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Strange in a Strange Land was published in late 1959 - but I'd consider that a 60's book!

Yay - Starship troopers lol

Peter wrote: "Strange in a Strange Land was published in late 1959 - but I'd consider that a 60's book!"

Stranger in a Strange Land is listed everywhere I look as a 1961 publication.

Greyweather wrote: "Peter wrote: "Strange in a Strange Land was published in late 1959 - but I'd consider that a 60's book!"

Stranger in a Strange Land is listed everywhere I look as a 1961 publication."

You're right, I must have been thinking of the pub date for Starship Troopers instead.

Why is Methuselah's Children on here, when GR says it was published in 1941?

You can also vote on favorite SC authors of the 1950s:
http://www.goodreads.com/poll/list/10...

Susanna wrote: "Why is Methuselah's Children on here, when GR says it was published in 1941?"

The 1941 pub date listed on GR must refer to when it was serialized in 'Astounding' magazine. It was expanded a great deal and published as a hardcover novel in 1958.

As the creator of the 70s and 80s list I find that anything nominated for hugo or nebula is fair game for this list. But I'm not sure if that was the intention of the 40s, 50s and 60s lists - so for example I don't see the lord of the rings here. Clearly these are fantasy rather than sf - but they would have been valid hugo/nebula nominees - if we are not leaving fantasy off these lists then they should be here. Thoughts?

I created the 50's and 60's lists, I based the original list entirely on my own taste. While I love The Lord of the Rings books, I personally do not consider them to be Sci-Fi, and I'm not much of a fan of Fantasy in general, so just didn't consider it to be included in the list.

However, I'm not about to dissuade someone from including them on the list. While I may not consider them to be Sci-Fi, there are other books listed that might be questionable as well.

I'm sure that "Hard Sci-Fi" fans would question wether Bradbury could be considered a Sci-Fi author at all. Someone could even argue that Clifford Simak and Walter Miller were not really Sci-Fi either. And that's just the 50's. There was an explosion of so called "Soft Sci-Fi" in the New Wave 60's, of which there is plenty on the 60's list.

I like your 70's and 80's lists, I was about to try to start a 70's list myself when I saw that you had already started it. I'm much more of a vintage Sci-Fi enthusiast myself, so any 70's list I would start would have been pretty sparse.

I really liked the label Speculative Fiction which was beginning to take root when the Sci Fi Channel appeared. My idea of the perfect sf book is something set in an unspecified near future in which one very small thing is different and the book is all about what difference that small thing makes.

Removed the following as the original publication dates are not in this date range:
The Fifth Galaxy Reader
Red Planet
Galactic Patrol
Slan

According to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Galactic... it was first published in 1950 - though it was serialized earlier.

I would consider serialization to be publication. The work was after all printed and distributed in public when it was serialized in the late 30s.

So if a book collection is of short stories from the fifties it should be on this list? I think if a book is first published in a year or a decade, then that is good enough. If it were a link for a magazine, that would be different. I did add Slan and Red Planet to the forties list though.

Serialization is defined as "To write or publish in serial form." Therefore to serialize something is to publish it. Serialization is not something different from publication; it is merely a type of publication.

If it really distresses you though, by all means, add it back on.

Should the Lord of the Rings be on this list?

I would say that fantasy including LotR should not be on this list. There are equivalent fantasy lists.

"The Last Answer", Asimov
Short story. Published January 1980

Peter wrote: ""The Last Answer", Asimov
Short story. Published January 1980"

As per https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Las...
removed.