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Top 50 Science Fiction Books on Goodreads
-Ray Bradbury
Don't pack up your dinosaurs, fellow sci-fi readers. You're among friends here.
When we set out to uncover the top science fiction books on Goodreads, our journey—searching through hundreds of books and thousands of ratings and reviews—was a spacewalk down memory lane, from revisiting the sci-fi heroes we grew up with, like young brainiac Ender and hapless (and homeless) Arthur Dent, to returning to beloved worlds created by Ursula K. Le Guin, Isaac Asimov, Octavia Butler, and many more.
The bar needed to be high. Every book on our list has at least a four-star average rating from Goodreads members. Unfortunately, this means that dinosaur king himself Michael Crichton failed to make the cut, along with other big names in the genre like Kim Stanley Robinson, William Gibson, and H.G. Wells. But while some classics may be missing, recent favorites from Emily St. John Mandel, Nnedi Okorafor, and Pierce Brown round out the list.
Without further ado, let's boldly go where many readers have gone before. Tell us how many of the top 50 sci-fi books you've read in the comments!
How many have you read? Tell us in the comments!
Check out complete coverage of Sci-Fi & Fantasy Week:
The New Frontier of Science Fiction
The Most Anticipated Sci-Fi & Fantasy
Top 50 Science Fiction Books on Goodreads
Check out complete coverage of Sci-Fi & Fantasy Week:
The New Frontier of Science Fiction
The Most Anticipated Sci-Fi & Fantasy
Top 50 Science Fiction Books on Goodreads
Comments Showing 551-600 of 934 (934 new)
I have read 35 of these, and have 5 tbr'd It's not a perfect list by any means, there are some I would add and some I would take away, but it is a good reference for starting out.
Wow great list. I read 13 of these. That's much less than I thought. I've heard of every book on the list and I own almost all of them. I better start reading.
24, most of the others physically in my library as upcoming reads. Foundation was my entry into sci-fi, but my favorite on this list is probably The Left Hand of Darkness. LeGuin was just such a damn good writer!
Dario wrote: "NO novels in languages different from English in top-50. Is it because they are not good or because they are not considered at all?" The Three Body Problem is Chinese.
Robert wrote: "How can you not list "Stranger in a Strange Land"!?Needs more Robert Heinlein."
Stranger in a Strange Land has 244,801 ratings which is plenty, but an average rating of only 3.91 so doesn't meet the criteria.
Susan wrote: "28. But the books I read 40 years ago are very different to many of the more contemporary ones. And when is Hal Clement?"Hal Clement's most rated book on goodreads is Mission of Gravity but it has only 6,163 ratings and an average rating of 3.90 so wouldn't meet the criteria for this list.
Guniz wrote: "6, more to go. But I do agree this is not the Best of Sci-Fi objectively. Missing some of the classics."I'd go with - missing many of the classics - but it kind of depends on your definition and perhaps taste. Fact is, books on goodreads that came out after goodreads have a lot more ratings in general than books before goodreads came out.
I like The Martian and Ready Player One but if they had come out just before goodreads they'd likely have A LOT less than their 613K and 626K ratings.
I've read about half of these. I wouldn't agree with the list as a whole; I doubt any SF enthusiast would, as our tastes are individual. There are many worthy titles here, but some odd choices and obvious (to me) omissions.
Papaphilly wrote: "Pınar wrote: "Papaphilly wrote: "Pınar wrote: "Can someone please remind me what makes The Handmaid's Tale a sci-fi novel?"It is dystopia, which is a sub-genre of science fiction."
Thanks for an..."
You sound right about the books that you give as example, they are similar with The Handmaid's Tale more than I thought, indeed. However, it made me wonder what makes a book a science fiction book, if "science" is not the answer.
8 from the list above, plus the rest of the books in a series, like all Foundation books by Asimov, and all his Robot series and many other of his, all Ann Leckie Ancillary books, the whole Dune series by Frank Herbert. Plus, many favorites not listed by John Varley (Gaea series and others), David Brin (Uplift series and others), David Weber (Honorverse), Elizabeth Moon (Vatta series), Jack L. Chalker (Well of Souls series) -- just to name a few faves!
36 read. Usually I am familiar with all the books on these types of lists. Glad there are a few new ones for me to check out.
Mystery is hilarious. I've only read 15 of the 50 and probably won't read some of the others that aren't in my bailiwick or are possibly mislabeled for the genre. But there are others that I will go for.
Fred wrote: "C. John wrote: "Ellen wrote: "Mystery wrote: "These lists are farcical because they are voted by folks who have read maybe five sci fi books in their life. "Hey! I read that! I'll vote for it!
