Isaac Asimov - Foundation Series Help

[Tinwolf]

I think what`s great about Asimov`s work was he doesn`t get "bogged down" in technical stuff, he doesn`t worry about explaining faster than light travel or mundane things like that he just wrote good stories with good characters.

To pakiyabhai, I hope you don`t have the same problem I had when I purchased the Foundation books in one package recently. I found there were odd characters every now and again which kept crashing my be-book. I downloaded them from different sites and found they were the same file with the same characters.

[bbusybookworm]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

When a series is written out of chronological order, forget published order and got for chronological order and let the spoilers be dammed.[/url]

I'm usually on two Minds on this. With some Authors, I agree that Chronological order or series order makes more sense as You get a better idea of the Arc of the Storyline.

In other cases, as in Asimov I feel that Doing so would do more of a disservice, as the Prequels take a lot joy of discover / new ideas out of the Earlier books.

Spoiler:

What we find out in the Foundation Prequels and sequels, especially about the Second Foundation, and the Robots involvement, Gia, etc kind of soiled the enjoyment I got out of the Originals as I now kept on seeing signs of manipulations or inconstancies which took me away from the book itself.

[davidbrucehughes]

Dear Folks,

What the FOundation, or something very much like it, actually existed? Would you join it like Gaal Dornick? Find out more here.

David Bruce Hughes (Gaurahari Dāsānudās)

[ardeegee]

Originally Posted by davidbrucehughes

Dear Folks,

What the FOundation, or something very much like it, actually existed? Would you join it like Gaal Dornick? Find out more here.

I'm much more worried about a future where small animals have lasers in their paws.

http://images.google.com/images?gbv=...tart=0&ndsp=20

except for this one-- I don't mind this one at all:

http://epicponyz.wordpress.com/2009/...pew-pew-pew-2/

If you have a weird web site you want to spam that faces the issue of too many laser-pawed kittens and too few laser-pawed Japanese cuties, please spam away.

[Slite]

Originally Posted by ardeegee

I'm much more worried about a future where small animals have lasers in their paws.

http://images.google.com/images?gbv=...tart=0&ndsp=20

except for this one-- I don't mind this one at all:

http://epicponyz.wordpress.com/2009/...pew-pew-pew-2/

If you have a weird web site you want to spam that faces the issue of too many laser-pawed kittens and too few laser-pawed Japanese cuties, please spam away.

You mean like this?

[ardeegee]

Oh, I know that one. http://www.animalswithlightsabers.com/

[Daephex]

I think it's more interesting to read the Foundation stuff in Asimov's suggested order-- yes, some things end up being less of a surprise, but it's also intriguing to have an overall framework to step away from the books and consider.

[bill_mchale]

Originally Posted by Daephex

I think it's more interesting to read the Foundation stuff in Asimov's suggested order-- yes, some things end up being less of a surprise, but it's also intriguing to have an overall framework to step away from the books and consider.

I am in the opposite camp. In fact, part of me wishes I had never read any of the novels written after Foundation's Edge. The suggestion of a linkage between the Robot Novels and the Foundation Novels was all I needed. In fact, I think he tried too hard in his later books to create that linkage.

--
Bill

[adityadubey]

I read the major ones in the order of publication, and the subsequent ones (prequels, sequels, et al) later over a period of time.

Its been a very long time since I read these, so now I think I'll read them in chronological and not publication order. Since I know the major storyline anyway, there's no risk of spoilers

This is the best case scenario methinks

[GreenMonkey]

If you haven't read it, I'd start with the original Foundation trilogy, read the Robot books, then, in no particular order, the rest of the Foundation books - the prelude ones and the last two books.

Or Robot / Foundation / the rest.

Either way.

The Robot novels have always been my favorite.

I agree with the previous person about sci-fi - I tend to read Asimov, Heinlein, etc and not a lot of modern sci-fi. Doc E.E. Smith is fun in that pulpy classic style.

Oh, and avoid the Second Foundation trilogy. It's terrible. Just terrible. I can't explain without spoilers...but awful. Especially book 2.

[ziegl027]

Don't forget the non-robot, non-Foundation short fiction. "Nightfall"' and "The Ugly Little Boy" spring to mind.


Also keep in mind before launching into reading Asimov that he was a very prolific author who pretty freelily admitted that he wrote largely to put some money in his pocket. Not that he wasn't a good writer and didn't love writing, but if he sent it out and somebody bought it, he didn't care if it was one of his BEST. The check cleared, so it was good enough. I think a lot of the Foundation stuff and Robot stuff falls into that category. It was selling, so he wrote more of it.

