# SciFi books I haven't read?
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scifi-books-i-havent-read/92051
**Category:** Cafe Society
**Created:** [November 7, 2001, 8:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scifi-books-i-havent-read/92051 "2001-11-07T20:46:26Z")
**Posts on this page:** 20
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@JustPlainBryan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JustPlainBryan)
#### Post date: [November 7, 2001, 8:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scifi-books-i-havent-read/92051/1 "2001-11-07T20:46:26Z")
This was inspired by my post on this [thread](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?threadid=96509&pagenumber=2)
It has recently come to my attention that I may not be as well versed in SciFi literature as I should be. As such I humbly submit myself and my bookcase to my fellow SciFi fans for book inspection.
On a side note:
I know I don’t have any Edgar Rice Burroughs books on my shelf. Can someone tell me how many Mars books he’s written, and what order they should be read?
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### Author:  [@CalMeacham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CalMeacham)
#### Post date: [November 7, 2001, 9:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scifi-books-i-havent-read/92051/2 "2001-11-07T21:22:03Z")
Tallllll Order.
I _know_ I’ll leave some out, but here are some of my picks. sadly, a lot of these are out of print.
**The Science Fiction Hall of Fame, Volumes I, IIA, and IIB** (You can ignore III and IV, as far as I’m concerned)
**Mission of Gravity** and **Needle** by Hal Clement
**The Demolished Man** and **The Stars my Destination** by Alfred Bester
\*\* The Moon is a Harsh Mistress,
The Past Through Tomorrow,
Space Cadet,
Citizen of the Galaxy, Expanded Universe\*\* and a LOT of others by Robert Heinlein
\*\* Rendezvous with Rama
Earthlight
A Fall of Moondust
The Songs of Distant Earth
The Sands of Mars\*\* and others by Arthur C. Clarke (And I _don’t_ like “Childhood’s End”)
**The Foundation Trilogy
(Foundation, Foundation and Empire, Second Foundation)** but NONE of the others by Isaac Asimov
\*\*I, Robot
The Caves of Steel
The Naked Sun
\*\* and several others by Asimov
**The Day of the Triffids
Re-Birth** by John Windham
**The Best of Cordwainer Smith
The Rediscovery of Man** (I guess they didn’t want to call it “The Second-Best of Cordwainer Smith”) by Cordwainer Smith
**The Best of Stanley G. Weinbaum** by Guess Who
**A Case of Conscience
The Seedling Stars** by James Blish
**One Step from Earth
West of Eden
Winter in Eden
Return to Eden** and others by Harry Harrison
**Ringworld
Protector
N-Space** and LOTS of others by Larry Niven
**The Mote in God’s Eye** by Larry Niven and Jerry Pournelle
**Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea
From the Earth to the Moon
Paris in the 20th Century
The Mysterious Island** and others by Jules Verne
**The War of the Worlds
The Island of Doctor Moreau
The Invisible Man
The Food of the Gods**
and others by H.G. Wells
Also read stuff by Murray Leinster (Will F. Jenkins), Fredric Brown, Robert Sheckley, William Tenn (Phillip Klass), John W. Campbell, Damon Knight, Brian Aldiss, Lester Del Ray, Henry Kuttner, Catherine L. Moore, Ursula K. LeGuin, and others too numerous to mention.
And these are the “Classic” writers. I haven’t even mentionwed the newer ones like Gibson, Dan Simmons, Neil Gaiman…
Edgar Rice Burroughs wrote about eight Mars books, I think, but they added another one collecting short stories after he died. I read 'em about thirty years ago, so I’m not sure. If you can, also read **Gulliver of Mars** by Arnold, which may have been an inspiration to Burroughs in writing these.
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### Author:  [@Cliffy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cliffy)
#### Post date: [November 7, 2001, 9:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scifi-books-i-havent-read/92051/3 "2001-11-07T21:26:20Z")
I’d say a passing familiarity with Saberhagen’s Swords and Zelaney’s Amber series are a must.
