'Gateway' SF & F books

[One]

So, everybody surely has books that reeled them into the reading realms of science fiction and fantasy.

Which books did the trick for you? Who was responsible for your transformation into a SFF geek?

For me it began with my fathers love of Tolkien. He read the Hobbit to me when I was a kid. And every week we watched an episode of Star Trek TNG. Roald Dahl corrupted my soul even further.

Ten years later, the next major influence was the breakthrough of the Harry Potter series, at that moment book 1 to 4 were available. So I started reading and somehow I never quit. A friend gave me a copy of Enders Game. I devoured it. On its cover I noticed it was a Hugo and Nebula winner.

I got me a copy of the winners list and now, again 10 years later Im here, stull working down the list, and having found many other marvelous reads.

[Milou]

Harry Potter, Artemis Fowl and Pratchett (mostly Amazing Maurice, and the Wee free men). Whenever the family went on a long drive we listened to Lord of the Rings, and my dad 'forced' me and my sister to watch the movies as soon as they came out.

For scifi Im less sure. My dads love for Star Wars most definitely helped, as did movies like Planet of the Apes and War of the Worlds, but I didn't read too much scifi till I picked up H.G Wells. In highschool I read the Dutch book 'de engelenmaker' (im not sure if its translated in English, but it literally means the angelmaker), which is about a bit of a weird docter and cloning. Even though it was quite a big book, it was such a refreshment between all those Boring books we had to read. Because I have always been fascinated with Biology, books like that, the island of dr moreau and the day of the triffids were just So interesting to me.

[Paul, A wanderer in unknown realms]

Definitely Tolkien and Pratchett for me. Discworld dragged me right in. I started with Thief of Time.

[Dawn]

Had to be the Sword of Shannara by Terry Brooks. This is the book that first got me reading fantasy way back when I was a youngster then Terry Pratchett hooked me for life with his fantastic Discworld books. The Sci-fi reading started when a friend loaned me some old Philip. K. Dick novels and I read about 18 of his books one after the other.

[Cupcakes & Machetes, Hybrid Creature]

Harry Potter when I was a teenager, then I stopped reading like a fiend for quite some time. Not really sure why, but A Song of Ice and Fire dragged me back in and now I'm catching up on all kinds of amazing books that I never knew about until I joined Goodreads.

[Milou]

Most discworld novels were really hard to come by in Dutch sadly, at least where I lived. My dad had copies of Colour of Magic and Light fantastic but that was it. My bookstore did have the Wee free men books and a friend borrowed me Amazing Maurice. But those were enough to get me hooked. So as soon as I started to understand a bit of English, I started reading Discworld.

[Lancer, Warden of the Slums]

I grew up watching star wars (IV, V, VI) pretty near on a monthly basis, and my parents were big I to all the star trek series so I would watch that with them. But what got me into sci fi and fantasy the most would have to be video games honestly. Growing up playing the NES and SNES, playing games like final fantasy, contra, mega man, and soanu other games started the love for the genres. Then PC games like heroes quest, space quest, then later Baldurs Gate, Icewind Dale and stuff like that.

That's where my reading started to take off after finding out those games were actually based of books. So I have R.A. Salvatore and his Drizzt books for breaking me into reading.

[Roger, Knight Radiant]

Dragonlance and Anne McCaffrey sucked me into the genre, telepathic dragons! Yes Please!

[Andrew]

My first Fantasy books were YA titles, The Lost Years of Merlin, and The Magician's Nephew (chronologically the first Narnia installment). Then I read The Hobbit. Then more in the Narnia and Lost Years books. Then I believe came The Belgariad, and then I get a bit lost in the mire :)

Sci-fi books came a bit later, and still are generally lacking in quantity. I picked up Snow Crash at a garage sale and really enjoyed it. Stranger in a Strange Land (coincidentally nominated this month) was another first.

I was NUTS over superhero comics as a kid, especially Spider-Man, but I loved most of the Marvel and DC universe up until the mid-90's or so, with back issues going all the way to the 60's.

Outside of that I always gravitated to both genres in everything else--TV, movies, video games, even card games (Magic the Gathering)... Star Wars, Star Trek, Final Fantasy, Super Mario RPG, Baldur's Gate, Deus Ex, King's Quest, Space Quest, Gargoyles, Willow, Princess Bride. Even the LOTR cartoons which were bizarre as heck. There was a live action production of The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe that I remember loving, but may be very corny if I ever saw it today.

