Favorite Science Fiction Novels > Likes and Comments
OK, so just quickly off the top of my head so as not to over think it and come up with a huge list...Arthur C Clarke - Childhoods End. James Blish - Cities in Flight series. The Jewels of Aptor-Samuel R Delany. (I'm stretching it a bit as that is Science Fantasy) Asimov - Caves of Steel - The Naked Sun and the original Foundation Trilogy.The Dreaming Jewels - Theodore Sturgeon. Robert Heinlein - StarshipTrooper. A E Van Vogt - The Silkie and the Null A Gosseyne books.Roger Zelazny - Damnation Alley - Creatures of Light and Darkness - To Die in Italbar. Jack Williamson - The Legion of Time (probably not the greatest book but one of the first adult Sci-Fi books I ever read, borrowed from my brother's bookshelf. OK, stopping now, because it is surprisingly hard to stop.☺ I am now thinking of Philip K Dick, Henry Kutner, Leigh Bracket, Poul Anderson, Larry Niven, Robert Silverberg, C L Moore, Ursula Is Guine, Brian Aldiss, C M Cornbluth. No, no, stop now!☺ Would I like these books now? I don't know... Most of them I haven't read in years. Fantasy would be whole other list... Things I didn't take to? Most things by Phillip Jose Farmer but again, that was then, what I would think of them now I don't know. How's that? Enough for now? Who's turn is it next!☺
You forgot Andre Norton. I liked her sci fi much better than her fantasy, but that woman could right! And she was one of the first of her gender to be successful in the field of science fiction. Breed to Come, Starman's Son, The Time Traders, Catseye, Storm over Warlock, The Beast Master, Lord of Thunder, Night of Masks, Judgement on Janus... and those are just the ones I could think of. I also preferred Heinlein's juvenile books. Podkayne of Mars and The Star Beast are still fun to read, even if dated. Otherwise, you have a pretty good list up there!
Did I miss CJ Cherryh in those lists? I think my favorite was The Faded Sun Trilogy. Or Gene Wolfe's Book of the New Sun. And Lois McMaster Bujold's Vorkosigan series starting with Warrior's Apprentice. I'm sure that I'm going to be posting again, but those immediately came to mind.
Oops, yes Susan, Andre Norton for sure... Her books about the Ifts were some of my earliest YA reads, Beast Master... And the one I can't remember the name of with the cities where the streets were all flooded with scented water... And Witch World. And I forgot Anne Macaffrey as well...☺
I love Doc Smith's Lensman series (while accepting that it's not great) and ERB's Barsoom series. I read a lot of Heinlein and Asimov and Norton when I was a teenager . Peter Hamilton writes great space opera, Stephen Baxter writes good hard SF, Kim Stanley Robinson is also good.
Let's see: Frank Herbert, Ray Bradbury and Bujold, Le Guin. And Orson Scott Card's Ender was amazing, will see how the rest of the books in the series go before I claim him as a favorite author. Zelazny!Asimov so far is good, but not in my top, but then I haven't gotten to his robot novels, just a mass of short stories. Clarke also I've read only one, Childhood's End which was good.
Robinson is good, but I find his novels can drag a bit, though I've only read his Mars trilogy so far (started great, then too much stuff got covered). I've got his Aurora standalone though so will reserve judgement till then ^.^ I've been daunted by his others since they look like real bricks!
Only read one Philip K. Dick (Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep) but it was great. So just on that I'd add him as a favorite, though need to read more to see if he stays on the list.
And wouldn't be right to leave out McCaffrey, I must like her well enough since I read the entire Pern and Acorna series :) Though I didn't actually care that much about Acorna...it was my obsessive need to complete series I started that made me finish that one. Pern I do actually love.
Read a couple good Elizabeth Moon ones, The Speed of Dark in particular.
I'm actually not sure what to make of Gene Wolfe's New Sun...was it amazing or just plain confusing, I needed some kind of guidebook to unravel all the references.
Loved Jack Vance's Fire Upon the Deep, still need to get to the rest of that trilogy but afraid they won't be as good...
