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[Zhengi]

I've read 4 of the top 5. Definitely a good ranking. Will need to pick up the Dune Chronicles.

 

[Piecake]

Question for Wheel of Time readers who are up to date with the series: could I legitimately skip a couple of the crappy slow books without being hopelessly lost?

If you thinking of skipping books, I would just drop the series. While the Sanderson books pick up the pace, they still have the same problems of Jordan's WoT books. That being HORRIFIC female characters, poor character interaction, predictable plot. Basically the only thing worthwhile about WoT is world building and personally, I don't find his world all that interesting.

 

[rando14]

I'm done with ASOIAF and WoT is, of course, widely read so I was curious. I normally wouldn't consider skipping books, but people really seem to loathe books 8 through 11. Book 10 has a 2-star rating on Amazon. :/

But I do enjoy world-building and I am fond of long fantasy novels, so I'll keep it in the back of my mind. Might be I'll pick up Dark Tower or Earthsea instead.

 

[Gigglepoo]

Might be I'll pick up Dark Tower or Earthsea instead.

Dark Tower is pretty fantastic.

 

[Fusion Pizza]

Yay I've read a healthy chunk of these. Prodigious reading ability FTW.

 

[B.K.]

More people need to read The Instrumentality of Mankind.

 

[SystemShock2]

Thanks for this. I'll definitely get to work on some of these.

 

[agrajag]

I highly approve of their choices for #1 and #2

 

[billy beane]

It's sad for me to say I've only read one book on that list. I can never get into reading books. I've tried many times to read, and then I forget about the book and end up dropping it.

 

[ezekial45]

How is the Codex Alera series? Any fans of it here?

 

[maxxpower]

Is the Death Gate Cycle in that list? I read it over a few times and I didn't see it.

 

[leroy hacker]

Are Frankenstein and Gulliver's Travels considered fantasy as well?

Frankenstein is frequently considered one of the first sci-fi novels.

 

[DrForester]

The Fact that "The Chronicles Of Narnia" or "Harry Potter" is nowhere on the list makes the list invalid in every way. I don't care if they say no "young adult" books, that's a BS way to exclude books they don't want on the list (not to mention there's several "Young adult" books on there).

Also, not one book from Michael Critchon.... No Sphere? Jurassic park? Andromeda Strain...

13. Animal Farm, by George Orwell

How does this qualify as sci-fi and fantasy?


IGN could make a better list.

 

[Zzoram]

Dune is great. Everyone remotely interested in sci-fi/fantasy should read it. The main Dune 8 Dune books anyways.

 

[i_am_ben]

Question for Wheel of Time readers who are up to date with the series: could I legitimately skip a couple of the crappy slow books without being hopelessly lost?

<3 Wot so much.

I wouldn't skip entire books but there are some POVs that you could wiki if they bore you. There is an amazingly detailed chapter précis and analysis done at TOR so you wouldn't miss anything.

WoT is very strong in world building and fan theories/speculation/arguments. So if you like those things you should give it a go.

 

[ZephyrFate]

Dune is great. Everyone remotely interested in sci-fi/fantasy should read it. The main Dune 8 Dune books anyways.

There are six, but yeah, stick with the main series. From start to finish, never stopping. By the end of Chapterhouse, your life will have changed.

 

[BorkBork]

Here was the criteria for nominating a book for voting:

In summer, people like to get away. Some visit the beach, others the mountains. But many of us like to go a little further: to Arrakis perhaps, or Earthsea — or maybe a new dimension entirely. Which is to say, we escape into a fat science fiction or fantasy novel.

And so, to help you chart any fantastic voyages you might like to take this vacation season, NPR Books is focusing our annual summer readers' poll on science fiction and fantasy (SF/F to insiders). During the coming weeks, your votes will decide the titles that make our top-100 list of the best SF/F novels ever written.

The first step in the process is to assemble nominees from you, the audience. To nominate your favorite SF/F books, log in below and write the titles and authors into the Comments field. Here are a few guidelines:

1. Limit yourself to five titles per post. Don't hesitate to nominate a book that someone else has already listed; your entry will count as a vote in favor of that title progressing to the next round.

2. No young-adult or children's titles, please. We plan to devote a poll to YA next summer. (It's also no fun if Harry Potter wins every year.)