[Andrew]

I remember when we first got cable (LOL), and one night I discovered the Sci-Fi channel. They were having a movie marathon: The Time Machine, Clash of the Titans, and Logan's Run. I thought to myself: "I have discovered the greatest thing in the universe! Sci-fi is king!"

I was disappointed to see many other offerings were not so great LOL But Mystery Science Theater 3000 fixed a lot of that :D

[Susie]

It was Terry Brooks for me too, Dawn! Although I started somewhere in the middle. My dad had read them for years, and whatever had most recently come out he gave me - I think it was Isle Witch. Before then, I had already been reading a lot of YA fantasy. One of the earliest I remember is Tanith Lee's Claidi Journals series, and I also read just about everything by Tamora Pierce.

I wonder what my first sci-fi was... Anne McCaffrey? That's pretty fantasy-oriented too though. Hmm. Possibly Tad Williams' Otherland books did it.

[Andy]

I also started with a lot of fantasy as a kid, I wonder what that says about scifi geared towards younger audiences, but Star Trek, Star Gate, and Futurama were always the Weird Grown Up TV that was playing in the background of my childhood. My parents' first date (no matter how hard my dad tries to deny it) was a Star Trek party my dad was throwing in his house, so I guess any scifi I read later was inevitable.

I think the first real scifi I read though must've been DJ MacHale's Pendragon series (or if that's too fantasy) then Fahrenheit 451 as a sixth grader, and then Harrison Bergeron, 1984, and Frankenstein in the tenth grade.

[Lancer, Warden of the Slums]

Andrew if I hadn't been on my phone at the time my list would have been almost identical to yours!

[Sandy]

Terry Brooks, The Hobbit and Drzitt (sp?) the Drow Elf. R.A. Salvatore is one of my favorite authors! Also Star Trek, the original series first then TNG. I have always loved SciFi but since coming to goodreads I have so many new authors to choose from. This site has opened my eyes to a tremendous amount to new authors - there is just never enough time in the day. Just finished reading Dune - another new one. I will have to look for that Hugo and Nebula winner list though.

[One]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of...

Perhaps there is a list on GR too.
Nice to see all those titles. Maybe we should make a list with best sff gateway books, to recommend to non-geek friends.

Magic the gathering.. I almost forgot about that.. Used to read the 'Duelist' en dream about the ultimate deck.

After Harry Potter I switched from Dutch too reading these genres in English. A translation just isnt the same. For example Flowers for Algeron is translated as 'The genius in a mousetrap'. Now the titles misses the emotional touch it has in English.

[Andy]

Raven Rebecca wrote: "
I don't think he meant to buy the Adams books for me. I just kept them. :)"

that's the best thing I've heard all day

what kind of horror did you read? I'm interested in the genre, but it seems (from the outside lol) to be as bad/worse than scifi when it comes to like, destroying women in horrible ways and also not scary. So I've been a little hesitant to get into the genre without someone pointing out what books to try

[One]

https://www.goodreads.com/list/show/9...

Made a list

Please vote

[Paul, A wanderer in unknown realms]

I woudn't call Dune a gateway book. Its a bit too heavy for the novice.

[Fannie]

For me it was fantasy first. I remember going to the library every two weeks to rent The Witches. Few years later it was also The Hobbit.

For SF it was a small book 'choose your own story' about a person (me) who time travel in a mirror. Then I fell in love with Asimov.

[Kirsty, Jedi Master]

For me it was Harry Potter, Dragonlance and His Dark Materials that took me into Fantasy.

I've always loved Star Wars and Star Trek for as long as I can remember but wouldn't be able to tell you exactly which book dragged me in to reading Sci-Fi....

[Sandy]

Bookarcana wrote: "Raven Rebecca wrote: "
I don't think he meant to buy the Adams books for me. I just kept them. :)"

that's the best thing I've heard all day

what kind of horror did you read? I'm interested in the..."
just read a book called The Summoning. KInd of Horror maybe more paranormal. However, Koontz has some pretty horror genre books and of course Stephen King.

[JenniferR]

I remember my father reading Madeleine L'Engle's Wrinkle in Time books to my sister and when we were in elementary school, but it was Mists of Avalon (Marion Zimmer Bradley) and Anne Rice that really started me on fantasy (sometime in high school).