..."
My apologies. I tend to forget that just because I've read a lot of books on the history of the genre others might not of. Stf. is short for "Scientifiction", which is the original name for the genre. It was coined by Hugo Gernsback.
I've read three and have one on the shelf at home to begin.Read Handmaids Tale, Dune, Hitcher Hiker's Guide To the Galaxy. In fact I read the entire Dune series and the entire Hitch Hiker's Guide series.
The Martin is on the read (or in my case listen to).
Very surprised not to see Obscura by John Hart not on the list. Still it's given me some new titles to look for.
Anissa wrote: "I just need to thank GR for giving Science Fiction its own list this time out. I've been thinking it's a shame SF isn't allowed to have its own chair as a genre. I'm much more a fan of it than Fant..."Well put!
Pınar wrote: "Papaphilly wrote: "Pınar wrote: "Papaphilly wrote: "Pınar wrote: "Can someone please remind me what makes The Handmaid's Tale a sci-fi novel?"It is dystopia, which is a sub-genre of science ficti..."
Pinar, I started reading Science Fiction back in the sixties and got involved in fandom in the seventies. There was no accepted answer to that question then and there isn't one now. But keep asking it and maybe one day we'll get an answer.
Papaphilly wrote: "Pınar wrote: "Papaphilly wrote: "Pınar wrote: "Can someone please remind me what makes The Handmaid's Tale a sci-fi novel?"It is dystopia, which is a sub-genre of science fiction."
Thanks for an..."
Since it's about the "human condition," that means that science fiction doesn't always need to be about the future. Jean M. Auel's Earth's Children series, though set in the Ice Age 20K years ago, is therefore science fiction.
Dario: Probably not considered, given what I said in reply to your similar post on the other thread...that GR HQ is in the US and is therefore probably full of English language chauvinists.
C. John: I don't. Re: knowing what "StF" means.
Kerry: In translation to English. Re: The Three Body Problem. I think Dario meant NOT in translation to English.
Randy wrote: "Two other nominations. The Book of the New Sun by Gene Wolfe, and On Wings of Song by Thomas Disch. There are a number of fine books in this list, but certainly nothing better than these two."I haven't read On Wings of Song but The Book of the New Sun is #2 on my list of best science fantasy. Deeper and more literate than LOTR which is my sentimental favorite, Gene Wolfe's works are not for the casual reader. I cannot praise this tetralogy enough.
I'll give a solid nod also to Stephen R Donaldson's The Chronicles of Thomas Covenant, a series of 10 books. Also undeniably dark but gripping and engaging. The last installment, a tetralogy, I can't vouch for as it was published 2 decades after the first 2 trilogies and I've not gotten to it as yet.
Thank you, Randy, for mentioning Wolfe's work. I'll look for the Disch.
Where do Paolo Bacigalupi's novels fall in terms of genera? He is brilliant! Titles I've read:
Windup Girl
Ship Breaker
The Drowned Cities
The Water Knife (this one was his best)
They're all set in a dystopia future.
Mystery wrote: "These lists are farcical because they are voted by folks who have read maybe five sci fi books in their life. "Hey! I read that! I'll vote for it!
Heinlein? Never heard of him? David Brin, Will..."
True. I haven't heard of even half these. It's more a popularity contest. Given the breathe of novels out there that are Sci-fi, I doubt anyone has read them all.
Pınar wrote: "Papaphilly wrote: "Pınar wrote: "Can someone please remind me what makes The Handmaid's Tale a sci-fi novel?"It is dystopia, which is a sub-genre of science fiction."
Thanks for answering. I know that dystopic books are generally sci-fi books like Brave New World or 1984 but both of these books have scientific developments that didn't exist on the days that those books were written and consequances of those developments are related to their stories. I don't remember I read something like this in The Handmaid's Tale, Glead was almost like a country that can exist today. So I'm not sure if it's a sci-fi book. "
While this type of book has traditionally been classified as Science Fiction because that was the precedent, I think cases like The Handmaid's Tale, The Road and, more recently, Station Eleven, should be classified as Speculative Fiction.
While I have long despised “Speculative Fiction” as a catch-all for SFF because of its namby-pamby, wishy-washy nature, I do think it is perfectly suited for stories like these which don’t depend on science for their impetus.
Books like Raptor Red (the life story of a velociraptor by paleontologist Robert Bakker) and The Dog Master: A Novel of the First Dog, would also slot neatly into Speculative Fiction.
