[lord of tragedy]

The Most Significant SF & Fantasy Books of the Last 50 Years, 1953-2002

I SAW THIS SOMEWHERE ELSE AND HAD TO POST IT. ABSOLOUTELY SHOCKING. DONALDSON BELOW ENDER? CRAZY. THE BOOK OF THE NEW SUN AT 11? THE NEW SUN WAS PANTS. GAVE UP AFTER 200 PAGES. ENDER WAS LIKE SCI FI FOR 9 YEAR OLDS. ALLISTAIRREYNOLDS MAKES DUNE LOOK SLIGHTLY LIMP TOO. WHILE I'M AT IT THE HYPERION CANTOS WERE ABSOLUTE SHITE TOO. CHASM CITY IS THE MOST UNDEWRATED SCI FI BOOK OF THE LAST TEN YEARS. TOLL THE HOUNDS IS EASILY THE BEST FANTASY BOOK. ITS STRENGHT IS ITS SILENCE. AND THE OX OFCOURSE. A WIZARD OF EARTHSEA? WHAT THE FUCK? THE SILMARILLION ONLY DOWN IN THE 40'S?



1 The Lord of the Rings, J.R.R. Tolkien
2 The Foundation Trilogy, Isaac Asimov
3Dune, Frank Herbert
4Stranger in a Strange Land, Robert A. Heinlein
5A Wizard of Earthsea, Ursula K. Le Guin
6Neuromancer, William Gibson
7Childhood's End, Arthur C. Clarke
8 Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?, Philip K. Dick
9The Mists of Avalon, Marion Zimmer Bradley
10Fahrenheit 451, Ray Bradbury
11The Book of the New Sun, Gene Wolfe
12A Canticle for Leibowitz, Walter M. Miller, Jr.
13The Caves of Steel, Isaac Asimov
14Children of the Atom, Wilmar Shiras
15Cities in Flight, James Blish
16The Colour of Magic, Terry Pratchett
17Dangerous Visions, edited by Harlan Ellison
18Deathbird Stories, Harlan Ellison
19The Demolished Man, Alfred Bester
20Dhalgren, Samuel R. Delany
21Dragonflight, Anne McCaffrey
2322Ender's Game, Orson Scott Card
24The First Chronicles of Thomas Covenant the Unbeliever, Stephen R. Donaldson
25The Forever War, Joe Haldeman
26Gateway, Frederik Pohl
27Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone, J.K. Rowling
28The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, Douglas Adams
29I 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

[polishgenius]

It said 'significant', not 'best', or indeed 'what Lord of Tragedy thinks is best'.

I don't like or haven't read several of those books, but there's no denying the influence of the likes of Foundation, Earthsea, Neuromancer, and Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep even though I personally found them fairly boring.
It could do with some more newer books - it's obviously difficult to judge the long-term influence of newish books but no Ice and Fire on there? Really?

Chasm City, on the other hand, while awesome, can't be considered a significant book - it's too new anyway, but to me it seems more influenced-by than influential.

[Cougar]

I think you'd find it pretty hard to argue with most of that; I'm surprised that there are multiple appearances by similar works by the same author though. Also I'm surprised neither Legend (Gemmell) or any Jordan are in there, nor is Feist or Eddings. There is a lot of those books that have been easily surpassed by what has come since but I understand the criteria of significant books. I mean I though Rendevouz with Rama sucked really hard but you can't argue with the vision or ideas involved.

[lord of tragedy]

polishgenius, on Sep 29 2008, 02:08 AM, said:

It said 'significant', not 'best', or indeed 'what Lord of Tragedy thinks is best'.

I don't like or haven't read several of those books, but there's no denying the influence of the likes of Foundation, Earthsea, Neuromancer, and Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep even though I personally found them fairly boring.
It could do with some more newer books - it's obviously difficult to judge the long-term influence of newish books but no Ice and Fire on there? Really?

