An SF book meme: I’ll bite

OK, I just saw this at Thinking Out Loud (or Mermaid) and I’m willing to play along.

“Below is a Science Fiction Book Club list most significant SF novels between 1953-2006. The meme part of this works like so: Bold the ones you have read, strike through the ones you read and hated, italicize those you started but never finished and put a star next to the ones you love.”

1. The Lord of the Rings, J.R.R. Tolkien *
2. The Foundation Trilogy, Isaac Asimov*
3. Dune, Frank Herbert
4. Stranger in a Strange Land, Robert A. Heinlein
5. A Wizard of Earthsea, Ursula K. Le Guin
6. Neuromancer, William Gibson[?]
7. Childhood’s End, Arthur C. Clarke
8. Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?, Philip K. Dick
9. The Mists of Avalon, Marion Zimmer Bradley
10. Fahrenheit 451, Ray Bradbury*
11. The Book of the New Sun, Gene Wolfe*
12. A Canticle for Leibowitz, Walter M. Miller, Jr. *
13. The Caves of Steel, Isaac Asimov*
14. Children of the Atom, Wilmar Shiras[?]
15. Cities in Flight, James Blish*
16. The Colour of Magic, Terry Pratchett*
17. Dangerous Visions, edited by Harlan Ellison
18. Deathbird Stories, Harlan Ellison[?]
19. The Demolished Man, Alfred Bester[?]
20. Dhalgren, Samuel R. Delany
21. Dragonflight, Anne McCaffrey *
22. Ender’s Game, Orson Scott Card[?]
23. The First Chronicles of Thomas Covenant the Unbeliever, Stephen R. Donaldson
24. The Forever War, Joe Haldeman
25. Gateway, Frederik Pohl
26. Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone, J.K. Rowling
27. The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, Douglas Adams[?]
28. I Am Legend, Richard Matheson
29. Interview with the Vampire, Anne Rice
30. The Left Hand of Darkness, Ursula K. Le Guin *
31. Little, Big, John Crowley[?]
32. Lord of Light, Roger Zelazny
33. The Man in the High Castle, Philip K. Dick*
34. Mission of Gravity, Hal Clement
35. More Than Human, Theodore Sturgeon*
36. The Rediscovery of Man, Cordwainer Smith
37. On the Beach, Nevil Shute
38. Rendezvous with Rama, Arthur C. Clarke
39. Ringworld, Larry Niven
40. Rogue Moon, Algis Budrys
41. The Silmarillion, J.R.R. Tolkien
42. Slaughterhouse-5, Kurt Vonnegut
43. Snow Crash, Neal Stephenson
44. Stand on Zanzibar, John Brunner
45. The Stars My Destination, Alfred Bester
46. Starship Troopers, Robert A. Heinlein
47. Stormbringer, Michael Moorcock
48. The Sword of Shannara, Terry Brooks
49. Timescape, Gregory Benford
50. To Your Scattered Bodies Go, Philip Jose Farmer *

I’ve added one more element: [?] means “I may have read this, but can’t remember.”

Don’t take the asterisks too seriously. I loved them at the time, and might or might not again–and could probably add another half dozen. As it is, 34 out of 50 ain’t bad.

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This entry was posted on Thursday, November 16th, 2006 at 11:28 am and is filed under Books and publishing. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.

3 Responses to “An SF book meme: I’ll bite”

  1. Bill Drew says:
    November 20, 2006 at 4:02 pm

    I am continuing the meme as well at:

    http://babyboomerlibrarian.blogspot.com/2006/11/science-fiction-book-meme.html

    It is a great list and I see some I am going to have to look for to read over the holidays.

  2. Connie says:
    November 28, 2006 at 10:32 am

    You must read On the Beach, one of the great cold war classics.

  3. walt says:
    November 28, 2006 at 11:57 am

    Seen the movie. Probably more than once. I may have read the book, a long time ago. Given how far behind I am on other books, there’s no way that happens before I retire (which should be a few years yet).