NPR 100 SF/F Books meme: bold the ones you've read, italics the ones you intend to read, underline series/books you've read part of, and strike the ones you never intend to read
( Read more... )
I think that some books that had more... urban fantasy elements (like the Sookie Stackhouse novels) weren't included here. Maybe that includes Dracula? lol, I have no idea XD
Technically Naahmah's kiss is book 6 of the Kushiel series, but it's also the first of its own trilogy, sooo I dunno xD I am presuming that they are including it in that listing.
I LOVED Watership Down so much. It was one of the books I consider being my "gateway drugs" into Fantasy. I think I read Watership down, and then started reading the Redwall series, but I'm not entirely sure if that was the order or if it was the other way around. After Redwall, I read Mercedes Lackey's Mage Wars series (about the gryphons), and that was kind of my gateway trilogy into fantasy books about humans, since they were also the first books I read that were probably intended for adults XD
Maybe Dracula falls into religious fiction rather than science fiction, as the explanation for the unusual events is religious in nature. Left Behind would also fall into that category if you haven't read it - it's about what happens to everyone left over after all the good people on Earth are Raptured at the same time. Other than the main character's conversion story, I enjoyed the book, as I enjoy "speculative fiction" in general (that is, fiction where the author proposes some unusual situation and then writes about the consequences and the characters' reactions to that situation), regardless of what the original premise is
( ... )
the various Robot fiction was retroactively attached to the Foundation universe. the material that was collected as the first three published Foundation books was a fairly distinct literary project from the other stuff written to be in that universe, and predated the later sequels and prequels by decades. the general fan and critical perception is that the first three books stand on their own pretty well and that most of the later stuff was a dubious cash-in project. in any case, those three are the ones that earned a recognized place in the canon of science fiction classics, while, say Foundation and Earth hasn't really been assigned the same status.
the last time i checked (about 15 years ago), there was one sequel to The Mote in God's Eye. i don't especially recommend it.
more generally, i think the intent of the list was that when a single book is mentioned they mean just that book, and when a series or collection is named they mean the specified series. so when they say The Caves of Steel they aren't asking about, say, Robots
( ... )
more generally, i think the intent of the list was...
Yeah, the list wasn't created for memes. :)
see also the way The Left Hand of Darkness and The Dispossessed get separate entries even though they're in the same universe
I recently read "The Word for World is Forest" and didn't particularly like the book, which led me to look up more info about it, which led me to learn that it is part of the tLHoD universe. I like to read related books in the order the author wrote them, so it frustrated me that Audible.com had no info at all that "Forest" was in the same universe. I don't think I would have liked Forest any more had I read it in order, but it's a philosophical point.
but i mean, the intent of the meme was probably to take the list at face value when it mentions individual books vs when it mentions series.
in the particular case of the Hainish/Ekumen cycle, i really, really wouldn't lose too much sleep over reading it all in precisely the order it was written. the sense of continuity is very loose, and even keeping track of where all the short stories fit into the writing/publication history is a pretty involved task, and i think there are even one or two stories where it's not clear, even to the author, whether they're part of that universe or not. plus, the couple of novels just aren't up to the standard of some of the later work.
other curious cases: there's a lot of character overlap between different Vonnegut novels, but there's no effort at consistency. also, the issue of whether Diamond Age and Snow Crash is a bit complicated.
Do you have specific evidence for this? A lot of the language bridges the different stories, such as "con-apt" (sorry if the spelling/punctuation is wrong, I read most of PDK in audio format) and I think also "artiforg" (which was borrowed later by the 2010 movie Repo Men, based on a 2009 novel).
This is a weird list. Iain Banks is still writing Culture novels (and Anthony will probably still be writing Xanth novels a few years after he dies--I kid, but not much)--how do you decide if you've read the series or not? On the other hand you have entries that don't really stand on their own (e.g. Dragonflight).
I've read 65 of them, read part of the designated series for a few more, and in two cases (Wicked and The Book Of The New Sun) read part and abandoned the rest.