Chasm City, on the other hand, while awesome, can't be considered a significant book - it's too new anyway, but to me it seems more influenced-by than influential.

apolgies for my strident tone.perhaps i should have considered the definition of signifigant. anyway, i was merely trying to provoke discussion. on the subject of chasm city i've never read a book like it before, it was so knowingly pulp yet still dazzling and enthralling, schuyler hausmann is one of the most haunting villains of sci fi.

[Abyss]

I haven't read that whole list but i've read most of it and there's nothing there i can realy disagree with. Even SWORD OF SHANNARRA, which gets frequently panned by epic fantasy fans, has the distinction of coming BEFORE RJ, Feist and various others who picked up the multi-book cast of thousands thing and ran with it.

These are books that pushed the envelope, that threw forward ideas that hadn't been seen, or at least threw them forward in new and different ways.

To go with your example, LoT, CHASM CITY (aside, imnsho, probably AReynolds weakest book) owes a lot to NEUROMANCER, STRANGER IN... and DO ANDROIDS DREAM... . The dystopian futurecityscape, the identity games, the corrupted tech, urban hunts, all those elements show up in the earlier works.

- Abyss, to be fair, didn't necessarily like everything he read on that list...

[Cougar]

Yeah but wasn't Chasam City released in like 2004? So it couldn't have been in, moreover if there was any Reynolds book I suspect it would be revelation space. I'd also add that I'm absolutely astonished that Benford has made it in there when Iain M Banks hasn't.

[Aptorian]

Where the hell is Terry Goodkinds - Wizards first rule? Bah, this list is pants!

[Use Of Weapons]

Cougar, on Sep 29 2008, 03:22 PM, said:

I'd also add that I'm absolutely astonished that Benford has made it in there when Iain M Banks hasn't.

I kind of agree -- though while Banks's SF may be significant, I'm not sure if you could call it "influential". There's no one writing stuff like Banks, as far as I'm aware (and if there is, please say here so I can buy everything they've written!) I have a feeling writers look at Banks and say, 'That's awesome -- but there's no way I can write like that.'

[polishgenius]

jitsukerr, on Sep 29 2008, 03:41 PM, said:

There's no one writing stuff like Banks, as far as I'm aware (and if there is, please say here so I can buy everything they've written!) I have a feeling writers look at Banks and say, 'That's awesome -- but there's no way I can write like that.'

Tony Balantine is kind of Banksian. Not as good but well worth reading. At least judging by the one I've read of his, Divergence.



On Chasm City, I agree that it's an awesome book, but as Abyss says you can trace its lineage back to a lot of places. If books which bear its hallmarks become popular (Richard Morgan's Kovacs books, to be fair, do bear a fairly strong resemblance, but one series isn't enough to make a list like this even if you could be sure that it was definitely from CS and not the same sources that influenced Reynolds) then it could make it on.
@ Cougar, it was released 2001, at least in the UK.

[Laxon]

Woot snow crash made the list as well
And neuromancer is in a good spot as well.

I agree with most of what is there.

-Laxon

[Abyss]

SNOW CRASH sort of took what Gibson and others did with cyberspace and made it less hard noir grim and more here and now. Sort of. he almost dumbed down the sf but made it more real at the same time.

- Abyss, ...now kinder and gentler...

[Bhurnae]

Read most of them and would agree with the cougar.........some of them dry and boring(could never get on with Philip K Dick) but ideas made you think.

[lord of tragedy]

i'm realising now that polish genius is correct and i didn't think this thread through. its not really a rank of quality but of influence. however i'd still like to see someone trace the textual derivitives of a wizard of earthsea? i take abyss's point about terry brooks but surely donaldson did the same thing earlier and better. donaldson's world building is also far more sophisticated. in terms of world building too perhaps the influential book of modern fantasy is surely the simarillion?

the chasm city point was not about its influence rather the audacity of the technique reynolds employs, the trashy pulpy identity twist that was still absolutely mind bendingly brilliant. its the technique that appeals to me, the hundred tiny epiphanies of TTH, the sense of being a helpless spectator donaldson creates as we watch linden avery's journey with 'her son and covenant' in the latest covenant book. i don't find that same kind of audacity in something like enders game or the mists of avalon.