Alan wrote: "Randy wrote: "Two other nominations. The Book of the New Sun by Gene Wolfe, and On Wings of Song by Thomas Disch. There are a number of fine books in this list, but certainly nothing better than th..."The Book of the New Sun has only 2994 ratings though it does have an average rating of 4.17. But not enough ratings for this list. But really that's two books. The Shadow of the Torturer is Gene Wolfe's most popular book on goodreads and has 18,129 ratings which is almost enough but only has an average rating of 3.79. And with 1305 tags as fantasy to 466 for science fiction, there's an argument that it wouldn't fit this list anyway.
On Wings of Song has 803 ratings and an average rating of 3.76. Three other books by Thomas M. Disch have more ratings, but none have an average rating of 4.0 or above.
"Stranger in a Strange Land has 244,801 ratings which is plenty, but an average rating of...""Yeah but Heinlein's terrible "Starship Troopers" gets a 4.0 score. That's just plain crazy. Kids nowadays, what can you say....
Terrible as it is, it was still better than the movie version of Starship Troopers.
I've only read 5 of these- Better pick up the pace!
I have read 35 of these, many before I ever joined this site. I have three more of them on my want to read list. This is a great selection, but I agree with Donald that Stranger in a Strange Land by Heinlein should be on here.
Amber wrote: "Papaphilly wrote: "Pınar wrote: "Papaphilly wrote: "Pınar wrote: "Can someone please remind me what makes The Handmaid's Tale a sci-fi novel?"It is dystopia, which is a sub-genre of science ficti..."
Stf is the abbreviation for Scienticiction, Hugo Gernsback's original name for this genre.
C. John wrote: "Fred wrote: "C. John wrote: "Ellen wrote: "Mystery wrote: "These lists are farcical because they are voted by folks who have read maybe five sci fi books in their life. "Hey! I read that! I'll vo..."
How many younger people even know who Hugo Gernsback is?
Trike wrote: "Pınar wrote: "Papaphilly wrote: "Pınar wrote: "Can someone please remind me what makes The Handmaid's Tale a sci-fi novel?"It is dystopia, which is a sub-genre of science fiction."
Thanks for an..."
I like "Speculative Fiction".
I was fairly disapointed with Goodreads Top 50 Fantasy books, but I think the fact that they at least included Red Rising on this list makes up for it. That is an amazing series. For anyone out there who hasn't read it, GO DO IT NOW. You will not be disapointed, even if your not a fan of Sci-Fi books.
OK... I'm an old guy... grew up with Heinlein, Norton, Asimov, and Simak... I also remain an avid reader of the genre. Don't have a clue who Gernsbach is.Sim
Fred wrote: "C. John wrote: "Fred wrote: "C. John wrote: "Ellen wrote: "Mystery wrote: "These lists are farcical because they are voted by folks who have read maybe five sci fi books in their life. "Hey! I re..."
Given his business practices that might not be a bad thing. Still given that one of our top awards is named for him I would think some do.
Hugo Gernsbach was the creator of Amazing Stories back in 1926. After losing control of his company due to a questionable bankruptcy he formed a new company and published two new magazines, Wonder Stories and Air Wonder Stories. Before Amazing Stories there were no magazines that specialized in SF.
I've only read 9 of these books, but every one was both challenging and enjoyable.
18, some so long ago I don't remember much about them. Several I have on my to-read list.
I've read the majority of these. Some I just couldn't get into, like the Three Body Problem. I also just couldn't get into the Ancillary series. The writing style made me feel like I was up against a wall.
Sim wrote: "OK... I'm an old guy... grew up with Heinlein, Norton, Asimov, and Simak... I also remain an avid reader of the genre. Don't have a clue who Gernsbach is.Sim"
Gernsback was an eccentric entrepreneur who wrote lots of books on electronics in the 30's and 40's. Google him.
C. John wrote: "Hugo Gernsbach was the creator of Amazing Stories back in 1926. After losing control of his company due to a questionable bankruptcy he formed a new company and published two new magazines, Wonder ..."Thanks for the bio.
Pınar wrote: "Papaphilly wrote: "Pınar wrote: "Can someone please remind me what makes The Handmaid's Tale a sci-fi novel?"It is dystopia, which is a sub-genre of science fiction."
Speculative Fiction. Learn more about the super category of science fiction with links in my article: http://www.dorendamico.com/3-importan...
Alanna wrote: "I can't overstate how AMAZING Station Eleven is! I recommend it to everyone I meet!"I didn't add it to my top 5 to read from this list. But I think I'll try adding a sixth book. So many books to read...
I might be inclined to include Wyndam's "The Chrysalids" and Grimwood's "Replay" on this list, if one would be inclined to consider them SF.
Not familiar with "Replay" but "The Chrysalids" is definitely science fiction.
Seriously? did you look at the title of the article?
smh