I would also suggest that "Animal Farm" is neither science fiction nor fantasy, but that's a different discussion. :)
I would also suggest that "Animal Farm" is neither science fiction nor fantasy, but that's a different discussion. :)
It's hard to define SF and F. There are quite a few dystopias (sp?) on here, but dystopias aren't necessarily SF/F by definition (such as Animal Farm). Vampire flicks/novels today are usually put into SF/F, but I suspect the makers of this list didn't consider Dracula an SF/F novel or they would have included it.
This is a weird list.
I'm at least glad to see that it includes some more contemporary pieces and not only classics. And I was pleasantly surprised that it included two graphic novels. But the repeat of authors surprises me less positively - there's so many more authors out there! - especially considering that out of some 90-ish unique authors they only managed to squeeze in 10 women and I don't think there are any non-white authors. If they hadn't duplicated authors, they could've fit more minorities in.
Comments 8
Technically Naahmah's kiss is book 6 of the Kushiel series, but it's also the first of its own trilogy, sooo I dunno xD I am presuming that they are including it in that listing.
I LOVED Watership Down so much. It was one of the books I consider being my "gateway drugs" into Fantasy. I think I read Watership down, and then started reading the Redwall series, but I'm not entirely sure if that was the order or if it was the other way around. After Redwall, I read Mercedes Lackey's Mage Wars series (about the gryphons), and that was kind of my gateway trilogy into fantasy books about humans, since they were also the first books I read that were probably intended for adults XD
Reply
Reply
the last time i checked (about 15 years ago), there was one sequel to The Mote in God's Eye. i don't especially recommend it.
more generally, i think the intent of the list was that when a single book is mentioned they mean just that book, and when a series or collection is named they mean the specified series. so when they say The Caves of Steel they aren't asking about, say, Robots ( ... )
Reply
Yeah, the list wasn't created for memes. :)
see also the way The Left Hand of Darkness and The Dispossessed get separate entries even though they're in the same universe
I recently read "The Word for World is Forest" and didn't particularly like the book, which led me to look up more info about it, which led me to learn that it is part of the tLHoD universe. I like to read related books in the order the author wrote them, so it frustrated me that Audible.com had no info at all that "Forest" was in the same universe. I don't think I would have liked Forest any more had I read it in order, but it's a philosophical point.
Reply
in the particular case of the Hainish/Ekumen cycle, i really, really wouldn't lose too much sleep over reading it all in precisely the order it was written. the sense of continuity is very loose, and even keeping track of where all the short stories fit into the writing/publication history is a pretty involved task, and i think there are even one or two stories where it's not clear, even to the author, whether they're part of that universe or not. plus, the couple of novels just aren't up to the standard of some of the later work.
other curious cases: there's a lot of character overlap between different Vonnegut novels, but there's no effort at consistency. also, the issue of whether Diamond Age and Snow Crash is a bit complicated.
Reply
(The comment has been removed)
Reply
I've read 65 of them, read part of the designated series for a few more, and in two cases (Wicked and The Book Of The New Sun) read part and abandoned the rest.
I would also suggest that "Animal Farm" is neither science fiction nor fantasy, but that's a different discussion. :)
Reply
It's hard to define SF and F. There are quite a few dystopias (sp?) on here, but dystopias aren't necessarily SF/F by definition (such as Animal Farm). Vampire flicks/novels today are usually put into SF/F, but I suspect the makers of this list didn't consider Dracula an SF/F novel or they would have included it.
This is a weird list.
I'm at least glad to see that it includes some more contemporary pieces and not only classics. And I was pleasantly surprised that it included two graphic novels. But the repeat of authors surprises me less positively - there's so many more authors out there! - especially considering that out of some 90-ish unique authors they only managed to squeeze in 10 women and I don't think there are any non-white authors. If they hadn't duplicated authors, they could've fit more minorities in.
Reply
Leave a comment