[Stego]

I was trying to figure out what my favorite book was the other day because someone asked me. They thought it mighty strange that I could not narrow my choice down to one.

I'm mostly interested in what other folks deem their absolute favorite, but here are my favorites, as of today:

-Replay by Ken Grimwood
-Anno Dracula by Kim Newman
-The Wizard Knight by Gene Wolfe
-A Storm of Swords by GRRM
-Ghost Story by Peter Straub
-The Last Hot Time by John. M. Ford
-Starship Troopers by Robert A Heinlein
-Her Smoke Rose Up Forever by James Tiptree Jr.
-Dune by Frank Herbert
-The Tooth Fairy by Graham Joyce
-Ender's Game by Orson Scott Card
-The Forever War by Joe Haldeman (Get Well Soon!)
-The Book of Knights by Yves Meynard
-Altered Carbon by Richard Morgan
-The Rediscovery of Man by Cordwainer Smith
-The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay by Michael Chabon
-The Anubis Gates by Tim Powers
-Earth Abides by George R. Stewart
-Use of Weapons by Iain M. Banks
-Little, Big by John Crowley
-Snow Crash by Neal Stephenson




I could name another hundred that I love, but I think these are my dearest. What books on my list suck? (Thems is fightin words, tho, so be warned)

This post has been edited by Stego: 17 November 2009 - 06:49 PM

[Relic]

Ok, to open it up, Starship Troopers sucked. :P I found it boring and tedious. And that was just the first chapter.

As for favorite Sf/F book of all time..i guess i'd have to go with...

Dune.

I've read it five or six times and im pretty sure ill read it at least twice more. A Storm of Swords comes in second place, and looses out because i don't think its as re-readable as Dune.

Forever War was an amazing book but loses the number 3 spot to The Warrior Prophet.

[gladius]

1.The Thousandfold Thought - RSB
2.Soldier of the Mist - Gene Wolfe
3.A Storm of Swords - GRRM

[Xray the Enforcer]

Lord of Light by Roger Zelazny
Parable of the Sower by Octavia Butler
An Autumn War by Daniel Abraham
The Snow Queen by Joan Vinge
A Canticle For Leibowitz by Walter Miller
Her Smoke Rose Up Forever by James Tiptree, Jr.
The Shadow of the Torturer by Gene Wolfe
The Darkness that Comes Before by R. Scott Bakker
The Carpet Makers by Andreas Eschbach
The Anubis Gates by Tim Powers
Last Call by Tim Powers
Fevre Dream by George RR Martin
A Feast for Crows by George RR Martin
Dune by Frank Herbert

I'm probably forgetting something crucial.

I'm not prepared to debate your choices, Stego, because these things are so personal. I don't think there is a bad (or even mediocre) book on your list, but there are those on your list that I didn't love, you know? :)

[Relic]

Xray the Enforcer, on Nov 17 2009, 12.54, said:

A Feast for Crows by George RR Martin

Wow, really? Craaaazy.

[Stego]

I heart your list, Martha!

So many of those choices are borderline choices for me, too.

[Happy Ent]

In my attempt to learn to like Science Fiction (much inspired by you, Stego), I read both Ender’s and Troopers. I think they’re both ridiculous (but for different reasons). I may have loved them when I was 14, and they might have changed my life. But for an adult? No.

Altered Carbon rocked my boat, but Black Man was even better. That was finally the book that made me like the genre. (Also off your recommendation.)

[Stego]

Well, Happy Ent, I'm glad you've come to love SF.

I read both of the novels you disliked long before I was 14, and was inspired by both. I also believe they both hold up quite well, while neither have the modern day connotations that a novel like Black Man has.

[WhiteHaven]

Oh well in order to narrow it down I will just list 5, allright? I haven't read that much in the past few years, but well.