–Cliffy
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### Author:  [@WordMan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WordMan)
#### Post date: [November 7, 2001, 9:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scifi-books-i-havent-read/92051/4 "2001-11-07T21:30:12Z")
**CalMeacham** ’s list is great (hey, I’ve read most of those!) Obvious adds:
1. Dune by Frank Herbert - IMHO should be at the top of the list
2. The Time Machine - yes, you listed HG Wells, but this is his most influential
3)Ender’s Game by Orson Scott Card - and the sequel, Speaker for the Dead
1. Snow Crash by Neal Stephenson - amazing
2. Neuromancer - William Gibson
Have fun,
Scott
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### Author:  [@JustPlainBryan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JustPlainBryan)
#### Post date: [November 7, 2001, 9:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scifi-books-i-havent-read/92051/5 "2001-11-07T21:43:08Z")
> [@](#):
>
> _Originally posted by CalMeacham \*
> \*\* Rendezvous with Rama
> Earthlight
> A Fall of Moondust
> The Songs of Distant Earth
> The Sands of Mars_\* and others by Arthur C. Clarke (And I _don’t_ like “Childhood’s End”)
> \*\*
I’ve got most of Clarke’s books, and I absolutly love them! Regarding Childhood’s End, my friends didn’t like it either. I really enjoyed it, though. What was your reason for not liking it?
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### Author:  [@Caprese](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Caprese)
#### Post date: [November 7, 2001, 9:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scifi-books-i-havent-read/92051/6 "2001-11-07T21:43:12Z")
Connie Willis is someone to check out.
Her \*\*Doomsday Book \*\*(Hugo and Nebula award) is about an Oxford student, in 2054, on a routine timetravel mission to 1320. Unfortunately she is sent mistakenly to 1348, which involves dealing with the Black Plague. Brisk pace, well-drawn characters,grittily real descriptions.
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### Author:  [@Polycarp](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Polycarp)
#### Post date: [November 7, 2001, 11:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scifi-books-i-havent-read/92051/7 "2001-11-07T23:36:32Z")
Almost any Niven-and-Pournelle work is good, though be careful not to get the sequels (two if I remember right) first.
Niven by himself doesn’t characterize as well, but his ideas are fascinating, and his writing is still head and shoulders above most others.
Spider Robinson is something of an acquired taste, but I find him mostly terrific, as does **Fenris** (a man whose tastes so closely align with mine that I would read the Peking phone book in Mandarin if he pronounced it “a good read”).
Lois McMaster Bujold is also remarkable. I haven’t read her newest fantasy, and didn’t particularly like _The Spirit Ring_ (her other fantasy). But **Falling Free** and the entire Vorkosigan saga is great – brilliant ideas, excellent characterization, plots that flow like mountain rivers. Start with **Shards of Honor** (chronologically first and written early) and move to its sequel **Barrayar** ; or start with **The Warrior’s Apprentice** , first of the Miles books, and save the other two for later.
H. Beam Piper wrote mostly for the pulps and suicided in 1964, but his work is still excellent.
The Clarke-and- collaborations are in a very different style from the Clarke-by-himself books, but are quite good themselves.
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### Author:  [@RealityChuck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RealityChuck)
#### Post date: [November 8, 2001, 12:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scifi-books-i-havent-read/92051/8 "2001-11-08T00:18:14Z")
Hard to add to Cal’s list, but I’ll try:
“Dhalgren” by Samuel R. Delany (if that’s a bit daunting, try “Nova” or “Babel-17”)
“The Man Who Folded Himself” by David Gerrold
“Startide Rising” by David Brin
“Ender’s Game” by Orson Scott Card
“Stand on Zanzibar” by John Brunner
“Davy” by Edgar Pangbourn
“Courtship Rite” by Donald Kingsbury
“War With the Newts” by Karel Capek
Any Harlan Ellison Collection
“The Book of the New Sun” by Gene Wolfe (broke into four volumes: “The Shadow of the Torturer,” “The Claw of the Concilator,” “The Sword of the Lichtor,” and “The Citadel of the Autarch”).
“San Diego Lightfoot Sue” by Tom Reamy
“The Persistance of Vision” by John Varley
“Do Android Dream of Electric Sheep” by Phillip K. Dick
“The Big Time” by Fritz Leiber.
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### Author:  [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)
#### Post date: [November 8, 2001, 12:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scifi-books-i-havent-read/92051/9 "2001-11-08T00:45:45Z")
I haven’t read all of the following myself, but this is a list put out by some SF organization of the books every SF/fantasy fan should read.
