentioned so [special mention to flowers for Algernon!]... let's see what is left...
Conan - Robert E Howard
A song of Ice of Fire - George R.R. Martin
1984 - George Orwell
Takeshi Kovacs - Richard K. Morgan
Spin State - Chris Moriarty
La Jetée - Chris Marker [not a book per se, but still a fotonovela]
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Leviathan Wakes - James S. A. Corey (pen name of Daniel Abraham and Ty Franck). Inner-system (asteroid belt and inwards) based sci-fi with a distinctly noir feel. I absolutely adore it, along with the two follow ups Caliban's War and Abaddon's Gate.
Altered Carbon - Richard Morgan. :cloning: (http://themittani.com/books/altered-carbon)
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Seriously?
No Gap cycle?
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Second the Robet E. Howard Conan recommendation. His collected short stories are incredible, makes you almost disappointed the Schwarzenegger films typecasted the franchise.
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If we are allowed to post books from larger universes' IP, then I'll add virtually anything written by Timothy Zahn, but especially his Thrawn Trilogy/Hand of Thrawn Duology.
Also,
- The Safehold series by David Weber.
- The Predator Cities tetrology starting with Mortal Engines by Philip Reeve.
- The Belgariad and Malloreon series and associated books by David Eddings - particularly for blatantly acknowledging all the various tropes common in fantasy writing, playing them all to the max with a wink and a grin, and still turning out an excellent story in Belgariad - and then spending half of the Malloreon brutally deconstructing those tropes he had just established.
- Harry Turtledoves' Worldwar series.
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The Gate To Women's Country by Sherri S Tepper
The Riddlemaster of Hed by Patricia McKillip (technically 3 books issued now as one, so if that disqualifies it, Ombria in Shadow by the same author)
The Blue Sword by Robin McKinley
Downbelow Station by C J Cherryh (originally a standalone; now part of a wider series. If that disqualifies it, either Cyteen or Cuckoos Egg by the same author. Heavy Time also deserves an honorable mention. As does Rider at the Gate)
Power of Three by Diane Wynn Jones
Bride of the Rat God by Barbara Hambly (not actually the best of hers but the only standalone I can think of)
The Invisible Road by Elizabeth Knox
The Children of Men P D James
The Changeover Margaret Mahy
The Nargun and the Stars Patricia Wrightson
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Being part of a series doesn't disqualify it, not being the first in a series will probably do so.
Power of Three rather than Fire and Hemlock? (I have nearly everything DWJ ever published, I should say)
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I c what you did there. ❤
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Also, wading through the part of the Perry Rhodan series that has been translated to English.
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Oh, Fire and Hemlock is also a good choice ... as is Eight Days of Luke.
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- The Predator Cities tetrology starting with Mortal Engines by Philip Reeve.
This is definitely one of my favourites too. I'd love to do some RP set in that universe. Its just so brilliant.
I'll toss in The Commonwealth Saga by Peter F. Hamilton (first book, Pandora's Star) Put my and Stitcher in a channel and tell us to talk about these books and we'll be able to just go for hours.
The Aldous Lexicon by Michael Lawrence (first book A Crack in the Line) This is like, psuedo-sci-fi, pseudo-fantasy. The whole series is very melancholy, but its very very good.
Saga of the Seven Suns by Kevin J. Anderson (first book, Hidden Empire) Really crazy awesome space opera. Very soft science but still very good. Living hydrogen beings, tree people, giant space battles...its good.
The Alex Benedict Series, by Jack McDevitt, (A Talent for War, Polaris, Seeker, The Devil's Eye, and there are a few more out I haven't had a chance to read yet) This is kind of like, Sherlock Holmes meets Indiana Jones, meets deep space.
Anything by Ben Bova, with a planet's name as the title. Decently hard sci-fi, very good. Parts tend to drag on though.
Halting State, and its sequal Rule 34, by Charles Stross. 20 minutes into the future, everything is awesome.
Stolen (not sci-fi) By Lucy Christopher, this one is very good, though rather heartwrenching. I finished reading it, then wandered around in a daze for three hours.
I need to do some more reading I think. Been a while since I sat down with a good book.
