Sci-fi and Heroic Fantasy discussion
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What fantasy/sci fi book first ignited your imagination as a kid?
First, Hi? I was trying to find a serie that a read a couple of months ago and I forgot to add it in my book list. Can anyone help me out to find it? I didn't know where to actually ask that question so I hope I'm at the right place :DThe premise is about a guy called Nathan I think, his father is the president of the federation i think and he's going on his first space ship to be a co-pilot or something and something happen and they are getting stranded in another galaxy with no way to get back home and he become the captain of the ship because during the test of the new engine to go further than speed of light they ended up into another ship and a fight broke out and the captain died.
Well i hope someone can help me out, thank in advance. I forgot the series is about 9 or 10 books already.
EDIT: Nevermind I finally found it lol. I've been looking for hours lol
by Ryk Brown
I was probably about 10 years old when I discovered an old carboard box filled with loads of dusty Lone Wolf books by Joe Dever and Fighting Fantasy books by Ian Livingstone & Steve Jackson. I remember feeling as though I'd stumbled upon a treasure chest!
Angela wrote: "I was probably about 10 years old when I discovered an old carboard box filled with loads of dusty Lone Wolf books...I remember feeling as though I'd stumbled upon a treasure chest! "That's so cool & a great way to put it. I had a similar thing happen to me at that age, too. It was a box of my father's books filled with the Lancer editions of the Conan books & a lot of others. Thanks for bringing back the memory.
A.L. wrote: "Watership Down which I still read. Chronicles of Narnia. Star Trek books."I just reread Watership Down this year. Always loved that book but hadn't read it in a long time. Still a great read.
The Lord of the Rings- in my late teens, I found this book really difficult going, especially the language, but my brother challenged me to read it, so I persevered. Have been a fantasy fan ever since and have never looked back.
You're most welcome Jim :) I'm sure you too can almost smell those dusty old books if you close your eyes and think on it. The treasure chest I discovered belonged to my uncle... He had moved on to playing what must be one of the first RPGs on the old Amiga Commodore 64 - 'the Bards Tale'. Ah, nostalgia.
There were a few, but I LOVED A Wrinkle In Time, Wind in the Door, and A Swiftly Tilting Planet. I just recently discovered that there are 2 more in the series and am reading them now. I hope they hold up to what I remember as a kid! I also loved The Unicorn Chronicles by Bruce Coville. Only, he never bothered to publish the third and final book in the series, so I guess I will never know how it ends. If anyone is friends with Bruce, maybe they could kindly mention that some of us have been waiting for this book since we were twelve...
Bobby wrote: "I remember the library was only 2 blocks from our house, right next to a pharmacy. My cousin and i would load up on candy then get our books. I also don't remember titles, it was almost 40 years ag..."I loved those books! I recently found some childrens books that are written that way and my girls think they are the greatest things ever.
K.S. wrote: "Watership Down. Awesome book, which led me to Redwall, which led me to realize that it wasn't the talking animals I liked, but the make-believe world, epic wars, and character interaction. I still ..."Every once in a while I will still call a car a hrududu...then people look at me funny and walk away...
Angela wrote: "I was probably about 10 years old when I discovered an old carboard box filled with loads of dusty Lone Wolf books by Joe Dever and Fighting Fantasy books by Ian Livingstone & Steve Jackson. I re..."
Ohhh fighting fantasy I remember those:)
If I go back far enough I loved Thomas the Tank Engine. I read the original books. I had them all and read them over and over.
Talking steam trains - what's not to like:)
Oh and I re-read the Tripods recently. Still a great trilogy.
Sarah wrote: "K.S. wrote: "Watership Down. Awesome book, which led me to Redwall, which led me to realize that it wasn't the talking animals I liked, but the make-believe world, epic wars, and character interact..."That's excellent :) I loved Watership Down too - I still don't look at rabbits in quite the same way...
I cried then and I still cry at the end.
A.L. wrote: "I cried then and I still cry at the end."Yes, it's beautifully written, isn't it?
This is so easy for me to remember, it was actually a pair of books by Ray Bradbury- R is for Rocket- and - S is for Space. They set my imagination on fire, and I've been a lifelong fan of Sci-fi and Ray Bradbury ever since.
Dragon On A Pedestal by Piers Anthony was the one that got me. I didn't realize it was part of a series when I asked my parents to buy it for me, but once I did, I had to get every one that had come out up to that point. After that, I started reading every other book he had written and then started branching out to other authors.
Pendragon, and Eragon sparked my love.
I read and loved 'Watership Down' way back when I was young. I tried reading 'Plague Dogs' but the cruelty was too much to finish.
Spooky1947 wrote: "and I ain't no she either...."Oh, for some reason I thought Sarah made that comment. :-)
And I still don't know what you're talking about.
I didn't say anything, but I do love Bradbury. Reading what you wrote Bobby, makes me want to start suggesting a Bradbury for the classic novel read. It has been awhile for me.
Sarah wrote: "I didn't say anything, but I do love Bradbury. Reading what you wrote Bobby, makes me want to start suggesting a Bradbury for the classic novel read. It has been awhile for me."It's funny, Sarah, I went years without reading a Bradbury novel. I read all of his collections of his short stories as a kid, and many of the stories even got recycled in different collections, I didn't care. But I didn't read Fahrenheit 451 until I was an adult (and was blown away) and I still haven't read Something Wicked This Way Comes or Dandelion Wine.