For what it's worth H.G.Wells impressed with very much with The War of the Worlds. I had just read Asimov's robot stories which almost always have twinge of humour in them so WotW came off so incredibly bleak in comparison.
I think I would really like Verne too, though I've only read his Journey to the Center of the Earth so far.
And if you wondered why my list was vaguely alphabetically ordered, it was because I was going through my shelf. It's about the same size as my "fantasy" shelf, but "fantasy" just contains those that didn't fall on other shelves like dragons/unicorns/steampunk/gods/faerie, etc...so SF was quite lacking. I've read almost more vampire books than SF ones :)
I've amazingly I've not read Andre Norton either for fantasy or SF! So many other names listed above I've not read yet, Poul Anderson, Heinlein, Cherryh, Delany, Sturgeon, Niven...will see how many I'll experience this year...right now I'm a bit overwhelmed with Herbert/Asimov/Card, my plans at least till end of summer will be mostly them :) But no point reading one book of a series here and there either.
Have you read Kay Kenyon's Entire and the Rose four book series? That was a good one. It's a relatively recent series.
From my top favorites authors:Hyperion is fantastic, maybe my favorite book. It can arguably be read as a stand-alone just for the ideas and the character's stories, but the whole "cantos" is great.
From the same author, I loved The Terror (though you could call it historical fantasy and not SF).
Also not technically SF, but rather urban fantasy (or maybe steampunk), The Anubis Gates is my favorite time travel book.
Philip K. Dick has many very good books, Ubik is my favorite then The Man in the High Castle. His short stories are also worth a read.
The old classics:
I loved Asimov's The End of Eternity and The Gods Themselves even more than Foundation.
I found A Canticle for Leibowitz to be a truly great book, there's something about this guy and this story that grabs me.
I've reread The Martian Chronicles a few years ago and it's still as powerful.
The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress is very interesting, my favorite of Heinlein's (though I've only read his most famous 3 books).
More recent books:
The First Fifteen Lives of Harry August is fantastic.
The Three-Body Problem trilogy is basically golden-age SF written in the 21st century, it's chock-full of ideas but don't expect great characters. It blew my mind.
I loved Spin, I didn't like the later books as much (and the last one gets a little crazy) but I still enjoyed them.
Kim Stanley Robinson's Mars trilogy is a great depiction of the colonization of Mars.
EDIT:
I thought of more favorite books by some of my favorite authors: The Inverted World, the Wool trilogy, and The Machine
Oh since you mention Ender's game, I liked the entire quartet-well, there's something that bugs me a lot in Xenocide-but the later books are very different from Ender's game (which is by far my favorite from the quartet). I haven't read the "Shadow" quartet or Ender in exile.
My favorites are the Ender/Shadow series and Andy Weir's books and John Scalzi's books, and Maria Snyder has done some sci fi that I've enjoyed so far.There are plenty I found very interesting that I wouldn't say are favorites but are still good.
I did not like The Expanse, The Three-Body Problem, or Ringworld. I DNF'd Pern and Ancillary Justice and Middlegame. Usually it came down to not liking the characters.
I have plenty on the TBR still.
Hello all! Been a while for me, but I thought I'd chime in... My favorite SF series is the Ender series by Orson Scott Card. The Dune books (up to God Emperor) are a close 2nd. I love anything by Card, actually, as well as Phillip K. Dick, Bradbury and Le Guin (Although I like her Earth Sea Trilogy the best!)And now... wait for it... I don't know what all the fuss is over Asimov's Foundation series! I found the story-telling aspect disjointed, the wordsmanship/turn-of-phrase average, and it was also very thin on character development. I did not develop a fondness (love or hate) for any character, and it's not like they are around long enough before we blast off into another timeline with a whole new set of characters!
I do recognize that Asimov was a pioneer in terms of the conceptual and speculative aspects... he influenced many sci-fi writers, indeed. I just think he isn't a very good story-teller. Is this blasphemy? :-)
Are we going to do a Fantasy thread? Ooh I have things to say about Stephen R. Donaldson as well and that White Gold wielding bastard!