Ammonite - Nicola Griffith
The Anubis Gates - Tim Powers
Babel-17 - Samuel R. Delany
Barrayar - Lois McMaster Bujold
Blind Voices - Tom Reamy
The Blue Sword - Robin McKinley
Bridge of Birds - Barry Hughart
A Canticle for Leibowitz - Walter M. Miller
Carrion Comfort - Dan Simmons
A Child Across the Sky - Jonathan Carroll
China Mountain Zhang - Maureen F. McHugh
The Chronicles of Narnia - C.S. Lewis
The Chrysalids - John Wyndham
A Clockwork Orange - Anthony Burgess
Courtship Rite - Donald Kingsbury
Cyteen - C. J. Cherryh
Dangerous Visions - Harlan Ellison
Deathbird Stories - Harlan Ellison
The Demolished Man - Alfred Bester
The Diamond Age - Neal Stephenson
The Dispossessed - Ursula K. Le Guin
Doomsday Book - Connie Willis
The Door into Summer - Robert A. Heinlein
Doorways in the Sand - Roger Zelazny
Dorsai! - Gordon Dickson
Dreamsnake - Vonda N. McIntyre
Drowning Towers - George Turner
Dune - Frank Herbert
Dying Inside - Robert Silverberg
Earthquake Weather - Tim Powers
Elric of Melnibone - Michael Moorcock
Emergence - David R. Palmer
Ender’s Game - Orson Scott Card
The Fall of Hyperion - Dan Simmons
The Female Man - Joanna Russ
A Fire Upon the Deep - Vernor Vinge
The First Chronicles of Amber - Roger Zelazny
Flow My Tears, the Policeman Said - Philip K. Dick
Flowers for Algernon - Daniel Keyes
The Forever War - Joe Haldeman
The Forgotten Beasts of Eld - Patricia A. McKillip
Foundation - Isaac Asimov
Gateway - Frederik Pohl
Gloriana - Michael Moorcock
The Gods Themselves - Isaac Asimov
The Gormenghast Novels - Mervyn Laurence Peake
Green Eyes - Lucius Shepard
Harpist in the Wind - Patricia A. McKillip
Helliconia Spring - Brian W. Aldiss
The Hobbit - J.R.R. Tolkien
Hyperion - Dan Simmons
Islands in the Net - Bruce Sterling
The Last Unicorn - Peter Beagle
The Lathe of Heaven - Ursula K. Le Guin
The Left Hand of Darkness - Ursula K. Le Guin
Little, Big - John Crowley
Lord of Light - Roger Zelazny
Lord of the Rings - J.R.R. Tolkien
Man Plus - Frederik Pohl
The Many-Colored Land - Julian May
The Martian Chronicles - Ray Bradbury
Memory, Sorrow and Thorn - Tad Williams
The Merlin Trilogy - Mary Stewart
A Midsummer Tempest - Poul Anderson
The Mists of Avalon - Marion Zimmer Bradley
The Moon is a Harsh Mistress - Robert A. Heinlein
More than Human - Theodore Sturgeon
Neuromancer - William Gibson
Neutron Star - Larry Niven
1984 - George Orwell
No Enemy But Time - Michael Bishop
Norstrilia - Cordwainer Smith
On Wings of Song - Thomas M. Disch
The Once and Future King - T.H. White
Our Lady of Darkness - Fritz Leiber
The Prestige - Christopher Priest
The Princess Bride - William Goldman
Red Mars - Kim Stanley Robinson
Rendezvous With Rama - Arthur C. Clarke
Riddley Walker - Russell Hoban
Ringworld - Larry Niven
Roadside Picnic - A & B Strugatsky
The Shadow of the Torturer - Gene Wolfe
Slan - A.E. Van Vogt
The Snow Queen - Joan D. Vinge
Snowcrash - Neal Stephenson
Something Wicked this Way Comes - Ray Bradbury
The Sparrow Mary - Doria Russell
Speaker for the Dead - Orson Scott Card
A Spell for Chameleon - Piers Anthony
The Stand - Stephen King
Stand on Zanzibar - John Brunner
The Stars My Destination - Alfred Bester
Startide Rising - David Brin
Stranger in a Strange Land - Robert A. Heinlein
Sunglasses After Dark - Nancy A. Collins
Tea with the Black Dragon - R. A. MacAvoy
A Time of Changes - Robert Silverberg
Timescape - Gregory Benford
Titan - John Varley
To Your Scattered Bodies Go - Philip José Farmer
Towing Jehovah - James Morrow
Waking the Moon - Elizabeth Hand
Watership Down - Richard Adams
Way Station - Clifford Simak
When Gravity Fails - George Alec Effinger
Where Late the Sweet Birds Sang - Kate Wilhelm
The White Dragon - Anne McCaffrey
A Wizard of Earthsea - Ursula Le Guin
The Year of the Quiet Sun - Wilson Tucker
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### Author:  [@Balduran](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Balduran)
