Sci-fi and Heroic Fantasy discussion
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What fantasy/sci fi book first ignited your imagination as a kid?
Someone else mentioned Earthsea trilogy, never heard of it but that sounds cool. I've always like the idea of oceanic adventures, gonna have to look into that one.
I, too, read The Hobbit as a child and truly loved it. I've always loved the idea of dragons and what young boy couldn't be thrilled by them?However, Legend by David Gemmell is without a doubt my biggest fantasy element. I went on to hunt down every book he wrote and thoroughly enjoyed each and every one.
If anyone is on the hunt for a good fantasy author then I definitely recommend him.
This thread brings back so many memories... like Paul said earlier, my first fantasy/sci fi exposure was actually the comic 2000AD, it blew my 8 year old mind. After that the Fighting Fantasy gamebooks (not really novels but kinda). Then I was introduced to Lord of The Rings but didnt quite get into it on the first read. Its probably Magician by Raymond E Feist that really got me into the genre big time, after that I read everything I could.
Anne McCaffery's Dragonsong, Mercedes Lackey's Arrows of the Queen and Piers Anthony's Centaur Aisle (the fourth book, but the first one of Xanth I read), and Christopher Stasheff's The Warlock in Spite of Himself These are the ones that got me locked into fantasy reading (even though a couple of those are sort of scifi) after lots of YA historical romances (Sunfire books FTW!).Then, when I was a bit older I ventured into actual SF with Friday by Heinlein and other books of his, but I mostly stuck to fantasy until my late 20s when I picked up Foundation and Dune and I've been reading more of it since then.
Scott wrote: "This thread brings back so many memories..."Very true. Ever since this thread started I've been trying to remember, but can't really. It's been too long ago & I've read so many of both genres. Many listed here are familiar, old favorites. There wasn't much TV back then & I was an only child living on a farm, so I read a lot early.
I remember that Frazetta's cover art for
&
made me want to read fantasy. My father used to get the old pulp SF mags, too. Awesome cover art on them, too. And he had almost all of Edgar Rice Burroughs's books which I also read early on.Perhaps the first was The Forgotten Door or, if ghost stories count, The Ghost of Dibble Hollow. (I found both these last 2 & reread them again a few years ago. I had good taste as a kid. They were still enjoyable.) I also read The Prydain Chronicles, Christopher's Tripod trilogy, L'Engle's A Wind in the Door trilogy (it was then), many by John Christopher & Narnia.
The book that started it all for me wasThe Forgotten Beasts of Eld by Patricia A. McKillip. I first read it in the 8th grade many many years ago and still have my original paperback copy which has yellowed with age. I am on a quest to find a first edition copy. I haven't read it in several years and may have to take a peek at it again.
For me it was a A Rag, a Bone and a Hank of Hair by Nicholas Fisk. I was six or seven at the time and after reading that I was hooked.
Jim wrote: "Scott wrote: "This thread brings back so many memories..."Very true. Ever since this thread started I've been trying to remember, but can't really. It's been too long ago & I've read so many of ..."
Wow, did you just bring back a blast from the past for me! "The Ghost of Dibble Hollow"--I hadn't thought of that book in YEARS and YEARS. I wonder if it's still in a box up in the attic? I'll have to check.
Z for Zachariah in middle school
Kyra wrote: "The Prydain Chronicles when I was about 8 or so, and around the same time our dad read The Hobbit out loud to us (it was a routine at our house, Dad reading a novel out loud to us kids, a chapter a..."The Prydain Chronicles. Goodness gracious. GREAT BOOKS. They're all fantastic but it's one of the few series that I felt really topped out with the final one, The High King. Though I will say, a few years later, after I'd grown a little older, Taran Wanderer had more meaning for me.
Bobby wrote: " Though I will say, a few years later, after I'd grown a little older, Taran Wanderer had more meaning for me."I agree. I think it's my favorite book of the series. Though I also agree that The High King is a more-than-worthy conclusion to the whole series.
After all these years its hard to point at one book, but looking back I would say the two authors that meant the most to me as a young SFF reader were Andre Norton and Robert A. Heinlein. I continue to reread Heinlein's "juveniles" every couple of years and I still remember reading Norton's books like Quest Crosstime (Crosstime, Search for the Star Stones and Witch World series for the first time.