Robin wrote: "OK, so just quickly off the top of my head so as not to over think it and come up with a huge list...Arthur C Clarke - Childhoods End. James Blish - Cities in Flight series. The Jewels of Aptor-Sa..."
Oh yes! Poul Anderson and Niven... forgot about them! There are many on your list that I haven't read, Robin. Not with you on Asimov... at least the Foundation series... I couldn't get through it, and it's scared me away from his other work.
Andrea wrote: "Let's see: Frank Herbert, Ray Bradbury and Bujold, Le Guin. And Orson Scott Card's Ender was amazing, will see how the rest of the books in the series go before I claim him as a favorite author. Ze..."I'm with you on Card and Herbert, Andrea! Le Guin is amazing, too. I also like Octavia Butler, but she's not always strictly sci fi...
Tony wrote: "I love Doc Smith's Lensman series (while accepting that it's not great) and ERB's Barsoom series. I read a lot of Heinlein and Asimov and Norton when I was a teenager . Peter Hamilton writes great ..."I haven't read any of these, Tony! I will need to check them out. Thanks for the recommendations from Down Under!
Oh, I almost forgot: The Sparrow and Children of God by Mary Doria Russell! Fantastic stuff! Only two books... does that qualify as a series? The Sparrow should be made into a movie or mini series, IMHO...
Relieved I'm not the only one to find the Foundation series annoying! It's a long time since I read it but I recall feeling cheated by the structure.Le Guin is probably my favourite author, along with Terry Pratchett but he's not really SF.
And this still brings me to tears: Flowers for Algernon
Isabella, that was one of the more upsetting books, I agree!
K.G. , your comment about the White Gold, umm, Wielder gave me the giggles!!
Audrey wrote: "My favorites are the Ender/Shadow series and Andy Weir's books and John Scalzi's books, and Maria Snyder has done some sci fi that I've enjoyed so far.There are plenty I found very interesting th..."
Doh! Marion Zimmer Bradley, of course, is the author of Mists of Avalon... I meant to say Le Guin's Earth Sea Trilogy was among my favorites... (I love Bradley, too, of course!)
K.G. wrote: "I do recognize that Asimov was a pioneer in terms of the conceptual and speculative aspects... he influenced many sci-fi writers, indeed. I just think he isn't a very good story-teller. Is this blasphemy? :-)"I suppose it is, but that's OK. I partially agree. I find some, usually his later novels, practically unreadable. His early robot stories & novels are still his best work, IMO. I never cared much for his Lucky Starr books & found the Black Widow stories somewhat tedious, though.
I think a lot of his shine came from introducing new concepts that have tarnished with age through no fault of their own. His early robot stories were new ground when written, but are now competing with the real world fruits of inventors who were spurred by them. It's pretty common to see references to his 3 Laws of Robotics in factual articles. Unfortunately, there's plenty of fault to be found in them even beyond what Asimov found in his stories.
I still really enjoy some of his nonfiction work. For instance, I skimmed a book he wrote on measurement a few years ago which I'd read maybe 20 years ago. It held up really well. I'll bet he was an excellent teacher.
K.G. wrote: "I haven't read any of these, Tony! I will need to check them out. Thanks for the recommendations from Down Under!"You can find quite a few of Edgar Rice Burroughs' books for free on Gutenberg in multiple formats for ereaders here:
https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/sear...
Librivox has them all available as free audiobooks, too.
https://librivox.org/author/698?prima...
If you read any of the series, you might want to ask about them before diving in. For instance, if you read his Barsoom (Mars), you really want to get the first 3 books lined up before starting the first since they're short & the first 2 end on cliff hangers. All is finally resolved at the end of the third one. After that the books stand alone. IMO, the 10th Llana of Gathol is the best of the rest & you should avoid the 11th at all costs. It is 2 short stories that are terrible.
You can find the Lensmen & other Doc Smith books free on Gutenberg & Librivox, too.