Here it goes:

1. A Game of Thrones (GRRM)
2. The Two Towers (Tolkien - I name just one book, but to be honest all of them were excellent, he is a true master)
3. Antares Dawn (Michael McCollum)
4. Accelerando (Charles Stross)
5. Gardens of the Moon (Erikson - I don't care if I am going to get killed for that, but while reading the first book in the series I really thought to be somewhere else

[Stego]

Antares Dawn, huh? I've never heard of the novel or the wuthor. What's to love about it?

[Xray the Enforcer]

Stego, on Nov 17 2009, 13.10, said:

So many of those choices are borderline choices for me, too.

:) Yep -- you just succinctly articulated what I was trying to say. The majority of your list would be on my "borderline" list -- and many would probably get promoted to the First Team depending on my mood and the phase of the Moon.

Other books on my borderline list are:
The Dispossessed by Urusla K. LeGuin
Left Hand of Darkness by Ursula K. LeGuin
House of Leaves by Mark Danielewski
The One-Armed Queen by Jane Yolen
Neuromancer by William Gibson
Red Mars by Kim Stanley Robinson
The Lions of al-Rassan by Guy Gavriel Kay

[Bellis]

Favorite is such a subjective word. Here are *some* that I've rated highly.


A Canticle for Leibowitz - Miller
The Last Unicorn/A Fine and Private Place - Beagle
A Clockwork Orange - Burgess
The Scar - Mieville
Earth Abides - Stewart
The Lord of the Rings - Tolkein
Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep/Man in the High Castle - Dick
Princess Bride - Goldman
Affirmation - Priest
The Dispossessed/Lathe of Heaven - Le Guin
Veniss Underground - Vandermeer
Fifth Head of Cerberus/Book of the Short Sun - Wolfe
Midnight's Children - Rushdie

[WhiteHaven]

Stego, on Nov 17 2009, 14.31, said:

Antares Dawn, huh? I've never heard of the novel or the wuthor. What's to love about it?

Well it is the first book in the Antares series. It's basically about the following. We humans were able to colonize worlds trough something like..., let's call it StarPassages. But somehow the Passage to the one colony vanishes due to a super nova. Well then another Super-Nova reaches this colony and one passage opens and they fly to another solar-system, and to their suprise, they find out that this system was once filled with humans, but they all died in a nuclear war. They travel on and find another planet with people all around but to their big suprise (the colonists are all democrats) there is no democracy on this planet but an Absolute Monarchy. Then they find out that mankind is waging a war against another race which wants to destroy humanity (and the reason for this is explained in something like 50 pages so...), they travel to earth and find out that due to the war there is no real democracy left, since Earth has become something like a fasicst state (but they play Democracy). And yeah...it goes on and on.

Here is a link: http://www.hardsf.org/HSFRAntT.htm

To be fair, I was 15 when I read them, but I really loved those books, so they are there, on my list.

This post has been edited by WhiteHaven: 17 November 2009 - 01:41 PM

[kuroishi]

- Storm of Swords by George RR Martin
- Tigana by Guy Gavriel Kay
- A Song for Arbonne by Guy Gavriel Kay
- Little, Big by John Crowley
- Songmaster by Orson Scott Card
- Gloriana by Michael Moorcock
- The Bone Doll's Twin by Lynn Flewelling
- His Dark Materials by Philipp Pullman
- One Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabriel Garcia Marquez
- La voie du cygne by Laurent Kloetzer
- Night Watch by Terry Pratchett
- The Lord of the Rings by JRR Tolkien


I'm not a big SF reader, even if I'm trying to change that.