3. Horror and paranormal romance are also out, which disqualifies most of Stephen King (also a big winner in previous polls), Charlaine Harris and Stephenie Meyer. Once again, we'll cover horror in a future poll.

4. Feel free to nominate a series — such as Tolkien's Lord of the Rings or Asimov's Foundation — as a single, collective work rather than listing individual books.
See The Results Of Past Polls
Illustration: Man running under sniper target.
The Top 100 'Killer Thrillers'

5. That said, there are series and series: To qualify as a collective work, the books in a series must be written consistently by the same originating author or authors. For example, you can't nominate the whole Star Wars franchise, though you can nominate individual Star Wars novels.

I can hear the howls of protest already. But arguing the fine points of zombie rules and such is half the fun (for the record, if zombie-ism is caused by a virus, then we're safely in the SF realm). In the end, a panel of SF/F writers and critics will make the tough calls about what's in or out.

Meanwhile, as the saying goes in the Seven Kingdoms, Winter Is Coming. So while summer lasts, let's make the most of it with a celebration of fantastic fiction. Give us your lists

Does Narnia fall into young adult? Also, it seems weird that they mention Earthsea but it's classified as young adult (at least the classic series).

 

[DrForester]

Here was the criteria for nominating a book for voting:



Does Narnia fall into young adult? Also, it seems weird that they mention Earthsea but it's classified as young adult (at least the classic series).

Yeah, it's a crap way for whoever wrote the piece to exclude thing they didn't want winning or ranking. It's not even Sci Fi but Animal Farm is certainly a young adult book.

 

[sonicmj1]

I am baffled to see so much love here for Speaker for the Dead, a book I read recently and found pretty mediocre. I don't think Ender's Game should be quite as high up as it is, but it's a much stronger book.

Lists like that could be much worse, so I don't have any huge problems with this one. Good to see the Vorkosigan Saga make it.

 

[Count of Monte Sawed-Off]

Ha lists. But anyway, there's no way Ender's Game should be over ASOIAF.

 

[Zzoram]

There are six, but yeah, stick with the main series. From start to finish, never stopping. By the end of Chapterhouse, your life will have changed.

I guess Books 7 and 8 are technically written by his son, but they do continue from the moment Book 6 left off.

That said, Book 7 and 8 go pretty much where I expected Frank would've went had he lived for another couple of years.

 

[ZephyrFate]

I guess Books 7 and 8 are technically written by his son, but they do continue from the moment Book 6 left off.

That said, Book 7 and 8 go pretty much where I expected Frank would've went had he lived for another couple of years.

I don't agree with this. There are so many deus ex machinas in Books 7 and 8 that they might as well be Dune written by fanfiction.net rather than Herbert himself. I absolutely loathed where they went with the series

(though Erasmus is a pretty cool character)

 

[Zzoram]

I don't agree with this. There are so many deus ex machinas in Books 7 and 8 that they might as well be Dune written by fanfiction.net rather than Herbert himself. I absolutely loathed where they went with the series

(though Erasmus is a pretty cool character)

What deus ex machinas did you have a problem with? Reply in spoiler tags.

 

[Dresden]

Brian Herbert pretty much fucked his father's corpse. Those nuevo Dune books are horrible.

 

[Count of Monte Sawed-Off]

Brian Herbert pretty much fucked his father's corpse. Those nuevo Dune books are horrible.

I wish my dad had written an awesome series. I could then make money on a bunch of my nonsense too (I admit I have not read Herbert Jr.s dune books).

 

[Zzoram]

Brian Herbert pretty much fucked his father's corpse. Those nuevo Dune books are horrible.

I didn't like the prequels much, and they were certainly different, but I didn't think they were that bad.

 

[ZephyrFate]

What deus ex machinas did you have a problem with? Reply in spoiler tags.

Spoiler

Duncan as SUPER KWISATZ HADERACH, SUPERSPICE, EVERYONE COMING BACK EVER, FACE DANCERS ARE ROBOTS, IT'S ALL BEEN OMNIUS ALL ALONG...

 

[Zzoram]

Spoiler

Duncan as SUPER KWISATZ HADERACH, SUPERSPICE, EVERYONE COMING BACK EVER, FACE DANCERS ARE ROBOTS, IT'S ALL BEEN OMNIUS ALL ALONG...