I liked ERB far more than Doc Smith's books. He had a lot more range in genres & wrote an amazing amount of books. Many plots were reused as were settings. I have trouble distinguishing between The Land That Time Forgot books & the Pellucidar series in my memory even though I read each several times as a teen.
The first Tarzan books stand out in my memory, but later ones often blur with the other series, especially since he visits Pellucidar & resembles every other hero in many respects. The Mucker always stood out for me, though.
Isabella wrote: "And this still brings me to tears: Flowers for Algernon"I reread that not long ago both as a short story & novel, then I watched the 1968? movie. I was trying to decide which did the story the most justice, but I came to no conclusion. All were fabulous. I'm not sure how that is possible, but each worked in their own way.
Heinlein was one of my favorite authors for years, but pretty much just his juveniles & short stories. He wrote Stranger in a Strange Land early in the 60s & I loved it for years, but it hasn't aged well. The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress was his best novel, IMO. He started getting wordy & weird, so I pretty much detest most of his work from 1970 on. Roger Zelazny is probably my favorite author, but his work isn't for everyone. If you haven't read a lot of the classics, much of his humor & description is lost. Many of his books blend SF & fantasy with quirky formats so they really can't be appreciated without a second read. The first time through I was usually too busy trying to figure out what was going on.
Bryan mentioned A Canticle for Leibowitz. It's not one of my favorite books, but it's certainly one of the great post-apocalyptic novels. I keep a mental list, pretty much in published order, of those which I compare whenever I read one. They mirror their times really well & are all worth reading even if some have pretty bad warts.
Disease kills us in:
The Last Man (1826)
The Scarlet Plague (1912)
Earth Abides (1949)
I Am Legend (1954)
Atlas Shrugged (1957) - economic/social/government idiocy
Atomic war:
On the Beach (1957)
A Canticle for Leibowitz (1959)
Alas, Babylon (1959)
Farnham's Freehold (1964)
Make Room! Make Room! (1966) - overpopulation
World Made by Hand (2007) - economic/social/government idiocy
One Second After (2009) - EMP bomb
Jim wrote (on the subject of Asimov) "I never cared much for his Lucky Starr books" Oh yes... I had forgotten those, or blotted them from my memory... They are a train wreck, every copy should be tracked down and sealed away like toxic waste. The only defence of them, is that they were intended for quite young readers.
With most of those books that I took off the top of my head I haven't read them lately and likely wouldn't be nearly so impressed with them now. Many of them come from a formative time in my life, and are viewed through rise tinted specs.
As regards the Foundation Trilogy, this was the first time I had encountered anything so far ranging, a story that spans decades and follows the descendants of the original protagonists. It was impressive then.
I would agree though, that in depth characterisation was never Asimov's strong point.☺
Those would be rose tinted spectacles... I have no idea what "rise tinted spectacles are."
Afterthought. .. I will probably not re-read them now but leave them in my memory. I recently did a re-read on a historical fiction novel, The Great Captains by Henry Treece, a book I had fond memories of. Afterwards, I was left wondering if perhaps it was a bad idea, if it isn't, generally better to make like a shark and keep moving forwards... I reviewed the Treece book by the way, if anyone is curious. ☺
Robin wrote: "Afterthought. .. I will probably not re-read them now but leave them in my memory. I recently did a re-read on a historical fiction novel, The Great Captains by Henry Treece, a book I had fond memo..."I'm ambivalent about re-reading. Sometimes a book is strong enough to take it, others not so. For many years my Mum wanted to read a book she had as a Sunday school prize and I kept an eye out for it in second hand bookshops and charity shops. When I finally came across it and gave it to her, Mum was delighted. When I asked her about it a few weeks later, she said she hadn't got very far into it. She never mentioned it again and I suspect, from the quick look I took into it, that she was disappointed. Of course, after twenty years of looking, I saw it again in charity shop a couple of months later ...
