(no subject)

[teleidoplex]

Mostly cause I was curious. Although truth to tell, there are a lot of books on this list that flabberghast me, and others that I wonder that they were left off. Who's the arbiter, anyways? Who makes such lists? Rail against the canon-formation!!



This is a list of the 50 most significant science fiction/fantasy novels, 1953-2002, according to the Science Fiction Book Club. Bold the ones you've read, strike-out the ones you hated, italicize those you started but never finished and put an asterisk beside the ones you loved.

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 Why, oh why is this series on the list!!!
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 And again with the why!
49. Timescape, Gregory Benford
50. To Your Scattered Bodies Go, Philip Jose Farmer But only because Alice Liddell is a main character!


So, 18 out of 50, two of which are so atrociously bad that I wonder they made the list when nothing by Mercedes Lackey did (ooh, snap!) Only one of which I started and haven't finished (but that wasn't because of a flaw in the book, more because of lack of continguous time). But even though I liked a few, none are in my favorites. I feel so alienated by my supposed fandom. Guess I'll eat some worms.

Comments

[kniedzw.livejournal.com]

Who's the arbiter, anyways? Who makes such lists? Rail against the canon-formation!!

[snip]

...according to the Science Fiction Book Club.

*whistles*

As to canon-formation, I'm sort of for it.

*rimshot*

[teleidoplex]

That's an organization of individuals who retain their anonymity through being an organization. I know it was this group, but who are they? Why are those people the organizers? Saying its the SFBC doesn't tell me anything.

[kniedzw.livejournal.com]

From their FAQ:

BOOKSONLINE.com is the premier direct marketer of general interest and specialty book clubs. With more than 8.5 million members, and over 40 book clubs including Book-of-the-Month Club®, The Literary Guild®, Quality Paperback Book Club®, and Doubleday Book Club®. Created in March 2000, BOOKSONLINE.COM is a partnership between Doubleday Direct, Inc. (owned by Bertelsmann Inc.) and Book-of-the-Month Club Holdings LLC (owned by Time Inc., a unit of AOL Time Warner Inc.).

...which is to say that they are The Man.

C'mon. You won't let me be even a little smarmy? Sheesh. :)

[danielmc.livejournal.com]

agreed.
so many not on the list that should be and some i must say QUOI?

[anima-mecanique.livejournal.com]

Well, to be fair, it's a list of 'most influential' books, not 'best books', and as far as I can tell The Chronicles of Thomas Covenant is considered something of a classic.

I'm not sure by WHO, since I've never met someone who actually finished the damn book, but. It IS famous.

The list seems heavily weighted towards SciFi instead of fantasy to my eyes, also. You'd think Mercedes Lackey WOULD be on there, since she's pretty much the reigning queen of angsty mediocre fantasy that seems to be designed to appeal to teenage girls, which is a pretty enormous genre these days.

At least there's no Terry Goodkind.

[kniedzw.livejournal.com]

At least there's no Terry Goodkind.

Amen to that.

[selenya.livejournal.com]

Yeah, see, I loved Misty way back when...

But now? Ugh. She's just awful.

[nekomata.livejournal.com]

Haha, you even called her Misty. She writes terrible romance now!

[selenya.livejournal.com]

Like I said...used to be a HUGE fan. ;)

Now...yugh. Blech and icky.

[nekomata.livejournal.com]

I read most of her stuff in highschool because the public library had it and it was o.k. Not great but readable. I didn't even know about the Misty thing until recently, when some girls were going on and on about her in a forum.

[selenya.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I really still have a soft spot for the Last Herald Mage, but that's about as far as it goes.. ^.^

[anima-mecanique.livejournal.com]

I totally loved that series when I was a 16 year old girl in high school.

I was flipping through it this summer and oh god, is it ever hilarious. The angst! The magical telepathic horses! No one understands poor Vanyel!

I think my favorite part is when they tell you about how between book 1 and 2, Vanyel apparently went out and kicked the ass of an evil wizard by turning his own summoned demons against them. You'd think book 2 would be about THAT, but they totally skip that part to talk about Vanyel's overwhelming angst.

It does kind of weird me out, though, that the main character in every single one of her books (that I've read, anyway) gets raped, sometimes multiple times.

[selenya.livejournal.com]

I don't think I could read Vanyel again and take it seriously - I just remember really liking it (oh was I into the angst. ;) ) But I do remember a WHOLE bunch being missing between book 1 and 2. Book 2 is very boring!