#### Post date: [November 8, 2001, 12:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scifi-books-i-havent-read/92051/10 "2001-11-08T00:59:08Z")
\*\*A Time of Changes - Robert Silverberg[\b]
Wow, somebody in a science fiction thread has finally mentioned Robert Silverberg (that I’ve noticed). He has some really neat short stories and novellas. I especially liked “The World inside” and “Thorns” and “At Winters End”
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### Author:  [@Balduran](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Balduran)
#### Post date: [November 8, 2001, 1:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scifi-books-i-havent-read/92051/11 "2001-11-08T01:00:15Z")
Yoiks! my first Vb mistake!
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### Author:  [@sturmhauke](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/sturmhauke)
#### Post date: [November 8, 2001, 1:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scifi-books-i-havent-read/92051/12 "2001-11-08T01:51:49Z")
My SF list:
_Earth Abides_, George Stewart (not sure if that’s the right name)
_Lucifer’s Hammer_, Niven and Pournelle (an English teacher pointed out this one when Deep Impact came out)
lots of other stuff by Niven and Pournelle
_Mindkiller_, Spider Robinson
the _Ender_ series and _Songbird_, Orson Scott Card (my wife likes the _Alvin Maker_ series too)
_Snow Crash_, Neal Stephenson
_Fahrenheit 451, The Illustrated Man_, Ray Bradbury (these might be considered more dark fantasy than SF)
_Chung Kuo_ (series), David Wingrove (This and the next couple of books are very good, but it gets exponentially harder to follow as the series continues. By comparison, Robert Jordan only gets linearly, or maybe quadratically harder to follow.)
_Starship Troopers_, Robert A. Heinlein (the movie was only superfically similar to the book)
My fantasy list (why do these get lumped together anyway?):
_The Magic of Recluse_ (series), L.E. Modesitt (DO NOT read anything after _The Death of Chaos_ because Modesitt introduces some stupefyingly bad sci-fi as ancient history for the series)
_The Wheel of Time_ (series), Robert Jordan
_Wizard’s First Rule_ (series), Terry Goodkind
the Valdemar books by Mercedes Lackey (these usually come in trilogys, the best ones are Magic, Arrows, and Winds, but don’t hold the dumb titles against her)
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### Author:  [@Niobium\_Knight](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Niobium_Knight)
#### Post date: [November 8, 2001, 2:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scifi-books-i-havent-read/92051/13 "2001-11-08T02:01:34Z")
The Man in the High Castle by Philip K Dick
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### Author:  [@CalMeacham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CalMeacham)
#### Post date: [November 8, 2001, 3:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scifi-books-i-havent-read/92051/14 "2001-11-08T03:54:35Z")
Wow-- lots of good suggestions. My first list was “off the top of my head”, so I missed a lot (like **Dune** , which I’ve read more times than I can remember).
As for the question about Burroughs’s _Mars_ books – I flubbed that one, too. I have here one of my books. There were _ten_ books in the series, to which they added an eleventh book of shorts. In order, they are:
\*\*1. A Princess of Mars
2. The Gods of Mars
3. Warlord of Mars \*\* (not Hi, Opal of Mars)
**4. Thuvia, Maid of Mars
5. The Chessmen of Mars
6. The Master Mind of Mars
7. A Fghting Man of Mars
8. Swrds of Mars
9. The Synthetic Men of Mars
10. Llana of Gathol
11. John Carter of Mars**
There are 25 books in the _Tarzan_ series, if you count the recently-published **Tarzan: The Lost Adventure**. I tried reading all the Tarzan ooks one summer, an I couldn’t do it. It was like living on a iet f cream puffs. You can ony take so mch Tarzan at a time.