Robin wrote: "Those would be rose tinted spectacles... I have no idea what "rise tinted spectacles are.""You really got on the bad side of Auto-Correct, Robin 😂
Yes, it's a gamble. Sometimes you like a book even more, find things in it you didn't see the first time but often it's a disappointment. It can work the other way too, things you hated at a certain time in your life, you can come to with fresh eyes and find something in them. I suppose it is true to say that nothing you read/watch/listen to is ever read/watched/heard in isolation, but always in the context of where life finds you at the time.
Michelle, the autocorrect on this Kindle Fire is the most "aggressive" I have ever come across, it tries to rewrite everything I say. One momentary lapse of concentration and you. .. Wrangle a bank in babble thickly curtain grill!
Robin wrote: "Michelle, the autocorrect on this Kindle Fire is the most "aggressive" I have ever come across, it tries to rewrite everything I say. One momentary lapse of concentration and you. .. Wrangle a bank..."It really is!!! I access GR most of the time from my Fire. Maybe our kindles are out to get us!
Robin wrote: "Michelle, the autocorrect on this Kindle Fire is the most "aggressive" I have ever come across, it tries to rewrite everything I say. One momentary lapse of concentration and you. .. Wrangle a bank..."I had to turn off autocorrect on my new phone. I couldn't write an intelligible sentence with it.
Rereads can be tough on books & my memories of them, but they make some really shine. They confer a stamp of "classic" on a few. Brave New World , 1984, Fahrenheit 451, & Flowers for Algernon are all books I read as a teen & revisited as an adult, some 30 or 40 years later. I had a far greater appreciation for them.
Stranger in a Strange Land, The Warlock in Spite of Himself, The Skylark of Space, & More Than Human all should have remained fondly remembered.
A thoroughly enjoyable book that had no pretentions of anything but pure escapist fun is Planet of the Gawfs. I still find it a lot of fun. It appeals to the adolescent male in me.
Jim wrote: "K.G. wrote: "I haven't read any of these, Tony! I will need to check them out. Thanks for the recommendations from Down Under!"You can find quite a few of Edgar Rice Burroughs' books for free on ..."
Hey Tony and Jim! I actually have a great ERB story... when I was about 7 years old, my father took me out to the garage and climbed up a ladder to get a box down from the rafters. It was full of books. He blew off the dust, reached inside and pulled out a book. He handed it to me and said, "Here... read this." I was holding in my hand a 1st edition hardback of Tarzan, Lord of the Apes. The original art work on the sleeve was worn away by my excessive handling... anyway, that was the beginning for me. I've been reading ever since!
I will look into some of those other writers you mention, which I am not familiar with. It's all good!
My grandfather was a civilian working at Pearl Harbor during the attack and witnessed the whole thing. The next day he enlisted in the army, and ERB was his commanding officer. My parents now have a large collection of his books, which are very old.
K.G. wrote: "Are we going to do a Fantasy thread? Ooh I have things to say about Stephen R. Donaldson as well and that White Gold wielding bastard!"Feel free to start such a thread...I'd have too many favorite to add to it LOL But umm...that leprous dude was kind of lecherous too, I actually read that whole series...I must like torturing myself (though there were cool worldbuilding, I HATED the two protagonists)
Isabella wrote: "And this still brings me to tears: Flowers for Algernon
Oh yes, me too...and ever since my great uncle passed away from alzheimer's that book has added poignancy, such a similar and disturbing experience.
Talking of ERB, I've read Barsoom and Pelucidar, they were ok,definitely not on my favorites list. I got his Venus stuff from Gutenberg to tackle perhaps this year. Tarzan is just not calling to me...he might have to wait a while. I've not read Doc Smith, though I've downloaded a few of those too, I don't think Gutenberg had the full series for Lensmen which is why I'm not considering it right now, though it's a classic.
Robin wrote: I never cared much for his Lucky Starr books"
Oh yes... I had forgotten those, or blotted them from my memory... They are a train wreck, every copy should be tracked down and sealed away like toxic waste.
