(no subject)
The NPR specfic meme:
Bold is read, italics is started and not finished. Miscellaneous commentary all mine.
1. The Lord of the Rings Trilogy, by J.R.R. Tolkien
2. The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, by Douglas Adams
3. Ender's Game, by Orson Scott Card
4. The Dune Chronicles, by Frank Herbert
5. A Song of Ice and Fire Series, by George R. R. Martin - I have tried a number of times to read both Dune and A Game of Thrones and it just never happens. In a couple of months I'm going to watch Game of Thrones and I think that might give me the interest/energy to actually get into ASoIaF, but I'm resigned to never reading Dune. I've seen the movie, it's fine.
6. 1984, by George Orwell
7. Fahrenheit 451, by Ray Bradbury - I was reading this out and about and it got into a bag somewhere and I haven't found it again. I will finish it eventually, I like Bradbury a lot.
8. The Foundation Trilogy, by Isaac Asimov - a few times, when I was a kid. I don't think I've re-read these since I was 14 or so, possibly even younger. I should go back to them; I re-read the robot books a few years ago and they were good fun.
9. Brave New World, by Aldous Huxley
10. American Gods, by Neil Gaiman
11. The Princess Bride, by William Goldman
12. The Wheel Of Time Series, by Robert Jordan
13. Animal Farm, by George Orwell
14. Neuromancer, by William Gibson
15. Watchmen, by Alan Moore
16. I, Robot, by Isaac Asimov
17. Stranger In A Strange Land, by Robert Heinlein
18. The Kingkiller Chronicles, by Patrick Rothfuss
19. Slaughterhouse-Five, by Kurt Vonnegut
20. Frankenstein, by Mary Shelley
22. Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?, by Philip K. Dick
23. The Handmaid's Tale, by Margaret Atwood - I really need to re-read all of these, especially The Handmaid's Tale.
24. The Dark Tower Series, by Stephen King
25. 2001: A Space Odyssey, by Arthur C. Clarke - I'm not sure if I have or not. Is it as good as the movie?
26. The Stand, by Stephen King - I know nothing about this book but apparently it's about apocalypses. I hate apocalypses.
27. Snow Crash, by Neal Stephenson
28. The Martian Chronicles, by Ray Bradbury - long, long ago (I had a fetish for classic SF from the ages of about seven to about 12), the first couple at least. I probably won't re-read these.
29. Cat's Cradle, by Kurt Vonnegut
30. The Sandman Series, by Neil Gaiman
31. A Clockwork Orange, by Anthony Burgess
32. Starship Troopers, by Robert Heinlein
33. Dragonflight, by Anne McCaffrey - everyone goes through a McCaffrey Era, right? My best friends and I did McCaffrey really hard for a solid two years and it was awesome.
34. The Moon is a Harsh Mistress, by Robert Heinlein - the more Heinlein I see on this list the more bitter I feel about the lack of Delany, Butler, etc etc
35. A Canticle for Leibowitz, by Walter M. Miller
36. The Time Machine, by H.G. Wells
37. 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea, by Jules Verne
38. Flowers for Algernon, by Daniel Keys
39. The War of the Worlds, by H.G. Wells - but I've heard the radio plays many times.
40. The Chronicles of Amber, by Roger Zelazny - not all of them, but the first few, when I was a teenager.
41. The Belgariad, by David Eddings - again, I feel like everyone has to read Eddings for awhile, you know? I did the Belgariad & Malloreon, the Elenium and the Tamuli, and The Redemption of Althalus, and that was all the Eddings I ever really needed to read. (Reading The Tough Guide to Fantasyland shortly before or after Eddings is sort of like shooting fish in a barrel. It all starts to seem terribly pointed even though, of course, it's just that Eddings combines SO MANY of the stereotypes.
42. The Mists of Avalon, by Marion Zimmer Bradley
43. The Mistborn Series, by Brandon Sanderson
44. Ringworld, by Larry Niven
45. The Left Hand of Darkness, by Ursula K. LeGuin
46. The Silmarillion, by J.R.R. Tolkien - my best friend once said of this book that "It was the most boring book I couldn't put down". She meant it as a compliment but oddly I've never been motivated to read it since ...
47. The Once and Future King, by T.H. White
48. Neverwhere, by Neil Gaiman - another list entry that makes me eyeroll bitterly, although I do like Neverwhere very much. But, sorry, you just don't need Neverwhere and American Gods on the list. Pick one. (How unsurprising that Anansi Boys doesn't make it.)