Spoiler

The Duncan thing was a bit meh but not completely unreasonable, he was being set up as special. Also come on, Miles Teg was written by Frank.

Everyone coming back was really unnecessary, but wasn't the DNA tube in Scytale mentioned in Book 6 by Frank? If so, it may have been his intention all along.

The new face dancers weren't robots, they were just enhanced by robots, and were conspiring to free themselves from robot control.

Even though I don't like that it's the same AI threat from the Butlerian Jihad, I am quite confident that Frank was alluding to the threat being AI. However, I think he was going to make the AI threat a new creation by the Ixians that left in the Scattering and formed that new technological faction.

 

[flintstryker]

Great to see the Xanth series made the cut I really love reading those books.

 

[milkyjay20]

yay dark tower 23 ^_^ i mean, 1984 and shit is better of course, but DT is close to my heart

 

[besada]

No Philip Jose Farmer?

Bullshit.

My man.

 

[Dead Man]

Brian Herbert pretty much fucked his father's corpse. Those nuevo Dune books are horrible.

So, so much.

 

[ZephyrFate]

Spoiler

The Duncan thing was a bit meh but not completely unreasonable, he was being set up as special. Also come on, Miles Teg was written by Frank.

Everyone coming back was really unnecessary, but wasn't the DNA tube in Scytale mentioned in Book 6 by Frank? If so, it may have been his intention all along.

The new face dancers weren't robots, they were just enhanced by robots, and were conspiring to free themselves from robot control.

Even though I don't like that it's the same AI threat from the Butlerian Jihad, I am quite confident that Frank was alluding to the threat being AI. However, I think he was going to make the AI threat a new creation by the Ixians that left in the Scattering and formed that new technological faction.

I just think Herbert would have made it a lot easier to comprehend, without shoveling in stuff from the prequels to somehow piecemeal an ending together. The Duncan thing is still the biggest stupid thing ever.

 

[flintstryker]

no Runelord though I recently read Wizardborn and now I need to read the rest also there's a character in there that shares our very own Gaborn name

 

[Freshmaker]

Ha lists. But anyway, there's no way Ender's Game should be over ASOIAF.

Poor ASOIF snobs...

Xenocide FTW.

 

[besada]

I dont think Orwell belongs there at all >_<

They werent what I would call sci fi or fantasy...

Then you don't know what fantasy or science fiction are. Animal Farm is clearly allegorical fantasy, while 1984 is sociological science fiction. That they're considered literature where other similar books aren't is a mixture of historical accident and the quality of Orwell's ideas.

 

[RyanDG]

I just think Herbert would have made it a lot easier to comprehend, without shoveling in stuff from the prequels to somehow piecemeal an ending together. The Duncan thing is still the biggest stupid thing ever.

I would love to see the notes that actually went into the prequels/follows ups to the original dune novels. For all the ills that Christopher Tolkien has done in some ways, one of the major benefits that he has done is that anything that has been published posthumously for his father has been done with a lot of care and supporting reference as to the whys and hows the items were being published. Brian Herbert just doesn't seem to have the same sort of respect for the source material.

 

[coldvein]

NEUROMANCER #1. awesome list.

 

[ZephyrFate]

I would love to see the notes that actually went into the prequels/follows ups to the original dune novels. For all the ills that Christopher Tolkien has done in some ways, one of the major benefits that he has done is that anything that has been published posthumously for his father has been done with a lot of care and supporting reference as to the whys and hows the items were being published. Brian Herbert just doesn't seem to have the same sort of respect for the source material.

I think elder Herbert left a really, really awesome cliffhanger in the last Dune novel that if a better writer had been able to work with, might have created a really, really fucking awesome ending.

Instead we got

Spoiler

superspice DBZ power levels

.

 

[Dead Man]

Then you don't know what fantasy or science fiction are. Animal Farm is clearly allegorical fantasy, while 1984 is sociological science fiction. That they're considered literature where other similar books aren't is a mixture of historical accident and the quality of Orwell's ideas.

And the arbitrariness of the 'literature' tag.

 

[KuwabaraTheMan]

Poor ASOIF snobs...

Xenocide FTW.

I would put the Ender's Game series over Ice and Fire, but not the book itself. It isn't clear which the list is referring to. Speaker and Xenocide are definitely better than any book in A Song of Ice and Fire.