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Starship Troopers, Robert A. Heinlein
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Poor Vonnegut appears in a Sci-Fi / Fantasy list yet again. It is a tremendous book, though.
Regarding Fantasy things I've enjoyed Joe Abercrombie's First Law trilogy and especially 'Best Served Cold' as a singular read.
And Sci-Fi, let's summon up a classic, shall we? Aldous Huxley's Brave New World.
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A Wizard of Earthsea - Ursula Le Guin
Use of Weapons - Iain M Banks
Lirael - Garth Nix
Philip Reeve's Mortal Engine's quartet has already been mentioned, but I love it to bits so it's worth mentioning again.
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Oh, hell yes the Sabriel, Lirael, Abhorsen series by Garth Nix are fabulous.
Anything by Alaister Reynolds, notably Century Rain and Terminal World. House of Sons is also great.
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Oh yeah the Abhorsen series is great.
I've never quite been able to get into Alaister Reynolds.
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Shout out for having Hyperion and The Forever War on that list. Great works.
Couple of Sci-fi books I would add.
The Berserker Series -- Fred Saberhage. Some of my favorite space-opera. Influencial and entertaining.
A Canticle for Leibowitz -- Probably the first book to really paint a post-apocalypic life vividly, very influencial for its day. I loved it. That I grew up in the areas described in the book only made it more impactful for me.
Red Mars -- Kim Stanley Robinson -- great hard sci-fi. Engrossing and entertaining. Followed by Green Mars and Blue Mars
Fantasy series
The Farseer Trilogy -- love this series. Best first person narrative Ive ever read, at least from my perspective.
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Reynolds does some wonderful space opera, as well as a pretty good detective novel. Terminal World is less of that and is actually more steampunk, set entirely on one planet, and mostly in one city. Where Reynolds really shines though is his ability to set a story over decades and even centuries, really capturing the distances involved in serious space travel.
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Red Mars -- Kim Stanley Robinson -- great hard sci-fi. Engrossing and entertaining. Followed by Green Mars and Blue Mars
Oooh yeah, big bucket of this.
In fantasy, I would also like to submit Pratchett's 'Reaper Man'.
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Huh, don't think I saw these, so I'll offer them up.
On Basilisk Station, by David Weber, but only if you like or can stand C.S.Forester style writing. The later books in the series can get overblown (the arms race this writer started will probably end in blowing up a world), but the early stuff is good.
The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe by C. S. Lewis. Yes its all highly Christian related, blah blah blah. But if you can get past that, its a nice adventure story where the trees talk, and animals invite you in for tea.
And if we're allowed books in bigger universes, Aaron Allston, start with Wraith Squadron and learn the meaning of "Yub yub Commander."
I'll second anything by Zahn. And someday I will read Ender's Game just to learn what all the hype is about. Other than that, I don't know, haven't read much published fiction these days.
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A few more suggestions, now that I've had time to gather my thoughts a bit.
The Dresden Files - Urban fantasy series by Jim Butcher, up to more than 10 novels and he writes them fairly quickly, at least once a year. The first novel is Storm Front. The series has a film noir tone, and its about Harry Dresden, private investigator and Chicago's only real live listed Wizard. Butcher's writing style definitely isn't the best in this list, and some of you more literary types might cringe at the overall quality, but his characters are interesting, his world is fascinating, and his pacing keeps you hooked very similar to the way in which Rowling is capable of.
The Silmarillion - more a history book than a fantasy novel, the post-mortem companion piece to Tolkien's the Lord of the Rings. This book is NOT for everyone. If you hated history in school, maybe not up your alley. Its dense, and very dry in most places. But if you can get past all that, the world Tolkien created is on par with none. He truly was the grandfather of world building.
The Dark Elf Trilogy - The first novel in the series is Homeland, I believe. A bit sophomoric. Salvatore isn't going to be winning any Pulitzer's anytime soon. But the character of Drizzt Do'Urden, while arguably damaging to the preteen fantasy community, has captured so many people's imagination for a reason. His fight scenes are also extremely complex and elaborate, take that as a pro or con as you will.