49. Childhood's End, by Arthur C. Clarke
50. Contact, by Carl Sagan - more books I haven't re-read since age 12.
51. The Hyperion Cantos, by Dan Simmons
52. Stardust, by Neil Gaiman
53. Cryptonomicon, by Neal Stephenson
54. World War Z, by Max Brooks
55. The Last Unicorn, by Peter S. Beagle - actually no! I know, I'm a terrible human.
56. The Forever War, by Joe Haldeman
57. Small Gods, by Terry Pratchett
58. The Chronicles Of Thomas Covenant, The Unbeliever, by Stephen R. Donaldson - back before SF&F became acceptable reading, the Newtown public library had two of those rotating book rack things that contained all their spec fic which was never sorted alphabetically, and these books were always in my goddamned way. The library either had a zillion copies, or there are a zillion Thomas Convenant books. Anyway, I remember the covers distinctly and I never shall read them (Also, I've heard dreadful things, frankly).
59. The Vorkosigan Saga, by Lois McMaster Bujold ♥ although I note two Discworld books and one entry for these!
60. Going Postal, by Terry Pratchett
61. The Mote in God's Eye, by Larry Niven & Jerry Pournelle
62. The Sword of Truth, by Terry Goodkind
63. The Road, by Cormac McCarthy
64. Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell, by Susanna Clarke
65. I Am Legend, by Richard Matheson
66. The Riftwar Saga, by Raymond E. Feist
67. The Shannara Trilogy, by Terry Brooks lolol.
68. The Conan the Barbarian Series, by R.E. Howard
69. The Farseer Trilogy, by Robin Hobb - I've tried a dozen times to get into Hobb and it never happens.
70. The Time Traveler's Wife, by Audrey Niffenegger
71. The Way of Kings, by Brandon Sanderson - wait, Brandon Sanderson gets multiple entries on this list, but there's no spot for Octavia Butler? FU, world.
72. A Journey to the Center of the Earth, by Jules Verne
73. The Legend of Drizzt Series, by R.A. Salvatore
74. Old Man's War, by John Scalzi - Zoe's Tale is better. But this is pretty good.
75. The Diamond Age, by Neil Stephenson
76. Rendezvous With Rama, by Arthur C. Clarke
77. The Kushiel's Legacy Series, by Jacqueline Carey - the first three, anyway.
78. The Dispossessed, by Ursula K. LeGuin
79. Something Wicked This Way Comes, by Ray Bradbury
80. Wicked, by Gregory Maguire - I know!
81. The Malazan Book of the Fallen Series, by Steven Erikson
82. The Eyre Affair, by Jasper Fforde
84. The Crystal Cave, by Mary Stewart
85. Anathem, by Neal Stephenson
86. The Codex Alera Series, by Jim Butcher - AMAZED that these are here and not Dresden. Every time I read a Dresden book lately there's that letter in the back where Butcher's like, please please please read my epic fantasy! Which has led me to believe that they must be, not awful, but not original or interesting enough to be distinctive (Butcher being a workmanlike writer but nothing special, but with a gift for both funny and FUCK YEAH moments. Like riding a dinosaur through the streets of Chicago), and that his publishers can only market the Codex Alera through the ubiquitous Harry. Perhaps this isn't true?
87. The Book of the New Sun, by Gene Wolfe
88. The Thrawn Trilogy, by Timothy Zahn - seriously, A TIE-IN SERIES? (I'm not actually sure whether I've read these, although I definitely have read some SWEU novels by Zahn.)
89. The Outlander Series, by Diana Gabaldon
90. The Elric Saga, by Michael Moorcock
91. The Illustrated Man, by Ray Bradbury
92. Sunshine, by Robin McKinley - just re-read this last month, still awesome.
93. A Fire Upon the Deep, by Vernor Vinge
94. The Caves of Steel, by Isaac Asimov
95. The Mars Trilogy, by Kim Stanley Robinson - my mother actually has these, I should get them off her.
96. Lucifer's Hammer, by Larry Niven & Jerry Pournelle
97. Doomsday Book, by Connie Willis - Just read this earlier this year. SOB.
98. Perdido Street Station, by China Mieville - I could never get into The Scar and haven't given Mieville a solid go since 2005ish. I really should have another go.