This post has been edited by lord of tragedy: 29 September 2008 - 06:41 PM

[Salt-Man Z]

lord of tragedy, on Sep 29 2008, 01:37 PM, said:

i take abyss's point about terry brooks but surely donaldson did the same thing earlier and better

Actually, The Chronicles of Thomas Covenant and The Sword of Shannara were both published in 1977.

lord of tragedy, on Sep 29 2008, 01:37 PM, said:

i don't find that same kind of audacity in something like enders game

You don't find anything audacious about a story in which

Spoiler

a young boy makes a habit of killing playground bullies, then exterminates an entire alien species -- all unwittingly

?

This post has been edited by Salt-Man Z: 29 September 2008 - 09:17 PM

[Coco with marshmallows]

lord of tragedy, on Sep 29 2008, 07:37 PM, said:

however i'd still like to see someone trace the textual derivitives of a wizard of earthsea?

well,

story = a gifted young wizard goes off to a magic school where he meets people who are jealous of his power and potential?

the most obvious one that springs to my mind is the harry potter series.
someone pointed out in the thread about Patrick Rothfuss that his first book has similar elements too.
the black magician trilogy's another one.

those are just the ones that spring to mind.
bearing in mind that 'wizard..' was first published in the late 60's, there are a whole lot of books that you could argue derive from it.

[lord of tragedy]

okay point taken. no more earthsea bashing. i hadn't realised that it was from the 60's. i came to fantasy through choose your own adventure novels and i guess most ya novels seemed sterile afterwards but that one seemed particularly so. i hadn't and didn't realise its signifigance. the textual derivitive remark was flippant.

off topic slightly one of the very formative books i read was the lonewolf series and another one about a wizard greystar? he had a white stripe in his hair. were they by same gene wolf of new suns fame?

i always thought enders game seemed like a manga rip off.

[polishgenius]

lord of tragedy, on Sep 29 2008, 07:37 PM, said:

the chasm city point was not about its influence rather the audacity of the technique reynolds employs, the trashy pulpy identity twist that was still absolutely mind bendingly brilliant. its the technique that appeals to me, the hundred tiny epiphanies of TTH, the sense of being a helpless spectator donaldson creates as we watch linden avery's journey with 'her son and covenant' in the latest covenant book. i don't find that same kind of audacity in something like enders game or the mists of avalon.

If you like the identity theme in Chasm City, I'd recommend, if you've not already, reading Altered Carbon by Richard Morgan and Use of Weapons by Ian M Banks.


Anyway, on-topic, the other thing that Earthsea can be noted for is the magic system. While I'm downright certain she wasn't the first to come up with the idea that names have power, the way in which it was presented seems to have had a massive effect on the genre, from virtual steals like the aforementioned Rofthuss, or generally related concepts like the Will and the Word system in Eddings.

I'm not sure your previous reading had anything to do with your reception of the book though - I've never read a CYO adventure and I didn't like it at all, at least not the first two. I got the omnibus though so I read the third, that was alright. Sterile is a pretty good description, for me.

[mocker]

how can Anne McCaffrey and Terry Brooks be in there? thats just plain damn wrong, their influence on the genre was telling but imo not as significant as the influence made by many other books and other authors.

i cant fault a lot of the list though there's some amazing reads in there, though i would have thought Jack Vance would have sauntered into that list quite easily as he influenced loads of modern authors!

This post has been edited by mocker: 30 September 2008 - 12:04 AM

[lord of tragedy]

read a good bit of altered carbon. didn't hold my attention. only read one banks book, consider phlebas, found it enjoyable but slightly unsatisfying. will definitely look out for that one. its not so much the theme of identity per se but the ones which push the envelope a bit. so much fantasy and sci fi is ten a penny, bound by the same old tropes and conventions. predictable even. i like the ones where you forget to expect. total immersion. like the ox in TTH.

[polishgenius]

Vance is a very good shout - in fact given the amount of people both in this list and newer authors who aren't who are either by admission or by reputation due to linked themes inspired or influenced by him, something of his should probably be near the top (Dying Earth probably being the most influential).

Oddly enough, I've not read anything of his myself. Need to get round to it, frankly.