phobosweb.com— "Take my word for it; all science fiction books are not created equal. Many of these novels are award winners, and most have inspired profound trends in science fiction."
Jul 22, 2006View in Crawl 4
51. 1984 Written by George OrwellThere is NO WAY that this deserves to be on any list of great books. 1984 is a lame plagiarism of Yevgeny Zamyatin's "We".Orwell was a thief and a hack, nothing more.
agreed. I just finished 'High Justice' (the prequel to the entire confederation series) and it was rather good too.At least it gave me something to read while I was waiting for Military Entrance Processing :)
@xorprimeWhat, seriously? In what way could The Fountainhead possibly be considered SF? At least 1984 was in the future when it was written. NB: The problem with Ayn Rand is that half of what she says is totally correct. Unfortunately, the other half is sorely mistaken, and a lot of people can't discern for themselves the difference...
Look overall this is a pretty good list. I would guess I've read about 60 of the books mentioned. If you remove the fantasy books like (Alice in Wonderland etc.) and some of the other questionable works (Upanishads etc.) and substitute those with books by some of the young Turks below and a few others and it would be pretty damn on target.Iain Banks: Of his Culture novels I'd suggest Player of Games or Use of Weapons and from his other novels, The Algebraist.Ian McDonald (River of Gods)Richard K. Morgan (Market Forces)Alastair Reynolds
Seriously, if the Upanishads is in there -- practically a whole religion's array of sacred books -- then I see no reason that the Holy Bible shouldn't be in that list, because man, the Bible's WACKY.
Greg Egan's Diaspora not there? !.Looking over that list, I've read maybe two thirds, but all of that stuff is _old_. SF doesn't stand up well to time compared to other genres, and most of the works on that list are from the 50's. Some new stuff would be nice... maybe a bit more cyberpunk stuff. *shrug*
I simply can't read OSC's writings knowing of his politics and prejudices. Goes against the spirit of what SF is all about.I also can't trust a list that doesn't have Sheffield or Varley.At least they squeezed in Brin and Bova.
reldrenJul 22, 2006
51. 1984 Written by George OrwellThere is NO WAY that this deserves to be on any list of great books. 1984 is a lame plagiarism of Yevgeny Zamyatin's "We".Orwell was a thief and a hack, nothing more.
artifezJul 22, 2006
The Upanishads? Come the hell on, what is the old testiment SciFi/Horror?
proustJul 22, 2006
Sci-fi is childish compared to Melville,Garcia-Marquez or Pynchon.
thetechnoloserJul 23, 2006
agreed. I just finished 'High Justice' (the prequel to the entire confederation series) and it was rather good too.At least it gave me something to read while I was waiting for Military Entrance Processing :)
pihkalJul 23, 2006
@xorprimeWhat, seriously? In what way could The Fountainhead possibly be considered SF? At least 1984 was in the future when it was written. NB: The problem with Ayn Rand is that half of what she says is totally correct. Unfortunately, the other half is sorely mistaken, and a lot of people can't discern for themselves the difference...
uselesscamperJul 23, 2006
Look overall this is a pretty good list. I would guess I've read about 60 of the books mentioned. If you remove the fantasy books like (Alice in Wonderland etc.) and some of the other questionable works (Upanishads etc.) and substitute those with books by some of the young Turks below and a few others and it would be pretty damn on target.Iain Banks: Of his Culture novels I'd suggest Player of Games or Use of Weapons and from his other novels, The Algebraist.Ian McDonald (River of Gods)Richard K. Morgan (Market Forces)Alastair Reynolds
indiejonesJul 23, 2006
Seriously, if the Upanishads is in there -- practically a whole religion's array of sacred books -- then I see no reason that the Holy Bible shouldn't be in that list, because man, the Bible's WACKY.
twangoJul 24, 2006
Oh god, don't start -that- up all over again.
creeptickJul 24, 2006
Greg Egan's Diaspora not there? !.Looking over that list, I've read maybe two thirds, but all of that stuff is _old_. SF doesn't stand up well to time compared to other genres, and most of the works on that list are from the 50's. Some new stuff would be nice... maybe a bit more cyberpunk stuff. *shrug*
manualJul 24, 2006
Having never really read a novel as a teen, I got hooked on sci-fi in my early 20's... So I thought I'd try to read the best of the best (or at someone's opinion of the 'best of the best') and found this list of Top 100<a class="user" href="http://home.austarnet.com.au/petersykes/topscifi/lists_books_rank1.html">http://home.austarnet.com.au/petersykes/topscifi/lists_books_rank1.html</a>Been working on that list for a few years, and I'm not even half-way through...
cenotaphJul 25, 2006
I simply can't read OSC's writings knowing of his politics and prejudices. Goes against the spirit of what SF is all about.I also can't trust a list that doesn't have Sheffield or Varley.At least they squeezed in Brin and Bova.
flashgordonwebOct 19, 2008
I'd agree, Contact by Carl Sagan is a classic. I enjoyed The Winds of Asharra recently: <a class="user" href="http://newgreatbooks.blogspot.com/2008/05/other-world-adventures-new-book-takes.html">http://newgreatbooks.blogspot.com/2008/05/other-wo ...</a>Yes, Digg needs to get a literature section.