99. The Xanth Series, by Piers Anthony
100. The Space Trilogy, by C.S. Lewis
47/100, a solid score on any reading list, IMO.
I actually got into a mild Twitter allocation lol, whoops, altercation with @neilhimself (very mild, he wisely chose not to keep fighting my bored-at-work-on-a-friday stream of tweets) and chattycheese about this list, which allowed me to sort out what really annoys me about it, which is primarily this: there are far fewer women than there are men on this list (and vanishingly few people of colour). This by itself is a problem, but what I think is characteristic of this problem is that the women who are on here are very much canonical. They're the women who write the books that always appear on these lists; The Mists of Avalon and Frankenstein and The Handmaid's Tale are as inevitable and, in their way, as uninteresting, demographically speaking, as Lord of the Rings, Foundation and, sigh, American Gods (It's not that I don't love Neil Gaiman, because I really do, it's just that can't we agree that maybe The War for the Oaks is as interesting and influential if not more so than Neverwhere, for pete's sake?) In all of these kinds of top 100s, these books will always be there. They are tremendously influential in the genre, and they're extremely widely read - although they're not necessarily good, I don't think genre fans would throw away Anne McCaffrey and Misty Lackey, or David Eddings and Piers Anthony.
But ... then there are the spots that are, hm, not so serious; not so solid; not so inevitable except of course they are, because they always get filled with the same stuff: Miscellaneous White Dude. It's always The Sword of Truth and never The Ruins of Ambrai. It's always Old Man's War and never China Mountain Zhang. Twelve zillion books by Robert Heinlein and none by Octavia Butler (a freaking crime). Michael Moorcock, not Elizabeth Moon. The Codex Alera, but not the Crown of Stars. Brandon Sanderson but not N K Jemisin.
I feel like I'm not articulating this very well, and at the end of the day I've long since decided that lists that don't adequately represent women and people of colour well are not worth my time in terms of trying to find books I actually want to read. But I'm pretty bored of having this represented to me as inevitable (because they're all canonical; well, so is lots of other stuff!) or an adequate representation of the demographics of either the good stuff or the industry generally (emphatically not true). Sigh, IDEK.
This entry is crossposted from http://labellementeuse.dreamwidth.org/346599.html, where there are
comments.
Bold is read, italics is started and not finished. Miscellaneous commentary all mine.
1. The Lord of the Rings Trilogy, by J.R.R. Tolkien
2. The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, by Douglas Adams
3. Ender's Game, by Orson Scott Card
4. The Dune Chronicles, by Frank Herbert
5. A Song of Ice and Fire Series, by George R. R. Martin - I have tried a number of times to read both Dune and A Game of Thrones and it just never happens. In a couple of months I'm going to watch Game of Thrones and I think that might give me the interest/energy to actually get into ASoIaF, but I'm resigned to never reading Dune. I've seen the movie, it's fine.
6. 1984, by George Orwell
7. Fahrenheit 451, by Ray Bradbury - I was reading this out and about and it got into a bag somewhere and I haven't found it again. I will finish it eventually, I like Bradbury a lot.
8. The Foundation Trilogy, by Isaac Asimov - a few times, when I was a kid. I don't think I've re-read these since I was 14 or so, possibly even younger. I should go back to them; I re-read the robot books a few years ago and they were good fun.
9. Brave New World, by Aldous Huxley
10. American Gods, by Neil Gaiman
11. The Princess Bride, by William Goldman
12. The Wheel Of Time Series, by Robert Jordan
13. Animal Farm, by George Orwell
14. Neuromancer, by William Gibson
15. Watchmen, by Alan Moore
16. I, Robot, by Isaac Asimov
17. Stranger In A Strange Land, by Robert Heinlein
18. The Kingkiller Chronicles, by Patrick Rothfuss
19. Slaughterhouse-Five, by Kurt Vonnegut
20. Frankenstein, by Mary Shelley
22. Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?, by Philip K. Dick
23. The Handmaid's Tale, by Margaret Atwood - I really need to re-read all of these, especially The Handmaid's Tale.
24. The Dark Tower Series, by Stephen King
25. 2001: A Space Odyssey, by Arthur C. Clarke - I'm not sure if I have or not. Is it as good as the movie?
26. The Stand, by Stephen King - I know nothing about this book but apparently it's about apocalypses. I hate apocalypses.