Bobby wrote: "...But I didn't read Fahrenheit 451 until I was an adult ..."I reread it as an adult & was also blown away. I didn't see A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court by Mark Twain on your shelves. That's another that impressed me as much & in a similar way.
Mind was brave new world... Still love that book. It truly is the one book that got me addicted to reading.
Bobby wrote: "...and I still haven't read Something Wicked This Way Comes..."
Just read that, absolutely recommend. Being a bit of a Horror buff as well as Sci/Fi; you'll LOVE that one. Plus, it is a perfect October read.
Just read that, absolutely recommend. Being a bit of a Horror buff as well as Sci/Fi; you'll LOVE that one. Plus, it is a perfect October read.
The Thief and Howl's Moving Castle were the books that got me into fantasy as a preteen. Now fantasy is my main genre of choice. So many waiting to be read!
The Martian Chronicles, then later, Stranger in a Strange Land. It's so interesting to me that Mars endures as a topic of fascination for writers, witness the book and movie of The Martian (I actually liked the movie better!)
I'll say it again, in the old SF pulp magazines it seemed that if they weren't on the moon or going to the moon, they were on Mars or going to Mars...PKD wrote so much about Mars it ain't funny....
Hands down, The Chronicles of Narnia. Talking animals, castles, battles, adventures on the sea, giants, underground kingdoms...what's not to love? Sometimes I still climb into wardrobes (but I always leave the door open)...
War of the Worlds and A Wrinkle in Time.
Children of Morrow, I found it in the elementary school library and I was hooked at age 10. I went on to Dune and the Robot novels.
John Carter of Mars, everthing by Heinlein, and then Lord of the Rings..
Sarah wrote: "I read and loved 'Watership Down' way back when I was young. I tried reading 'Plague Dogs' but the cruelty was too much to finish."I couldn't get on with Plague Dogs either
I'm 40 now and I still love Watership Down and I still cry.I remember seeing a theatre production of Voyage of the Dawn Treader and I was hooked on the theatre and fantasy.
I read Frankenstein when I was about 12 or so.
Sherry wrote: "Children of Morrow, I found it in the elementary school library and I was hooked at age 10. I went on to Dune and the Robot novels."Wow, that's a blast from the past! I read that one in elementary school as well. Couldn't remember the title for years and years, only the name of the girl, Tia. I finally did some research and came up with the title a few years back. I did the same thing with another book named House of Stairs that gave me the shivers as a kid. I actually bought a copy of that one.
Mary Shelley's Frankenstein was one of the first books I remember reading, and it is quite possibly one of my favorite books of all time, in fact just remembering it makes me want to pick it up again to read.
You had me on the movie thread, Miles, but here we differ. It's a classic, I'll grant you. The writing is obviously well done. But, the story was just okay for me. Not bad, but I'd have a hard time saying it was among my favorites.
Pick it up again! It's almost Halloween. When will you find a better time to reread it?
Pick it up again! It's almost Halloween. When will you find a better time to reread it?
Amelia wrote: "You had me on the movie thread, Miles, but here we differ. It's a classic, I'll grant you. The writing is obviously well done. But, the story was just okay for me. Not bad, but I'd have a hard time..."The writing doesn't hold up unless you put yourself in the time period when it was written, if you're not living in a post-Frankenstein world. And, I mean, that's no reader's job. Have your own experience. But Mary Shelley changed the face of literature! At nineteen! Now it's hard to comprehend but before this book came along, no one else had written a story about a brilliant scientist making a new man out of the spare parts of dead bodies. No one else had written a story about a man using science to put himself in God's place and create life -- and then that goes terribly wrong. And Shelley could have just made the monster, well, a monster. But instead she made it complex, conflicted, tragic hero/villain. And she wasn't old enough to drink! Incredible.
I recommend reading or buying the version that has the incomparable Bernie Wrightson illustrating it. Wrightson perfectly captures the mood and aesthetic of Shelley's epic fable. This one:
I can appreciate what she did. It still isn't among my favorite reads.
I loved a lot of the books on this thread eventually, the the first was a picture book of Theseus and the Minotaur I found in the school library. I'll never forget the simple line drawings and sparse text describing a fascinating, impossible story. I've spent the rest of my time in the genre trying to recapture the thrill I felt following a prisoner into a labyrinth to face an unknown fear.
Phil wrote: "I loved a lot of the books on this thread eventually, the the first was a picture book of Theseus and the Minotaur I found in the school library. I'll never forget the simple line drawings and spar..."Greek myths were big for me in the beginning as well. For me, it was Icarus and Daedulus and the Twelve Labors of Hercules that really captured my imagination.
Hmmm...I wonder if a lot of collections of Greek myths have those simple line drawings. I seem to have read a few myself.
it was all my Mom' fault! she left Triplanetary laying on the desk- and the rest is future history! I was four-how was I to know where it would take me? Well, to the library, of course.54 years later, I have not gotten enough books yet!
It was the Hobbit! I read it at 11 and by 12 I had read all of Tolkien's work including the Silmarillion.
Sci-fi and Heroic Fantasy
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I haven't read it in ages, but it's the story of three young boys who go on kind of a quest, so it is lacking in female characters. Come to think of it, I think the series as a whole didn't feature many women. I don't remember his other books as well. I may have to go back and take another look.
I think the main protagonist falls in love at one point, but I don't remember the details (actually I think I do, but it would be a spoiler if I'm right). That may be in the second book though. Almost all of the adult characters are just sort of "there" though because they are under the influence of the aliens.