As for Science Fiction, Galaxies Like Grains of Sand (Brian W. Aldiss) and Ray Bradbury's Dark They Were, and Golden Eyed.

[Ty]

For me it was The Chronicles of Narnia followed by The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings. About the same time I discovered the Heinlein Juveniles, most notably Red Planet and Have Space Suit—Will Travel.

[One]

Seems like everyone started with fantasy first. Got me thinking about early my sf. I think the grafic novels drawn by Don Lawrence ('Storm') really hooked me on SF as an early teen, after discovering one in our public library I was sold. Later the Akira and Ghost in the Shell anime's hit the dystopian spot in much the same way.

As a kid, I also read some abridged versions of Verne, but felt nothing special for them, so I liked other genres better at that age.

[Jay]

In fantasy, it was C.S. Lewis and, especially, Lloyd Alexander, although The Eyes of the Dragon by Stephen King that cemented fantasy's hold on me. But it was only a matter of time, as my mom was a huge fan of David Eddings and Mercedes Lackey.
As for SF, movies and TV grabbed me in ways that few books in the genre ever did. There are a few I love, but I'm a fantasy/horror guy first.

[Fannie]

I forgot about The Eye of the Dragon.

[Audrey, Queen of the Potato People]

My mom is a huge sci fi fan, so it was a white before I realized other genres even existed. When I was little I'd look for books on magic. Then I found the Chronicles of Narnia and Chronicles of Prydain and A Wrinkle in Time. In high school I found Lord of the Rings and Ray Bradbury and Orson Scott Card. I was an adult when Harry Potter came out, which is making me feel old now.

[Kevin]

Mine was His Dark Material, which I read the last two books as they were coming out because I saw the cover of the first book, and thought the alethiometer looked like a roulette wheel.

My 1st SF was the Hitchhiker's Guide around the same time as the series was given to me by a neighbor's kid

But Redwall was the series that made a big impact that made me into a SFF reader as all my friends was reading, and my teacher that loved reading had all of them. He even went to England to pick up the new books, so he could have them early.

[Paul, A wanderer in unknown realms]

I actually came to His Dark Materials quite late, reading it about five years ago. Certainly works as a gateway book though. I know it was the first fantasy for quite a few around my age

[Wayland, Ernest Scribbler]

Hmm. I"m older than at least some of folks on here, and I always read "above my level" when I was a kid. I can't say for certain which was first, but I'm pretty sure it was either The Chronicles of Narnia or The Lord of the Rings. Those are among the first two fantasy series I remember reading. My memories go back a good ways into the dim mists of childhood, and I can't remember a time when I hadn't read them. I know I had the Narnia boxed set and the Lord of the Rings with the mostly white covers back when I was in first grade.

[One]

Would you still recommend them to starting sf & f readers?

[Wayland, Ernest Scribbler]

One wrote: "Would you still recommend them to starting sf & f readers?"

Depends on age. Narnia is good for almost anyone to read, bearing in mind there's a lot of Christian imagery , in case you object to that sort of thing.

Lord of the Rings is a more complex plot, so it might not work for a younger reader, although the Hobbit would, which is sort of a prequel anyway.

Other good "intro" books/series, IMHO, are Lloyd Alexander's Taran Wanderer, Susan Cooper's the Dark is Rising, Anne McCaffery's original Dragonriders Trilogy, and the Sword of Shanara (however the heck you spell that).

[Melanie]

The Eyes of the Dragon was the first fantasy book I fell madly in love with. I was also a total fan-girl for anything and everything from the Dragon Lance sagas as a teenager, especially Dragonlance Chronicles, DragonLance: Legends Trilogy, and The Legend of Huma.

I am actually reading the Narnia Chronicles for the first time now (as a project with my niece). I read The Hobbit only 2 years ago when the movies came out.

As for recommending fantasy and sci-fi, I think you have to look at what that person has already read and liked. If they are into classic literature LOTR is a great start. If they like action, something like Red Rising. Comedy? Douglas Adams...etc.

[Kevin]

Your could say your gateway SF was Gateway.

[One]

Altough I'm not religious myself, I live in West Europe, which is rooted in Christian culture.The Christian references in Narnia didnt bother me, 'cause they make the story familiar in a certain kind of way, thus providing an easy read. Thats good for a Gateway book, allthough I can see it failing for people from other cultures.

I read the Pern books at a later age (a few years ago) and didnt like them. Influences of darker ASOIAF?