And yeah, that is WAY weirding out. Rape happens in at least every storyline (Vanyel, Tarma, Talia, etc.)

Hrm...

[anima-mecanique.livejournal.com]

Heh, I feel like I'm spamming kitsune_zen's journal here, but hey. Discussion!

The thing that got me about book 3 in the Vanyel series was that while people will angst for chapters and chapters about absolutely nothing, Vanyel gets raped and she glosses over the whole thing so much that he's pretty much fine in a couple of pages. I mean, here's a chance to angst about something that actually matters, and she totally misses the boat. Maybe it was too difficult to write or something.

[selenya.livejournal.com]

(Yeah, sorry kitsune_zen!)

The whole Vanyel-being-raped thing was way traumatic for me when I read it because I was like "dear god! poor Vanyel!" but then he's just magically better a chapter later because of the Tayledras. *sigh* If you're going to write something, write it. Don't shirk.

It's the Sunshine thing (kitsune_zen will know what I mean.)

[anima-mecanique.livejournal.com]

Wasn't there a talking wolf involved in that whole bit?

People could be spared years of trauma and therapy if we just found some talking wolves and magical gay hawk-people.

[selenya.livejournal.com]

Yes, there was a khree (I think that's what they're called) involved.

BWAHAHAHA. Magical gay hawk-people who greatly resemble Native Americans and who clearly smoke WAY too much peyote for their own good.

It's the magic of magic, baby. Magical-gay-hawk-people can make everything better. ;)

[teleidoplex]

See, I came to the Vanyel stuff too late. MY big thing was the Knight of Ghosts and Shadows stuff. Elves, motorcycles, renfaires, my first encounter with a kitsune. I was so hooked.

I LOVE MISTY!!! GIVE ME MORE MISTY!! A WHOLE LISTY OF MISTY!!!

[selenya.livejournal.com]

*giggles madly* I got a D in math because of Vanyel. >.>

I read the Bardic stuff very last...and kinda wished I had read those before the others. I actually enjoyed them, even though I read them late.

C'mon....elf-horses that were motorcycles? I loved it. ;-)

Now...if only she'd stuck with that instead of Valdemar so much... the Valdemar stuff just got old after a while!

[moonandserpent.livejournal.com]

My first Changeling PC (James Michael "Jimi" Hendrix) was a swordfighting Rennie who drove a psychic steed/mororcycle and fought crime (eventually with a Mind reading perky-goff Malk girlfriend).

Yeaaahhhhhhhhh......

[oddsboy.livejournal.com]

I am honestly just posting to see if I can get everyone else's posts to get skinnier. Glee.

-RC

[kniedzw.livejournal.com]

Punk.

[moonandserpent.livejournal.com]

I had a brief Elves + Psychics + Magic + Motorcycles phase. Yep, in Jr. High I thought Elves on Motorcycles were so awesome.

I think the book that snapped me out to my senses and stopped me from reading her was the first Bardic Voices book.

[d-c-m.livejournal.com]

Rail against the canon-formation!!
Oh yeah....

And the Hugo goes to...

[kaishakunin.livejournal.com]

As for who makes these lists, I'm pretty sure it's taken largely from the Hugo awards:

http://www.worldcon.org/hy.html

I've read about half of these and I have to say, I agree for the most part. I'm sad not to see some books like certain Rober Jordan books or George Martin books on the list but at the same time, neither of those series introduced anything new to the genre.

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
6. Neuromancer, William Gibson
8. Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?, Philip K. Dick
10. Fahrenheit 451, Ray Bradbury
13. The Caves of Steel, Isaac Asimov
22. Ender's Game, Orson Scott Card
24. The Forever War, Joe Haldeman
26. Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone, J.K. Rowling
27. The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, Douglas Adams
29. Interview with the Vampire, Anne Rice
30. The Left Hand of Darkness, Ursula K. Le Guin
33. The Man in the High Castle, Philip K. Dick
38. Rendezvous with Rama, Arthur C. Clarke
39. Ringworld, Larry Niven
41. The Silmarillion, J.R.R. Tolkien
42. Slaughterhouse-5, Kurt Vonnegut
43. Snow Crash, Neal Stephenson
46. Starship Troopers, Robert A. Heinlein
50. To Your Scattered Bodies Go, Philip Jose Farmer

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