 

[Zeliard]

Animal Farm is certainly a young adult book.

Well, it's Animal Farm. It's not exactly Fear Street. Qualifying it strictly as young adult because it's popularly taught in middle and high school means Shakespeare and Homer are young adult as well.

 

[The Technomancer]

If you thinking of skipping books, I would just drop the series. While the Sanderson books pick up the pace, they still have the same problems of Jordan's WoT books. That being HORRIFIC female characters, poor character interaction, predictable plot. Basically the only thing worthwhile about WoT is world building and personally, I don't find his world all that interesting.

Wow, really? Sanderson writes some of the best female characters in modern fantasy, that surprises me.

 

[elrechazado]

I'm done with ASOIAF and WoT is, of course, widely read so I was curious. I normally wouldn't consider skipping books, but people really seem to loathe books 8 through 11. Book 10 has a 2-star rating on Amazon. :/

But I do enjoy world-building and I am fond of long fantasy novels, so I'll keep it in the back of my mind. Might be I'll pick up Dark Tower or Earthsea instead.

If you pick up dark tower you'll want to read 1-4 and then skip the rest....

 

[milkyjay20]

i'm surprised that neal stephenson's anathem made the list. that book had some excellent world-building and originality, and nothing blows your mind like a stephenson book can. his characterization and plot needs a lot of work, but who cares when he presents a real legitimate case for alternate realities.

 

[besada]

And the arbitrariness of the 'literature' tag.

That too. There's every bit as much artistic merit in something like Thomas Disch's Camp Concentration, but because Orwell did it before we broke everything into convenient genres for easier marketing, and because Disch started selling books in the science fiction section, he gets shafted. Ursula K LeGuin has been fitting forever to be treated as more than a genre author, and she is, of course. Vonnegut hated the label, because it causes a certain sort of idiot to automatically tune your work out.

Some, even much, science fiction is cheap escapism, and there's nothing wrong with that, but science fiction at its core is a literature of ideas. It's a shame it's been so adulterated in movies that when people hear the term they think of summer blockbusters and special effects. Some of the most moving stories I've ever read were science fiction. And I've read a lot of short stories, including most of the work done by people considered masters of the short story.

 

[elrechazado]

wow just noticed rothfuss in the top twenty. Makes me want to vomit. I thought this list wasn't supposed to include juvenile fiction...

 

[Zzoram]

I think elder Herbert left a really, really awesome cliffhanger in the last Dune novel that if a better writer had been able to work with, might have created a really, really fucking awesome ending.

Instead we got

Spoiler

superspice DBZ power levels

.

What did you think was going to happen?

I thought the

Spoiler

old man and woman were going to be the leaders of the super face dancers, and that they would be an enemy but not the main one. Evidence to suggest that face dancers weren't the main enemies was the Honored Matres not even knowing about them. The Honored Matres were supposedly running from the true enemy, and you wouldn't run from an enemy you didn't know existed. I always assumed that AI would be the ultimate threat to humanity, and that the Golden Path was a means to avoid extinction by spreading out humanity as far as it could go in every direction across the universe, with the genetic ability to dodge prescience in addition to genetic diversity, so that they could never all be tracked down and eliminated.

 

[ZephyrFate]

wow just noticed rothfuss in the top twenty. Makes me want to vomit. I thought this list wasn't supposed to include juvenile fiction...

Well, it also has Gene Wolfe.

ba dum dum TSHHHHHH

 

[The Technomancer]

That too. There's every bit as much artistic merit in something like Thomas Disch's Camp Concentration, but because Orwell did it before we broke everything into convenient genres for easier marketing, and because Disch started selling books in the science fiction section, he gets shafted. Ursula K LeGuin has been fitting forever to be treated as more than a genre author, and she is, of course. Vonnegut hated the label, because it causes a certain sort of idiot to automatically tune your work out.

Some, even much, science fiction is cheap escapism, and there's nothing wrong with that, but science fiction at its core is a literature of ideas. It's a shame it's been so adulterated in movies that when people hear the term they think of summer blockbusters and special effects. Some of the most moving stories I've ever read were science fiction. And I've read a lot of short stories, including most of the work done by people considered masters of the short story.

Fully agree with this. I've found more intellectual merit in some of the sci-fi greats then in about half of the "literature" we read in high-school English. Fuck The Scarlet Letter