For me it was Eragon, I think. Even though it's got some themes and stuff that have been done before, I wasn't familiar with any of it. It seemed completely different from anything I'd ever read.
Jim wrote: "Scott wrote: "This thread brings back so many memories..."Very true. Ever since this thread started I've been trying to remember, but can't really. It's been too long ago & I've read so many of ..."
You guys are burying me in nostalgia!!! In a good way! The Forgotten Door, yo? I haven't thought about that book in years! Those Frazetta (and Boris Vallejo but especially Frazetta) covers led me to buy that entire
collection! Had to be it, because the supplemental stories by Lin Carter and L. Sprague de Camp were not up to the quality of Howard.
It is cool to remember some of these books. I read a lot of Norton & Heinlein, but they came after the ones I mentioned like the Hobbit & LOTR.
Space Viking by A.E. Van Vogt. Great space opera.
I guess it would be cheesy, but The Lord of the Rings. Hands down my all time favorite.
I know this isn't "literary" but the first time I got engrossed in a book and cared about the characters was reading Margaret Weiss and Tracey Hickman's book Dragons of Autumn Twilight and I quickly devoured the other two books of that series and the related series beginning with Time of the Twins. I have loved dragons and magic ever since. Quickly found The Dragonriders of Pern after that.I was also able to read the entire Tarzan series as my grandmother had the original hardcovers.
Zach wrote: "Z for Zachariah in middle school"Oh, I loved that story!
My introduction to fantasy as a child was first with Enid Blyton's The Faraway Tree series, and then Richard Carpenter's Catweazle stories.
I almost feel like a broken record but for me it was Master of the Five Magics by Lyndon Hardy. It influences my writing today. A basic quest, some things go wrong, but Alodar pushes through anyway. There is a complex magic system but it handled carefully with a great deal of logic. How can you have logic and magic in the same place? Well Lyndon Hardy made it work and beautifully so. Still a favorite to this day!
I used to read alot as a kid. My favorites growing up were C.S. Lewis Narnia Chronicles. Also, a book by Piers Anthony from the Incarnations of Immortality series titled On A Pale Horse was and is one of my very favorites. I never got into the rest of the deities though. I read Wielding a Red Sword (about War) but only the one centered on Death did I find interesting.
The "Sword of Shannara" - read it after reading Dracula. But then it was "Lord Foul's Bane". The opening shocked me (I was, what, 13) but loved the idea of being transported from our world to another one and was hooked. Though in a Sci/Fi kick right now, I always return to Fantasy.
Ahh this thread got me thinking and reminiscing -- wonderful! I was a big lover of comic books when I was young, and then gradually discovered some amazing books that stirred my love for fantasy and sci-fi. This is a random one to mention but I vividly remember The Phantom Tollbooth, and really must read it again some day soon. Then The Chronicles of Narnia really stirred my imagination, and some of the Oz books (didn't read them all). I was quite a bit older before I started reading Lord of The Rings and other more 'adult' fantasy. It was a bit of a slog to begin with if I recall, but so so worth it :)
The Colour of Magic by Terry Pratchett when I was 7 I think. He was my favourite author for the longest time.
Dragonflight by Anne McCaffrey, this book opened up a whole entire world of fantasy!!!
Lori wrote: "Dragonflight by Anne McCaffrey, this book opened up a whole entire world of fantasy!!!"Dragonflight was one of my early faves as well!
Lord of the Rings, The Chronicles of Narnia, The Chronicles of Prydain, The Earthsea books, The Xanth books. Kind of read them all in a big burst when I was a kid.
Hmm Lord of the Rings and the Hobbit, everything by Heinlein, Xanth...I remember reading a wrinkle in time somewhere in there too, and remember nothing about it...
And I wish I knew of Callahans crosstime salloon and the space operas by Mike Resnick back then, those were fun
Although I didn't read much as a child because I hated it believe it or not. I didn't get into sci-fi as much until I watched Alien and then from there things escalated! =)
The Weirdstone of Brisingamen by Alan Garner. I didn't even know the genre of fantasy existed until I read this book. I fell in love and have never fallen out again.
Rory wrote: "This is a random one to mention but I vividly remember The Phantom Tollbooth, and really must read it again some day soon."The Phantom Tollbooth is one of those strange ones that tends to stick with people. Those who know it remember vivid things about it. I think I have an excuse for some of the details, I was in a theatrical adaptation of it (in school).