27. Snow Crash, by Neal Stephenson
28. The Martian Chronicles, by Ray Bradbury - long, long ago (I had a fetish for classic SF from the ages of about seven to about 12), the first couple at least. I probably won't re-read these.
29. Cat's Cradle, by Kurt Vonnegut
30. The Sandman Series, by Neil Gaiman
31. A Clockwork Orange, by Anthony Burgess
32. Starship Troopers, by Robert Heinlein
33. Dragonflight, by Anne McCaffrey - everyone goes through a McCaffrey Era, right? My best friends and I did McCaffrey really hard for a solid two years and it was awesome.
34. The Moon is a Harsh Mistress, by Robert Heinlein - the more Heinlein I see on this list the more bitter I feel about the lack of Delany, Butler, etc etc
35. A Canticle for Leibowitz, by Walter M. Miller
36. The Time Machine, by H.G. Wells
37. 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea, by Jules Verne
38. Flowers for Algernon, by Daniel Keys
39. The War of the Worlds, by H.G. Wells - but I've heard the radio plays many times.
40. The Chronicles of Amber, by Roger Zelazny - not all of them, but the first few, when I was a teenager.
41. The Belgariad, by David Eddings - again, I feel like everyone has to read Eddings for awhile, you know? I did the Belgariad & Malloreon, the Elenium and the Tamuli, and The Redemption of Althalus, and that was all the Eddings I ever really needed to read. (Reading The Tough Guide to Fantasyland shortly before or after Eddings is sort of like shooting fish in a barrel. It all starts to seem terribly pointed even though, of course, it's just that Eddings combines SO MANY of the stereotypes.
42. The Mists of Avalon, by Marion Zimmer Bradley
43. The Mistborn Series, by Brandon Sanderson
44. Ringworld, by Larry Niven
45. The Left Hand of Darkness, by Ursula K. LeGuin
46. The Silmarillion, by J.R.R. Tolkien - my best friend once said of this book that "It was the most boring book I couldn't put down". She meant it as a compliment but oddly I've never been motivated to read it since ...
47. The Once and Future King, by T.H. White
48. Neverwhere, by Neil Gaiman - another list entry that makes me eyeroll bitterly, although I do like Neverwhere very much. But, sorry, you just don't need Neverwhere and American Gods on the list. Pick one. (How unsurprising that Anansi Boys doesn't make it.)
49. Childhood's End, by Arthur C. Clarke
50. Contact, by Carl Sagan - more books I haven't re-read since age 12.
51. The Hyperion Cantos, by Dan Simmons
52. Stardust, by Neil Gaiman
53. Cryptonomicon, by Neal Stephenson
54. World War Z, by Max Brooks
55. The Last Unicorn, by Peter S. Beagle - actually no! I know, I'm a terrible human.
56. The Forever War, by Joe Haldeman
57. Small Gods, by Terry Pratchett
58. The Chronicles Of Thomas Covenant, The Unbeliever, by Stephen R. Donaldson - back before SF&F became acceptable reading, the Newtown public library had two of those rotating book rack things that contained all their spec fic which was never sorted alphabetically, and these books were always in my goddamned way. The library either had a zillion copies, or there are a zillion Thomas Convenant books. Anyway, I remember the covers distinctly and I never shall read them (Also, I've heard dreadful things, frankly).
59. The Vorkosigan Saga, by Lois McMaster Bujold ♥ although I note two Discworld books and one entry for these!
60. Going Postal, by Terry Pratchett
61. The Mote in God's Eye, by Larry Niven & Jerry Pournelle
62. The Sword of Truth, by Terry Goodkind
63. The Road, by Cormac McCarthy
64. Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell, by Susanna Clarke
65. I Am Legend, by Richard Matheson
66. The Riftwar Saga, by Raymond E. Feist
67. The Shannara Trilogy, by Terry Brooks lolol.
68. The Conan the Barbarian Series, by R.E. Howard
69. The Farseer Trilogy, by Robin Hobb - I've tried a dozen times to get into Hobb and it never happens.
70. The Time Traveler's Wife, by Audrey Niffenegger
71. The Way of Kings, by Brandon Sanderson - wait, Brandon Sanderson gets multiple entries on this list, but there's no spot for Octavia Butler? FU, world.