The Picture of Dorian Grey - I think this one qualifies as fantasy, right? Or maybe science fiction? Anyway, Oscar Wilde at his best. The rest speaks for itself.
The Divine Comedy - Italy's great epic, Dante Alighieri has done so much to shape our conception of the afterlife that the average first-world citizen often can't tell the difference between the Biblical myths and Dante's. Obviously, its a 14th century poetic epic, so not exactly super accessible. Also, be forewarned that more than anything, the DC was just as much a tool for political commentary than anything else, so most of the time Dante is shit talking politicians we've never heard of and don't understand the relevance for. But if you can find a simplified translation or wrack your brain over the original poetry, there's all sorts of juice in there. Inferno is obviously the most popular, Purgatorio And Paradisio are hit and miss.
Paradise Lost - 17th century England's answer to Dante, pretty much any misconceptions we have about God and Biblical myth that weren't established by Dante are the fault of John Milton. Perhaps one of the last great epic poems so far in history, although Milton's epic is only slightly more accessible than Dante's, the story that he weaves about God and Lucifer, angels and men, has shaped the spiritual consciousness of the Western world for centuries.
That's it for now. I'm sure I can think of more.
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Two series I very highly recommend:
The Entire and the Rose By Kay Kenyon
http://www.amazon.com/Bright-Sky-Book-Entire-Rose/dp/1591026016 (http://www.amazon.com/Bright-Sky-Book-Entire-Rose/dp/1591026016)
Absolutely incredible and unique series of books. Some of the greatest ideas I have ever read.
Unlike any other sci-fi
The Gaunt's Ghosts series by Dan Abnett
http://www.amazon.com/Gaunts-Ghosts-Founding-Novels/dp/1844163695/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1370567174&sr=1-1&keywords=gaunts+ghosts+omnibus (http://www.amazon.com/Gaunts-Ghosts-Founding-Novels/dp/1844163695/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1370567174&sr=1-1&keywords=gaunts+ghosts+omnibus)
Without a doubt the greatest action author I have ever read. He writes Warhammer 40K books that are like a WWII documentary and the original Star Wars in their old established realism.
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Sentenced to Prism - Alan Dean Foster
Main actor in this book is one of the more imaginative alien ecosystems in sci-fi.
The Sight Of Proteus - Charles Sheffield
What would happen if shape-changing became an everyday technology? The other two books in the Proteus cycle are also worth reading.
Peter Hamilton was already named, although depending on your preferences, the Greg Mandel trilogy might be more to your liking.
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I would like to add the Quiet War and Gardens of the Sun by Paul McAuly.
They start off a bit slow, but totally dragged me in. Busy with the third book (In the mouth of the Whale), which sadly is a bit of a disappointment after those two.
Also Cyberabad Days and River of Gods by Ian McDonald. Both more or less interconnected short stories set in future India. Imaginative writing and a great setting.
In fantasy I really would second the First Law books. Also, the entire Black Company series by Glen Cook is great, although a bit unconventionally written for a fantasy book (not a lot of descriptions of surroundings and very to the point).
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American Gods, Neil Gaiman (my only complaint about this book is that I frequently caught myself wondering how an American author -- who isn't Stephen King -- would have written the book)
Courtship Rite, Donald Kingsbury
Darwin's Radio, Greg Bear
Islands in the Net, Bruce Sterling
The Diamond Age, Neil Stephenson
The Ginger Star, Leigh Brackett (and the rest of her Skaith novels, for that matter)
The Scarlet Plague, Jack London Yes, Jack London wrote a sci-fi book. It scared the crap out of me when I read it as a little kid, and set me up for a lifetime of reading about contagions and broken societies.
Regarding Fantasy things I've enjoyed Joe Abercrombie's First Law trilogy and especially 'Best Served Cold' as a singular read.
I read the three in the trilogy back-to-back-to-back over a weekend this spring. I'm not sure I slept that weekend, honestly. (Also, Sand dan Glokta's personality reminds me strongly of Veik's player. :D)
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Just recalled the Tales of the Bard trilogy by Michael Scott - Magician's, Demon's and Death's Law.