Thursday, February 14, 2013

50 Essential Science Fiction Books

There's a list of 50 Essential Science Fiction Books over at AbeBooks:
A Journey to the Center of the Earth by Jules Verne (1864)
The War of the Worlds by H.G. Wells (1898)
Brave New World by Aldous Huxley (1932)
When Worlds Collide by Edwin Balmer & Philip Wylie (1933)
Odd John by Olaf Stapledon (1935)
Nineteen Eighty-Four by George Orwell (1949)
Earth Abides by George R. Stewart (1949)
Foundation by Isaac Asimov (1951)
The Illustrated Man by Ray Bradbury (1951)
The Demolished Man by Alfred Bester (1953)
Ring Around the Sun by Clifford D. Simak (1953)
Mission of Gravity by Hal Clement (1954)
The Long Tomorrow by Leigh Brackett (1955)
The Chrysalids by John Wyndham (1955)
The Death of Grass or No Blade of Grass by John Christopher (1956)
Starship Troopers by Robert Heinlein (1959)
The Sirens of Titan by Kurt Vonnegut (1959)
Alas, Babylon by Pat Frank (1959)
A Canticle for Leibowitz by Walter M. Miller (1960)
Venus Plus X by Theodore Sturgeon (1960)
Solaris by Stanislaw Lem (1961)
The Drowned World by J.G. Ballard (1962)
Hothouse by Brian Aldiss (1962)
A Wrinkle in Time by Madeleine L’Engle (1962)
Dune by Frank Herbert (1965)
Make Room! Make Room! by Harry Harrison (1966)
Logan’s Run by William F. Nolan & George Clayton Johnson (1967)
Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? by Philip K. Dick (1968)
The Left Hand of Darkness by Ursula K. Le Guin (1969)
Behold the Man by Michael Moorcock (1969)
Ringworld by Larry Niven (1970)
Rendezvous with Rama by Arthur C. Clarke (1972)
Roadside Picnic / Tale of the Troika by Boris & Arkady Strugatsky (1972)
The Female Man by Joanna Russ (1975)
Man Plus by Frederik Pohl (1976)
The Stand by Stephen King (1978)
The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams (1979)
Nor Crystal Tears by Alan Dean Foster (1982)
Ender's Game by Orson Scott Card (1985)
Consider Phlebas by Iain M. Banks (1987)
Falling Free by Lois McMaster Bujold (1988)
Hyperion by Dan Simmons (1989)
Red Mars by Kim Stanley Robinson (1993)
Ribofunk by Paul Di Filippo (1996)
Cryptonomicon by Neal Stephenson (1999) (started twice. not finished yet)
Uglies by Scott Westerfeld (2005)
Old Man’s War by John Scalzi (2005)
Little Brother by Cory Doctorow (2007)
Acme Novelty Library #19 by Chris Ware (2008)
Embassytown by China MiƩville (2011)
Ones I've read (or remember reading, anyway) are in bold print. That's 31 out of 50. Some of these I've been looking for at local book stores for years but don't want to order. Maybe I'll come across them someday; maybe not.

4 comments:

  1. Anonymous7:27 AM

    I've read seven! All of them books that you have read, too. I guess I'm just not sci-fi...
    --A Pal

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    Replies
    1. this list isn't the be-all and end-all of lists, ya know ;)

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    2. It is interesting to compare and see which books repeat from list to list. Some books and authors seem to make every list. At least in this way you can judge which authors write consistently good scifi.

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    3. that's exactly what my husband said lol: that at least the ones he's read show up on all the lists. i think some lists are less about which are the best reads and more about which have had the most influence.

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