72. A Journey to the Center of the Earth, by Jules Verne
73. The Legend of Drizzt Series, by R.A. Salvatore
74. Old Man's War, by John Scalzi - Zoe's Tale is better. But this is pretty good.
75. The Diamond Age, by Neil Stephenson
76. Rendezvous With Rama, by Arthur C. Clarke
77. The Kushiel's Legacy Series, by Jacqueline Carey - the first three, anyway.
78. The Dispossessed, by Ursula K. LeGuin
79. Something Wicked This Way Comes, by Ray Bradbury
80. Wicked, by Gregory Maguire - I know!
81. The Malazan Book of the Fallen Series, by Steven Erikson
82. The Eyre Affair, by Jasper Fforde
84. The Crystal Cave, by Mary Stewart
85. Anathem, by Neal Stephenson
86. The Codex Alera Series, by Jim Butcher - AMAZED that these are here and not Dresden. Every time I read a Dresden book lately there's that letter in the back where Butcher's like, please please please read my epic fantasy! Which has led me to believe that they must be, not awful, but not original or interesting enough to be distinctive (Butcher being a workmanlike writer but nothing special, but with a gift for both funny and FUCK YEAH moments. Like riding a dinosaur through the streets of Chicago), and that his publishers can only market the Codex Alera through the ubiquitous Harry. Perhaps this isn't true?
87. The Book of the New Sun, by Gene Wolfe
88. The Thrawn Trilogy, by Timothy Zahn - seriously, A TIE-IN SERIES? (I'm not actually sure whether I've read these, although I definitely have read some SWEU novels by Zahn.)
89. The Outlander Series, by Diana Gabaldon
90. The Elric Saga, by Michael Moorcock
91. The Illustrated Man, by Ray Bradbury
92. Sunshine, by Robin McKinley - just re-read this last month, still awesome.
93. A Fire Upon the Deep, by Vernor Vinge
94. The Caves of Steel, by Isaac Asimov
95. The Mars Trilogy, by Kim Stanley Robinson - my mother actually has these, I should get them off her.
96. Lucifer's Hammer, by Larry Niven & Jerry Pournelle
97. Doomsday Book, by Connie Willis - Just read this earlier this year. SOB.
98. Perdido Street Station, by China Mieville - I could never get into The Scar and haven't given Mieville a solid go since 2005ish. I really should have another go.
99. The Xanth Series, by Piers Anthony
100. The Space Trilogy, by C.S. Lewis
47/100, a solid score on any reading list, IMO.
I actually got into a mild Twitter allocation lol, whoops, altercation with @neilhimself (very mild, he wisely chose not to keep fighting my bored-at-work-on-a-friday stream of tweets) and chattycheese about this list, which allowed me to sort out what really annoys me about it, which is primarily this: there are far fewer women than there are men on this list (and vanishingly few people of colour). This by itself is a problem, but what I think is characteristic of this problem is that the women who are on here are very much canonical. They're the women who write the books that always appear on these lists; The Mists of Avalon and Frankenstein and The Handmaid's Tale are as inevitable and, in their way, as uninteresting, demographically speaking, as Lord of the Rings, Foundation and, sigh, American Gods (It's not that I don't love Neil Gaiman, because I really do, it's just that can't we agree that maybe The War for the Oaks is as interesting and influential if not more so than Neverwhere, for pete's sake?) In all of these kinds of top 100s, these books will always be there. They are tremendously influential in the genre, and they're extremely widely read - although they're not necessarily good, I don't think genre fans would throw away Anne McCaffrey and Misty Lackey, or David Eddings and Piers Anthony.
But ... then there are the spots that are, hm, not so serious; not so solid; not so inevitable except of course they are, because they always get filled with the same stuff: Miscellaneous White Dude. It's always The Sword of Truth and never The Ruins of Ambrai. It's always Old Man's War and never China Mountain Zhang. Twelve zillion books by Robert Heinlein and none by Octavia Butler (a freaking crime). Michael Moorcock, not Elizabeth Moon. The Codex Alera, but not the Crown of Stars. Brandon Sanderson but not N K Jemisin.
I feel like I'm not articulating this very well, and at the end of the day I've long since decided that lists that don't adequately represent women and people of colour well are not worth my time in terms of trying to find books I actually want to read. But I'm pretty bored of having this represented to me as inevitable (because they're all canonical; well, so is lots of other stuff!) or an adequate representation of the demographics of either the good stuff or the industry generally (emphatically not true). Sigh, IDEK.
This entry is crossposted from http://labellementeuse.dreamwidth.org/346599.html, where there are
comments.