Of all the books I know, it is the only one I reference (by title, specifically) in my own book. Of course that is because I lifted a character name... and no, not Milo.
The Tripods Trilogy by John ChristopherI read this as a 10 year old, after finding it in my school library.
I was aware of scifi TV, growing up with Star Trek, Doctor Who, Lost in Space etc but this was the first scifi literature I had come across, and totally fell in love with it.
Ender's game. We had a forced reading period in 8th grade and it really felt "forced". That is, until I came across Ender's Game, I read the first few chapters during the period, then I promptly stuffed it in my backpack when the teacher was looking elsewhere. It's the only thing I actually remember stealing.From then on I got in trouble for reading too much during class.
Bobby wrote: "Ender's game. We had a forced reading period in 8th grade and it really felt "forced". That is, until I came across Ender's Game, I read the first few chapters during the period, then I promptly st..."Love your story!
Mine didn't come until middle school. The cool kid in the class was carrying around a copy of 20, 000 Leagues Under the Sea. I wanted everyone to think I was cool, too. So I got my Mom to buy it for me. I woke up a couple years later and realized that I was so into this new thing I'd discovered, sci-fi and fantasy books, that I had become antisocial.
I read voraciously as a kid. C.S. Lewis, Andre Norton, Clarke, Asimov, Heinlein, McCaffrey, Anderson, Burroughs, Wells, Verne, Alexander... Way too many to remember or name. What a great time to be a sci fi fan. sue
It was The Hobbit that started it off for me. I was bored during a rainy summer holiday, and I'd read most of the children's section in the library. So she gave me her copy of The Hobbit, just to see how I'd do. From there I went to LOTR, but I was a bit young for those hefty books (i eventually re-read them as a teenager and liked them far better). After that, I got hooked on the Pern series. Which are still, by far, my favourite books today.
Lindsay wrote: "Just like my mom handed me Calvin and Hobbes when I was 8, she also handed me The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy when I was 12."My dad gave me HGTTG when I was about 13 or so. Still the funniest book I've ever read :)
I was seven or eight when I read both the Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe and Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone for the first time.
I think it was more watching Doctor Who and Star Wars that did it for me, although I did read a lot of Doctor Who books (and the Star Wars novel) when I was a kid.
As a child it would have been the Magic Tree House series by Mary Pope Osborne, but my first real sci fi was The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy.
I read Magic Tree House too! I loved that series!
I don't remember exactly which story was the first. I received a box full of books from an uncle, including some great anthologies. The stories I remember most vividly were "Who goes there?" (jumpy for a week after that one!), "And then there were none", "A Martian odyssey", "The Marching Morons" and "Mimsy were the Borogroves". Funny how fragments of these stories still pop up in movies (Robocop, Last Mimsy, The Thing...).
Holly wrote: "Hi all, for me it has to be The Lord of The Rings. I heard a radio recording first...and that led me to the book. Listening to it on the radio fired my imagination and I created all those images in..."I'm totally curious. It must have been a radio dramatization, yeah? As opposed to say, reading the whole book. Where did you hear that? Who produced it? I'd be interested to hear something like that. I love radio theatre.
Lord of the Rings for me too. I had been reading everything I could reach since knee-high to a chair (oh well, slight exaggeration - but I did learn to read on my own before going to school), and my mother once said to me that I might like LOTR. I marched to our little local library, and to my disappointment the first part was on loan. So I just took the Two Towers and started reading the story from there. After that I borrowed the Fellowship of the Ring, and finally the Return of the King. And nothing was the same after that... I started writing my own fantasy stories immediately after that. At first a lot like LOTR - but now I am content I have developed my own style...
Sci-fi and Heroic Fantasy
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The Dark Green Tunnel (other topics)The Dark Green Tunnel (other topics)
The White Mountains (other topics)
Over Sea, Under Stone (other topics)
The Martian Chronicles (other topics)
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Authors mentioned in this topic
Arthur C. Clarke (other topics)J.K. Rowling (other topics)
Mark Twain (other topics)
Ryk Brown (other topics)
John Christopher (other topics)
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I did read A Wrinkle in Time, but it was just too weird and kind of creepy. Also read the Martian Chronicles and some other things like that, but in general I've always preferred fantasy over science fiction.