i never liked Rincewind that much...

[ironymaiden]

every so often a list of books surfaces in eljay-land. (i saw it first from brainstormfront.)
The Most Significant SF & Fantasy Books of the Last 50 Years, 1953-2002, per SFBC

i typically find what hasn't been read to be more interesting when these things come around.

TBR.
in both cases, i think the author rocks, i just haven't put my hand on a copy. when last i checked, I Am Legend was missing from the library. i need to check again and put both of these on my holds list. Theodore Sturgeon could be the most amazing writer of short stories ever, so i'm game for the novel.

28. I Am Legend, Richard Matheson
35. More Than Human, Theodore Sturgeon

Tried and failed.

2. The Foundation Trilogy, Isaac Asimov
it's been several years, so i may pick it up again. i like Asimov short stories and the nonfiction, but i never could get into these.

31. Little, Big, John Crowley
aaaaargh. C and i both are repeat failures on this one. the book was a gift from a relative with great taste, lots of writers talk about this one, and matt_ruff digs Crowley. i feel more guilt over this one than all the false starts with LotR. i need to try another book by Crowley and see if it helps.

41. The Silmarillion, J.R.R. Tolkien
when i have trouble sleeping, C either reads me this or a book on Napoleonic era military tactics. they both work like a charm.

44. Stand on Zanzibar, John Brunner
zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz

need to know more.
if you've read one of these and enjoyed it, tell me about it. i don't have enough info. i've never even heard of Children of the Atom.

11. The Book of the New Sun, Gene Wolfe
14. Children of the Atom, Wilmar Shiras
15. Cities in Flight, James Blish
18. Deathbird Stories, Harlan Ellison
20. Dhalgren, Samuel R. Delany
32. Lord of Light, Roger Zelazny
34. Mission of Gravity, Hal Clement
36. The Rediscovery of Man, Cordwainer Smith
40. Rogue Moon, Algis Budrys

rejected.
Clarke is dull. wish he wasn't. the Farmer short stories i've read held zero interest for me, so i can't believe a book would be better.

7. Childhood's End, Arthur C. Clarke
38. Rendezvous with Rama, Arthur C. Clarke
50. To Your Scattered Bodies Go, Philip Jose Farmer

the ones i've read.
1. The Lord of the Rings, J.R.R. Tolkien
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
8. Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?, Philip K. Dick
9. The Mists of Avalon, Marion Zimmer Bradley
10. Fahrenheit 451, Ray Bradbury
12. A Canticle for Leibowitz, Walter M. Miller, Jr.
13. The Caves of Steel, Isaac Asimov
16. The Colour of Magic, Terry Pratchett
17. Dangerous Visions, edited by Harlan Ellison
19. The Demolished Man, Alfred Bester
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
29. Interview with the Vampire, Anne Rice
30. The Left Hand of Darkness, Ursula K. Le Guin
33. The Man in the High Castle, Philip K. Dick
37. On the Beach, Nevil Shute
39. Ringworld, Larry Niven
42. Slaughterhouse-5, Kurt Vonnegut
43. Snow Crash, Neal Stephenson
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

significant is a delightfully loaded word.
there are books that i think will be considered significant by the time the decade ends that were too close to the 2002 date or have been published since. i think American Gods, Perdido Street Station, and Altered Carbon will make a later list (and probably that furniture-prop Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrell.) i'm disappointed that The Watchmen could win a Hugo but not be noted here. and where is A Game of Thrones ???

Comments

[buhrger]

20. Dhalgren, Samuel R. Delany
read it, can even loan it, enjoyed it, but them i'm a SRD fan. it's set in a city that's somehow become separated from the rest of the US - details are vague. strange things happen. three of my favourite quotes:

"I spend a lot of time happy; I spend a lot of time unhappy; I spend a lot of time just bored. Maybe if I workeed real hard at it, I could avoid some of the happiness, but I doubt it. The other two I know I'm stuck with."

"You know, here you're free. No laws: to break or to follow. Do anything you want. Which does funny things to you. Very quickly, surprisingly quickly, you become exactly who you are. If you're ready for that, this is where it's at."

