Sci-Fi Book Club List
Yet another tidbit from Amp - The Science Fiction Book Club have created a list of the fifty most significant SF novels from 1953-2006. The game is to bold the ones you've read, strike through the ones you didn't like, italicize the ones you never finished and put a star next to the ones you liked. Righty ho then.
- The Lord of the Rings - J.R.R. Tolkien *
- The Foundation Trilogy - Isaac Asimov
- Dune - Frank Herbert *
- Stranger in a Strange Land - Robert A. Heinlein
- A Wizard of Earthsea - Ursula K. Le Guin *
- Neuromancer - William Gibson *
- Childhood's End - Arthur C. Clarke
- Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? - Philip K. Dick
- The Mists of Avalon - Marion Zimmer Bradley
- Fahrenheit 451 - Ray Bradbury
- The Book of the New Sun - Gene Wolfe
- A Canticle for Leibowitz - Walter M. Miller, Jr.
- The Caves of Steel - Isaac Asimov
- Children of the Atom - Wilmar Shiras
- Cities in Flight - James Blish
The Colour of Magic - Terry Pratchett- Dangerous Visions - edited by Harlan Ellison
- Deathbird Stories - Harlan Ellison
- The Demolished Man - Alfred Bester
- Dhalgren - Samuel R. Delany
- Dragonflight - Anne McCaffrey
- Ender's Game - Orson Scott Card *
- The First Chronicles of Thomas Covenant the Unbeliever
- Stephen R. Donaldson * - The Forever War - Joe Haldeman *
- Gateway - Frederik Pohl
- Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone - J.K. Rowling
- The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy - Douglas Adams *
- I Am Legend - Richard Matheson
- Interview with the Vampire - Anne Rice
- The Left Hand of Darkness - Ursula K. Le Guin
- Little, Big - John Crowley
- Lord of Light - Roger Zelazny *
- The Man in the High Castle - Philip K. Dick
- Mission of Gravity - Hal Clement
- More Than Human - Theodore Sturgeon
- The Rediscovery of Man - Cordwainer Smith
- On the Beach - Nevil Shute
- Rendezvous with Rama - Arthur C. Clarke
- Ringworld - Larry Niven
- Rogue Moon - Algis Budrys
- The Silmarillion - J.R.R. Tolkien
- Slaughterhouse-5 - Kurt Vonnegut
- Snow Crash - Neal Stephenson *
- Stand on Zanzibar - John Brunner
- The Stars My Destination - Alfred Bester
- Starship Troopers - Robert A. Heinlein *
- Stormbringer - Michael Moorcock
The Sword of Shannara - Terry Brooks- Timescape - Gregory Benford
- To Your Scattered Bodies Go - Philip Jose Farmer
The most glaring item in that list is that I've never finished The Silmarillion. Talk about having to hand in my nerd card - sheesh. I do have it on my bookshelf, so that might be something I correct sometime in the future, when I'm um, really bored. There are quite a few big names on that list that I've never read, like Stranger in a Strange Land, Rendezvous with Rama and Stormbringer, that tempt me somewhat, but stuff like Harry Potter and Interview with the Vampire isn't ever going to make it onto my bedside table. I'm a bit miffed that Dan Simmons' Hyperion isn't on this list anywhere, but I suppose that's bound to happen when someone else makes the list.