[Stego]

WOW, Martha Seriously, here is my borderline list:

-The Left Hand of Darkness by Ursula K. LeGuin
-The Dispossessed by Ursula K. Leguin
-House of Leaves by Mark Z. Danielewski
-Mythago Wood by Robert holdstock
-The Mars Trilogy by Kim Stanley Robinson
-The Years of Rice and Salt by Kim Stanley Robinson
-Black Man by Richard Morgan
-The Prince of Nothing Trilogy by R. Scott Bakker
-A Canticle For Liebowitz by Walter M. Miller Jr.
-The Book of The New Sun by Gene Wolfe
-Grass by Sheri S. Tepper
-The Glamour by Christopher Priest
-Lamb by Christopher Moore
-The Carpet Makers by Andreas Eschbach
-Winter's Tale by Mark Helprin
-The Last Coin by James Blaylock
-The Stars My Destination by Alfred Bester
-Perdido Street Station by China Mieville
-American Gods by Neil Gaiman
-Davy by Edgar Pangborn


Lots of overlap :P

[Stego]

Bellis, on Nov 17 2009, 13.36, said:

Favorite is such a subjective word. Here are *some* that I've rated highly.


A Canticle for Leibowitz - Miller
The Last Unicorn/A Fine and Private Place - Beagle
A Clockwork Orange - Burgess
The Scar - Mieville
Earth Abides - Stewart
The Lord of the Rings - Tolkein
Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep/Man in the High Castle - Dick
Princess Bride - Goldman
Affirmation - Priest
The Dispossessed/Lathe of Heaven - Le Guin
Veniss Underground - Vandermeer
Fifth Head of Cerberus/Book of the Short Sun - Wolfe
Midnight's Children - Rushdie

Midnights's Children is criminally overlooked as a fantasy book, I think. Too bad we'll never be able to get Rushdie to come to an SF con.

A Fine and Private Place! That should be on my list. Delightful book.

Lathe of Heaven might be LeGuins best. At least, I've heard rational arguments for that.

[Stego]

kuroishi, on Nov 17 2009, 13.42, said:

- Storm of Swords by George RR Martin
- Tigana by Guy Gavriel Kay
- A Song for Arbonne by Guy Gavriel Kay
- Little, Big by John Crowley
- Songmaster by Orson Scott Card
- Gloriana by Michael Moorcock
- The Bone Doll's Twin by Lynn Flewelling
- His Dark Materials by Philipp Pullman
- One Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabriel Garcia Marquez
- La voie du cygne by Laurent Kloetzer
- Night Watch by Terry Pratchett
- The Lord of the Rings by JRR Tolkien


I'm not a big SF reader, even if I'm trying to change that.

I think I still need to read The Bone Doll's Twin. I keep meaning to. I know I picked it up years ago to read. I may crack it tonight.

One Hundred Years of Solitude was my first taste of South American fantastic. It definitely deserves the love.

[Jon AS]

No particular order:

The Lord of the Rings - J.R.R. Tolkien
Dune - Frank Herbert
A Game of Thrones - George R.R. Martin
Night Watch - Terry Pratchett
The Silmarillion - J.R.R. Tolkien
Hyperion - Dan Simmons

[Xray the Enforcer]

So it seems I'm Stego in terms of books (many books on your borderline list that I simply forgot to include, like Blaylock and Bester), Tsavong Lah in terms of music, and Eefa in terms of everything else. A glitch in the Matrix? :stunned:

Some great books in the other lists, too.
I can't believe I forgot Hyperion/Fall of Hyperion -- and those are for my favorite list rather than borderline. Gods, I love those two books.

ETA: Relic -- I liked the writing in AFFC.

This post has been edited by Xray the Enforcer: 17 November 2009 - 02:03 PM

[kuroishi]

Stego, on Nov 17 2009, 19.51, said:

I think I still need to read The Bone Doll's Twin. I keep meaning to. I know I picked it up years ago to read. I may crack it tonight.

One Hundred Years of Solitude was my first taste of South American fantastic. It definitely deserves the love.

Well to be fair it's much better than the following books in the series and the other books by Lynn Flewelling that I tried afterward, so I sometimes wonder if Bone Doll's Twin was just an accident in her writing career. But I really loved it, a really well done and strangely intriguing piece.

I had never heard of Yves Meynard, how are his books ? (I see on his wikipedia page that he usually writes in french but wrote The Book of Knights in english and then translated it into french... now i'm confused as to which language I should read him in)