Bwhahaha, now I almost want to read them. But life's short so perhaps I'll give them a wide berth :)
Finally regarding re-reads - https://www.tor.com/2010/09/28/the-su... - Dune, Fahrenheit 451 (how do you Americans remember to spell that right...), 1984 all survived untouched....on the other hand A Wrinkle in Time was drowning in pixie dust...the Suck Fairy teamed up with the Message Fairy on that one, sigh.
I've never had a problem with the Suck Fairy -- I still love A Wrinkle in Time. There are books I hated when young that I might enjoy now, so I do plan on giving some of those a second chance.
Rereading can certainly be problematic - there are a lot of books I have fond memories of, but when rereading I haven't really enjoyed them. There are a few that I have reread often - The Hobbit / Lord of the Rings is top of that list. I no longer read it once a year, as I did in my 20s, but I still reread it every 4 or 5 years. The Lensmen series is another - I know the writing isn't great, and the science is bad (particularly since the author had a PhD in physics) but it's just fun. I liken it to the movie Independence Day - there are so many things wrong with it, not least of which is Jeff Goldblum being able to upload a killer virus from his Mac laptop - but it's just fun. The actors are clearly having a great time with a hokey script.
I have just realised what 'rise tinted spectacles ' are. They make you think everything is looking up, even when it isn't.☺
Susan Kite wrote " you forgot Andre Norton "Susan, (anybody) help me out here. I still can't remember the name of that Andre Norton book I mentioned and it's bugging me now. I am sure I was still at school when I read it so it must have come out prior to 1973. I remember the stuff about the cities having streets flooded with scented water that everyone waded around in to get from A to B... These were I think seen in visions or memory downloads from an ancient past. It was set on Mars I think... But I could be wrong. I remember enjoying it at the time and trying to get friends to read it. I am so fuzzy on it... Put me out of my misery someone. What am I half remembering?
Many great recommendations to add to my towering TBR list! Most of my favorites have been mentioned already. I quit buying books when I realized that I very, very rarely-if-ever reread books. Although I did reread one last year and it was certainly a disappointment. You all make me smile when I read the comments!
I know what that Andre Norton book was now. Out of nowhere the hero's name came into my head. Diskan Fentress... From there I asked Mr Google and he said the book was called, 'The X Factor.' ( no relation to a popular British TV show.) Ain't the mind a funny thing?☺
Robin wrote: "I know what that Andre Norton book was now. Out of nowhere the hero's name came into my head. Diskan Fentress... From there I asked Mr Google and he said the book was called, 'The X Factor.' ( no r..."Pleased for you, Robin. There's nothing more frustrating than a ghost of a memory floating around, driving you crazy.
Robin wrote: "... Ain't the mind a funny thing?"It is. The other night we were eating dinner & watching TV when my wife paused the show briefly to say, "Jim Mooney". She started it again. It was a name we'd both been trying to think of a couple of days before & required no more discussion. It's nice to know it happens to others.
Totally agree. The Three-Body Problem has the most amazing science fiction I have ever read. I heard they were making a movie but not sure what happened.
Don't lose hope, Jevon! They were supposed to make Wheel of Time ages ago before they finally got to it.
I'd have to say my favorite science fiction novel is "The Mote in God's Eye" by Larry Niven and Jerry Pournelle. It does a great job of establishing the characters, both human, and alien, and really pulls you along with the mysteries about the aliens. The alien society is well... very alien from the human one but not in ways that seem unreasonable or illogical. Definitely worth a read.
Mark Lawrence's Impossible Times trilogy is one of my new favorites.
These are all great books and authors that have been mentioned! Has anyone read Macroscope by Piers Anthony? Anthony wrote mostly fantasy I think, but Macroscope is hard science fiction and very good.Also I would add Vonnegut's Player Piano. Prophetic tale of how automation will destroy the middle class in America.
Speaking of hard SF I wonder if there would be interest in a thread/discussion of that. Many SF fans are scientists and engineers and we love a tale that starts with the known and goes into the unknown.
And why not, what about the ones you felt were terrible? I know that's a bit more controversial but we all know everyone has different tastes and look for different things in a book so we're all allowed to hate something that someone else might love.