SF book meme

[scarfman]

"The Most Significant SF & Fantasy Books of the Last 50 Years, 1953-2002"
(my source did not quote the list's source)

The ones I've read are bolded. The ones I started but didn't finish are in italics.

1 The Lord of the Rings, J.R.R. Tolkien
2 The Foundation Trilogy, Isaac Asimov
3 Dune, Frank Herbert
4 Stranger in a Strange Land, Robert A. Heinlein
5 A Wizard of Earthsea, Ursula K. Le Guin
6 Neuromancer, William Gibson
7 Childhood's End, Arthur C. Clarke
8 Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?, Philip K. Dick
9 The Mists of Avalon, Marion Zimmer Bradley
10 Fahrenheit 451, Ray Bradbury
11 The Book of the New Sun, Gene Wolfe
12 A Canticle for Leibowitz, Walter M. Miller, Jr.
13 The Caves of Steel, Isaac Asimov
14 Children of the Atom, Wilmar Shiras
15 Cities in Flight, James Blish
16 The Colour of Magic, Terry Pratchett
17 Dangerous Visions, edited by Harlan Ellison
18 Deathbird Stories, Harlan Ellison
19 The Demolished Man, Alfred Bester
20 Dhalgren, Samuel R. Delany
21 Dragonflight, Anne McCaffrey
22 Ender's Game, Orson Scott Card
23 The First Chronicles of Thomas Covenant the Unbeliever, Stephen R. Donaldson
24 The Forever War, Joe Haldeman
25 Gateway, Frederik Pohl
26 Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone, J.K. Rowling
27 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, Douglas Adams
28 I Am Legend, Richard Matheson
29 Interview with the Vampire, Anne Rice
30 The Left Hand of Darkness, Ursula K. Le Guin
31 Little, Big, John Crowley
32 Lord of Light, Roger Zelazny
33 The Man in the High Castle, Philip K. Dick
34 Mission of Gravity, Hal Clement
35 More Than Human, Theodore Sturgeon
36 The Rediscovery of Man, Cordwainer Smith
37 On the Beach, Nevil Shute
38 Rendezvous with Rama, Arthur C. Clarke
39 Ringworld, Larry Niven
40 Rogue Moon, Algis Budrys
41 The Silmarillion, J.R.R. Tolkien
42 Slaughterhouse-5, Kurt Vonnegut
43 Snow Crash, Neal Stephenson
44 Stand on Zanzibar, John Brunner
45 The Stars My Destination, Alfred Bester
46 Starship Troopers, Robert A. Heinlein
47 Stormbringer, Michael Moorcock
48 The Sword of Shannara, Terry Brooks
49 Timescape, Gregory Benford
50 To Your Scattered Bodies Go, Philip Jose Farmer

Comments

[angryricecooker.livejournal.com]

Of the unbolded, I highly recommend The Left Hand of Darkness.

[1-big-grizz.livejournal.com]

I didn't finish Thomas Covenant either (#23 on the list). Just couldn't get into it.

[pedanther]

Google says it's from the Science Fiction Book Club.

[larksilver.livejournal.com]

I loved the first three Shannara books (number 48)! I also recommend the Left Hand of Darkness (#30)

Couldn't get past the reprehensible behavior for the Thomas Covenant books, I'm afraid (#23), and thus - although I finished that one - I can't remember it for squat.

If #32 is one of the Amber books, it's worth the read. I enjoyed those books immensely.

Has anyone ever gotten all the way through #41 (The Silmarillion)?

I've never read any Terry Pratchett, although I'm told I should - by many! Perhaps I should go find that one...

[scarfman]

I've read some or all of the Amber novels, but I don't recall which ones, and I don't recall them well, perhaps because I didn't read them in order. Picked one up in the library at random at first and went from there over the next few weeks.

[sidhekin.livejournal.com]

Has anyone ever gotten all the way through #41 (The Silmarillion)?

Oh, come on!

... though I guess a certain amount of Tolkien obsession helps:

The Silmarillion and Unfinished Tales of Numenor and Middle-earth back in the '80s; History of Middle-earth volume I-XII pretty much as they were published; Tree and Leaf; Letters of JRR Tolkien; and Carpenter's Tolkien biography. Roverandom and Mr. Bliss as a bonus. Oh, and the usual, of course.

The scary thing is, there's been enough of us to warrant publishing those twelve volumes of HoME ...

[pedanther]

Has anyone ever gotten all the way through #41 (The Silmarillion)?

I have, although I admit there were times I wasn't sure I'd make it.


I've never read any Terry Pratchett, although I'm told I should - by many! Perhaps I should go find that one...

That one is listed because it was the first Discworld novel, I suspect, not so much because the list compilers thought it was one of the best. You might be better trying one of the stand-alones from later in the series for a first taste.

[sidhekin.livejournal.com]

Oh, wait, was that a setup for a Sheldon reference?

http://www.sheldoncomics.com/archive/061106.html

Sorry. I'll try to be sharp next time.

[alienfish.livejournal.com]

The thing that startled me is that I've also read most of the ones you have, and not the ones you haven't. I did read the Chronicles of Thomas Covenant, but not the newest books.