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### Author:  [@Leonora](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Leonora)
#### Post date: [November 8, 2001, 4:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scifi-books-i-havent-read/92051/15 "2001-11-08T04:45:57Z")
I enjoyed the Venus Prime series. I don’t remember who the author is. McCaffrey’s “the ship who sang” and the books that followed it are great.
The other books listed here give me much to go looking for 🙂
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### Author:  [@DPWhite](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DPWhite)
#### Post date: [November 8, 2001, 4:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scifi-books-i-havent-read/92051/16 "2001-11-08T04:56:03Z")
Many great choices above guys. I’d like to add a few:
A Canticle for Leibowitz by Walter Miller
Solaris by Stanislaw Lem
Anything by Phillip K. Dick. I know some are listed above, but this guy wrote lots of stuff in his short life, all of it stunning.
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### Author:  [@KillerFig](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/KillerFig)
#### Post date: [November 8, 2001, 4:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scifi-books-i-havent-read/92051/17 "2001-11-08T04:57:33Z")
Hey, back in June there was a discussion on [this subject](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?threadid=74792) over in IMHO.
It generated a lot of discussion with a lot of posters making some good suggestions before finalizing the list. It’s pretty long, but it’s comprehensive and worth checking out.
-KillerFig
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### Author:  [@Steve\_Wright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Steve_Wright)
#### Post date: [November 8, 2001, 11:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scifi-books-i-havent-read/92051/18 "2001-11-08T11:04:10Z")
> [@](#):
>
> \*Originally posted by Leonora \*
> \*\*I enjoyed the Venus Prime series. I don’t remember who the author is. \*\*
The Venus Prime books are by Paul Preuss - but they’re actually adaptations and expansions of some of Arthur C. Clarke’s short stories. I’ve read the first four, and I’m reserving judgement until I’ve finished the series and seen how Preuss’s overall plotline works out. Good old Sir Arthur, though, is almost always a good read. (And I like _Childhood’s End_!)
(Checks thread, sees nobody has yet mentioned Olaf Stapledon, inserts obligatory plug for _Last and First Men_ and _Star Maker_.)
(Also sees no James Blish, which to my mind is an omission worthy of remedy. _A Case of Conscience_ and an omnibus volume of the _Cities in Flight_ books are definitely currently in print.)
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### Author:  [@CalMeacham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CalMeacham)
#### Post date: [November 8, 2001, 12:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scifi-books-i-havent-read/92051/19 "2001-11-08T12:11:20Z")
**Steve Wright** [ – you didn’t look closely enough at my list. I give **A Case of Conscience** and **The Seedling Stars**. I know **Cities in Flight** is supposed to be a classic, but I found it deadly dull. Ditto in spades for Olaf Stapleton, of whose ouevre I have not yet been able to finish a single book.
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### Author:  [@Steve\_Wright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Steve_Wright)
#### Post date: [November 8, 2001, 1:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scifi-books-i-havent-read/92051/20 "2001-11-08T13:34:50Z")
**CalMeacham** - _mea culpa, mea maxima culpa_, you are, of course, right, I shouldn’t skim-read so much.
Hmmm. Can I adequately defend Stapledon, in light of your criticism? Which is not without validity, both _Star Maker_ and _Last and First Men_ are big, dense books… (racks brain, tries to think of nice fluffy “introductory” Stapledon book, fails abjectly). But I like Stapledon anyway, for the sheer scope of his vision (_Last and First Men_ covers the whole future history of the solar system, _Star Maker_ the entire universe) and the range of invention he shows (the various human species, and the Martians - a kind of sentient colloid - in _Last and First Men_, and the dazzling array of alien life in _Star Maker_). Heavy though these books are, I think they give my “sense of wonder” a really good work-out. And they do also have a heavy philosophical edge to them, which I like in SF - come to think of it, this is also the reason why I like _Cities in Flight_, and why my favourite of the four books is the last one, _A Clash of Cymbals_.
Of course, anything like this needs to be taken with a big dose of IMHO and YMMV…
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