So, as an Asimov newbie, if you launch into trying to read things in chronological order by publication or series chronology, you may not get the best first impressions of him....

[bill_mchale]

Originally Posted by ziegl027

Don't forget the non-robot, non-Foundation short fiction. "Nightfall"' and "The Ugly Little Boy" spring to mind.


Also keep in mind before launching into reading Asimov that he was a very prolific author who pretty freelily admitted that he wrote largely to put some money in his pocket. Not that he wasn't a good writer and didn't love writing, but if he sent it out and somebody bought it, he didn't care if it was one of his BEST. The check cleared, so it was good enough. I think a lot of the Foundation stuff and Robot stuff falls into that category. It was selling, so he wrote more of it.

So, as an Asimov newbie, if you launch into trying to read things in chronological order by publication or series chronology, you may not get the best first impressions of him....

Actually I would say that is somewhat unfair to Asimov. Pretty much every writer who publishes fairly often, writes to make money (There are some exceptions like J.D. Salinger). Even "Literary Authors" write with the hopes that their books will sell, or at least give them enough credentials to get a spot as a writing teacher some where.

In addition, Asimov's SF output was basically bimodal. He published most of his SF in the 40s and 50s... and then basically his output greatly dropped off in the 1960s and 70s before picking up again the 1980s. He was writing other things, even though his publishers had been begging him for years to write more Foundation and Robot novels.

Of course, I may not be completely objective when it comes to Asimov. He was my favorite author in my early teen years. I remember in the last one or two summers before I had to get a job, spending hours sitting on a chair in the back yard reading Foundation, or the Complete Robot....

--
Bill

[ziegl027]

Originally Posted by bill_mchale

Actually I would say that is somewhat unfair to Asimov. Pretty much every writer who publishes fairly often, writes to make money (There are some exceptions like J.D. Salinger).

Of course, I may not be completely objective when it comes to Asimov. He was my favorite author in my early teen years. I remember in the last one or two summers before I had to get a job, spending hours sitting on a chair in the back yard reading Foundation, or the Complete Robot....

--
Bill

I never said he was unique in that respect . But it's simple fact that if somebody publishes enough stuff to to be included in 9 out 10 categories for the Dewey Decimal system, that not all of it is going to be gold. Even narrowing it down to the Foundation/Robot universe covers a heckuva lot of printed material. The problem with recommending to a newbie that they read things in a somewhat arbitrary order is that the first book in that order may not be a particularly good one. It's first "just because", not because it's best. And since so many of them are more or less self-contained, why not read a really, really GOOD one?

Unfortunately I haven't read a lot of Asimov since high school--and yes, he was one of my favorite authors, too! So I can't recall a lot of specifics about which of the Foundation/Robot series specifically to recommend.

Too bad "Nightfall and other Stories" doesn't seem to be available as an ebook. There's a good cross-section of Asimov for you right there. I'll take "It's Such a Beautiful Day" or "Breeds there a Man" over probably half of the Robot shorts. But there's clunkers in that collection, too (at least to me, YMMV).

[bill_mchale]

Originally Posted by ziegl027

I never said he was unique in that respect . But it's simple fact that if somebody publishes enough stuff to to be included in 9 out 10 categories for the Dewey Decimal system, that not all of it is going to be gold. Even narrowing it down to the Foundation/Robot universe covers a heckuva lot of printed material. The problem with recommending to a newbie that they read things in a somewhat arbitrary order is that the first book in that order may not be a particularly good one. It's first "just because", not because it's best. And since so many of them are more or less self-contained, why not read a really, really GOOD one?

Which category did he miss? And of course fiction is not covered by Dewey, so he has books out side the Dewey Decimal system as well.

As for what to read... my first exposure to Asimov came in 8th grade, and it was Foundation. It got me hooked on both Asimov and SF in general, so I suppose that is the one I would recommend.

Unfortunately I haven't read a lot of Asimov since high school--and yes, he was one of my favorite authors, too! So I can't recall a lot of specifics about which of the Foundation/Robot series specifically to recommend.

Too bad "Nightfall and other Stories" doesn't seem to be available as an ebook. There's a good cross-section of Asimov for you right there. I'll take "It's Such a Beautiful Day" or "Breeds there a Man" over probably half of the Robot shorts. But there's clunkers in that collection, too (at least to me, YMMV).

Personally, I also found his story Nightfall to be the most striking... it also has the advantage of popping up in tons of anthologies. So, there is a good chance its in ebook form already.

--
Bill

[ziegl027]

Originally Posted by bill_mchale

Which category did he miss? --
Bill

100's, Philosophy and psychology.