I did enjoy the Hitchhikers Guide books, but somehow just can't consider them scifi. I would recommend them as fun book, but not as gateway sf

[Tokio]

My gateway into fantasy has be the D&D monster handbook. I would look at all the terrifying and cute monsters that was pictured on the pages, and help my dad plan his next d&d game by choosing the monster I wanted his friends to fight. My gateway into scifi is Enders Game.

[Andrew]

Melanie wrote: "The Eyes of the Dragon was the first fantasy book I fell madly in love with. I was also a total fan-girl for anything and everything from the Dragon Lance sagas as a teenager, especia..."

Ever since I was a kid I would see Dragonlance books and think "WOW, that's the kind of book I'd like to read one day!" LOL When I finally actually started reading, I never quite understood where to start. And now that Wikipedia and GoodReads makes it easy, I kind of forgot about them! Added to my to-read pile ^_^

Tokio wrote: "My gateway into fantasy has be the D&D monster handbook. I would look at all the terrifying and cute monsters that was pictured on the pages, and help my dad plan his next d&d game by choosing the ..."

I remember the WarCraft II RTS came with a booklet that gave lore on the world and little character/profile summaries of some important figures in each race. I used to read it over repeatedly and even drew my own additions. Not too long after that I ended up picking up some Merlin, Narnia, and Hobbit books :)

[Sandy]

Melanie wrote: "The Eyes of the Dragon was the first fantasy book I fell madly in love with. I was also a total fan-girl for anything and everything from the Dragon Lance sagas as a teenager, especia..."

I so totally agree about the dragonlance books...really love the story lines in those. I tore through the ones about the twins series - actually I am thinking a reread I enjoyed them so much.

[Lel]

Mine, like most people, was The Hobbit. We went on a family holiday when I was about 11 I think and my parents put the audio book in the car instead of the radio. I never wanted to get out of the car!

From there it was Terry Pratchett, Piers Anthony, Terry Brooks, some of the Forgotten Realms books. Anything my parents had. Like Wayland I constantly got told 'I was reading above my level'. I think I upset my English teacher when I turned up to silent reading with the same book as him.

[Mike]

For me it was the world of Warhammer and more specifically the Gotrek & Felix series. As a kid I already played with the miniatures, which gave me already some knowledge on the world.

Besides that I played a lot of games, and saw a lot of movies which already made me love the fantasy and sf setting. But I wasn't really into reading books. But the combination of Gotrek & Felix and a new found interest in D&D made me change that.

[Rinn, (Retired mod) Captain of the SSV Normandy]

I realised I never answered this, and it's a great question.

For me, I'm not entirely sure. I just remember always loving SFF. I remember reading The Hobbit aged 8 or so, and of course Harry Potter. I loved William Nicholson's Wind Singer series, plus a series by Marianne Curley called the Guardians of Time which I read in my early teens.

I think that perhaps it was less a gateway book than my dad showing interest in SFF, and me copying him? :P

[One]

Seem like all the dad's had a lot of influences in this. And I'm being example to my kids right now.

[Rinn, (Retired mod) Captain of the SSV Normandy]

Yesssss, make us proud! :D

[Mike]

One wrote: "Seem like all the dad's had a lot of influences in this. And I'm being example to my kids right now."

I'm sorry but I have to say that my dad has no clue whatsoever about Fantasy and Sci-Fi ;) . For me it was my mom with whom I share a love in that particular genre with things as The Lord of the Rings and Star Wars.

[Fannie]

Same here, but I am the mom with who my sons share fantasy/SF interest. I am currently reading The Hobbit to my 7 years old. We also watch Doctor Who together.

[Audrey, Queen of the Potato People]

Mike wrote: "One wrote: "Seem like all the dad's had a lot of influences in this. And I'm being example to my kids right now."

I'm sorry but I have to say that my dad has no clue whatsoever about Fantasy and S..."

My mom is much more hard-core than my dad. I used to think sci fi was a "girly" thing. My dad did like the old sci-fi movies, though: "Forbidden Planet," "Black Hole," "Tron."

[Pickle]

without a doubt it was starting off with Sir Arthur C Clarke's 2001 series, this got me hooked.

With fantasy it was a bit different, i solely read sci-fi then one day, randomly, i picked up China Mieville's Perdido Street Station read it and was hooked...

[Mary]

Was reading SF and fantasy as soon as I could read. Can't really remember the first. 0:)