"Look, about... being nuts. You're not, and you never have been. That means what you see, and hear, and feel, and think... you think that is your mind. But the real mind is invisible: you're less aware of it, while you think, than you are of your eye while you see... until something goes wrong with it. Then you become aware of it, with all its dislocated pieces and its rackety functioning, the same way tou become aware of your eye when you get a cinder in it. Because it hurts... Sure, it distorts things. But the strange thing, the thing that you can never explain to anyone, except another nut, or, if you're lucky, a doctor who has an unusual amount of sense - stranger than the hallucinations, or the voices, or the anxiety - is the way you begin to experience the edges of the mind itself... in a way other people just can't."

the fact that i just happen to have three quotes from the book lying around on my hard drive might tell you something. have you read any other delany?

as to
7. Childhood's End, Arthur C. Clarke
38. Rendezvous with Rama, Arthur C. Clarke

i enjoyed both, but they're books you read for concept, not for things like plot or character.

[ironymaiden]

i love Big Ideas, but somehow Clarke has never sold them to me very well. i'm learning that plot and pacing are key to my enjoyment of a book. it's why Jonathan Strange et al fell completely flat for me.

[sinthrex.livejournal.com]

Lord of Light is actually my favorite Zelazny book ever, though it's probably closely followed by Nine Prince and Guns of Avalon. Well worth reading, chock full of the best Zelazny goodness.

I think you might like To Your Scattered Bodies go, only b/c I also have little interest in Farmer's short stories, but like his novels quite a bit. I liked the Dayworld books too. Kinda pulpy but fun. I'm not certain the the Riverworld series should have had quite so many though. By the time you get to The Magic Labyrinth, so start to wonder.

I don't understand why Stormbringer made the list at all. The series over all is quite good, but I've never really thought much of Stormbringer and I was a huge Elric fan as a 11-13 year old.

{shrug} Not like it matters. It's all opinion.

[raevnos.livejournal.com]

Book of the New Sun: Gene Wolf is one of, if not /the/ greatest English-language authors. BotNS is one of his best. (Four volumes making up one work.) It's set on Earth many many years in the future, when the sun is slowly going out, and the main character is an orphan taken in by the Torturer's Guild, who makes the mistake of getting involved in politics.

Cities in Flight: NYC and other cities get uprooted and given space drives. They travel around much like hobos in the great depression, doing whatever work more sedentary cities will offer. Then things get strange. It's an okay series.

Dhalgren: It's in my keep-bouncing-off pile.

Lord of Light: Zelazny's best. A man on a future colony of Earth re-invents Buddhism.

Misson of Gravity: This was one of the first science fiction books I read as a little kid, and I still love it. An experimental probe gets stuck on a planet with an average gravity several hunderd times Earth's. Luckily, it has intelligent natives...

Rediscovery of Man: Blanket title for Smith's work. I'm actually in the middle of one
of his collections now. Lots of fun.

Others...

To Your Scattered Bodies Go. First and best Riverworld book. Re-read recently. Like it. The quality of the sequels drops off at an inverse logarithm.

Zanzibar: Read it once, no real urge to re-read.

My own pet "Why isn't it on this list?" list: John M. Ford's The Dragon Waiting and Michael Swanwick's The Iron Dragon's Daughter.

[brainstormfront.livejournal.com]

I was wondering why Tim Powers doesn't rate at all; granted, I've read a few shorts and DECLARE, having not yet gotten to ANUBIS GATES or some others.

Philip Jose Farmer's on my list of influentials, but only because he stands on the shoulders of Edgar Rice Burroughs and other pulpsters (who didn't get listed as most of their stuff ended before the 40s did).

If you're looking for a fun writer (influential or not), have you tried Charles de Lint? While there's tons of books to try, I started with GREENMANTLE, moved on to MULENGRO and FORESTS OF THE HEART and have yet to be disappointed in the many shorts or novels I've read since. (Still haven't worked back to THE LITTLE COUNTRY yet though...)

Say, odd thought--doesn't anyone think some comic books or creators belong in that list anywheres? Doesn't WATCHMEN or something deserve a nod? I'm just askin'...

[matt-ruff.livejournal.com]

I Am Legend, Richard Matheson

My take when I read this years ago was that it was a really interesting idea executed in a mediocre fashion. (Actually, I feel the same way about most of the Matheson I've read.)

Little, Big, John Crowley

If you want to try a different, easier-to-get-into Crowley novel, I think The Translator is probably your best bet.

Deathbird Stories, Harlan Ellison

Rumor has it you can download this for free off the AOL server. ;)

Clarke is dull. wish he wasn't.

Ditto.