io9 on 10 Science Fiction Novels You Pretend to Have Read (And Why You Should Actuall

[AndrewH]

I've read Dune, the Foundation series, and Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell.

Originally Posted by tubemonkey

Dune is my absolute fav sci-fi book and series! I'll take it over anything done by Asimov and Bradbury.

You are going to be my new best friend. The six book Dune series, as written by Frank Herbert... not that garbage his son wrote, is my favorite sci-fi series. I've re-read it seven or eight times over the years. It was introduced to me in English class in high school and I enjoyed it so much I'd read the entire series before the assignment to read the first book was completed.

Originally Posted by din155

I have read Dune, 1984 and Foundation. Just out of curiosity, has anyone read later books of Dune series? I could not bring myself to read rest of the series as the characters got altered just too much for my taste.

I loved all six Dune books by Frank Herbert. The Dune books written by Brian Herbert... not so much.

Originally Posted by Yapyap

I've read 1984 and Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell from that list; I can't say I ever thought of the latter as science fiction, though (seemed pretty straightforward alternative history fantasy to me, from what I recall).

Nothing at all sci-fi about it. Definitely fantasy, I don't know why it's on this list.

Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell is, I think, a book will people will either love or hate. It's different, the story is meandering, there's almost no action, there's footnotes galore and the footnotes have their own footnotes (though the footnotes aren't fundamental to the story), the magic that occurs is fairly subtle, the humour is dry and witty. However, the prose is achingly beautiful, the dialogue is thick with subtext, and the story is brilliant. Reading it reminded me of driving leisurely in the country, occasionally pulling over to enjoy a breathtaking vista.

[caleb72]

I've read Cryptonomicon, Dune, 1984 and Foundation. I read some of Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell but had to stop due to persistent attacks of mind-numbing boredom.

Cryptonomicon is one of my favourite books and I loved the Dune series up to God Emperor of Dune (Look! A talking worm!) which was just too much for me. One day I'll read it just so that I can finish the original series as apparently the later books are quite good. Foundation was good, but it didn't excite me enough to read the whole series and I liked 1984.

Of the books on the list I haven't read, I don't really know anything about them and they're not currently on my radar.

[kennyc]

Originally Posted by AndrewH

...


You are going to be my new best friend. The six book Dune series, as written by Frank Herbert... not that garbage his son wrote, is my favorite sci-fi series. ....

https://www.mobileread.com/forums/sho...postcount=1872

[taosaur]

Originally Posted by Prestidigitweeze

About that io9 article:

The list-maker is either trying to be meta or incorporating literature deemed relevant regardless of genre, as certain publishers and critics like to do when they decide to blur the stratification of levels of culture and taste.

Or maybe she just needed to pad one way or another to get to 10, and went with "let's drag in some tough stuff that borders on the genre."

They do different top 10s at least once per week, and there are always outliers in the lists.

[Catlady]

I've never even heard of six of the ten. I have read only 1984.

[Rockbobster]

I would prefer to put Pat Frank's Alas Babylon on the list. It was published in 1959, and is a period piece while still holding up well in many respects. It is the story of a nuclear war, and the aftermath for survivors in a small Florida town. I read it over 30 years ago, and visited it again this year, finding it to leave an impression now as much as it did then.

[GlenBarrington]

Originally Posted by DiapDealer

*Raises hand*

I missed out on it at the time it would have been considered groundbreaking. And now ... I frankly fear that it wouldn't hold up in comparison to some of the works that it broke ground for—many of which I have read. I've found that when I read something (for the very first time) is oftentimes just as important as what I read. Notice how many brand-new, young fantasy fans are left scratching their heads at why so many of their elders bow to the temple of Tolkien? They've already read many of the stories that took what he started and ran with it.

It's a pretty good book I reread it every so often. The sequels are unmitigated crap however.

[GlenBarrington]

Originally Posted by charlesatan

at http://io9.com/5924625/10-science-fi...ally-read-them

It's mostly (relatively) old/classic titles, so that should please the traditionalists here :P

"Davy"? "I Robot"? "A Canticle for Liebowitz"? "Farnham's Freehold"? "Stranger in a Strange Land"?

Some of the books in the original list. . . well, classics that should be read? I'm not so sure. Replace some of them with the books in my list and I think you'll have a better a better list and more fun reading.

[Mike Hobart]

Read: Dune, Foundation, 1984, First & Last Men
Not read: Cryptonomicon, Gravity's Rainbow, Jonathan Strange, Dhalgren, Infinite Jest.
Not sure: Long Tomorrow (I have read a lot of Brackett, not certain)

I did read Dune but only after four or five attempts; be wary of any novel that has to include maps, a glossary and a who's who. Have not read any of the sequels. A friend of mine says he didn't have any trouble reading it, but he read it when it was a serial in Analog magazine so he had the advantage of reading the synopsis before each installment!

[taosaur]

Originally Posted by GlenBarrington

It's a pretty good book I reread it every so often. The sequels are unmitigated crap however.

Dune? I would say that certainly Messiah and possibly God Emperor were better than the original.

[GlenBarrington]

Those were the 2nd and 3rd books weren't they? As Dune sequels, they were OK but the quality REALLY dropped after that. Of course that was about the time Frank Herbert died. And the publishing industry doesn't let a little setback like death stop the revenue flow (not for Herbert and not for Ian Flemming either)!

[taosaur]

Messiah was #2 and very much stood on its own. God Emperor was #4 and more dependent on the mythos but still fairly self-contained. Children of Dune was #3, and had less going on in its own right, mostly just bridging the gap between Messiah and God Emperor. Frank Herbert wrote two more books after God Emperor which pretty much just carried on with the world he'd created without particularly going anywhere. After his death, his son Brian Herbert cashed in, churning out dreck based on "found" manuscripts/outlines/dinner napkins. You really can't lump the original works together with what the son did.

[ApK]

I've read Cryptonomicon. Good book especially if you're a hacker or into cryptography.

I read 1984 in highschool Thought it was pretty good.

I've been on page 64 of Dune for...oh...over 25 years now. BOOORING! Sorry.
The movies sucked too. IMHO, of course.

Foundation, I've tried to start a few times, but while I like Asimov's short stories and non-fiction essays, I've always had problems with his novels. If I can score a Foundation audiobook, I might try it again.

I haven't read any of the others, and except for Gravity's Rainbow, I don't think I'd even heard of them.

[AndrewH]

Originally Posted by Mike Hobart

I did read Dune but only after four or five attempts; be wary of any novel that has to include maps, a glossary and a who's who.

Doesn't that describe 90% of all fantasy novels?

[ApK]

Originally Posted by GlenBarrington

And the publishing industry doesn't let a little setback like death stop the revenue flow (not for Herbert and not for Ian Flemming either)!

Some of the post-Flemming Bond stuff is really good.

Originally Posted by AndrewH

Doesn't that describe 90% of all fantasy novels?

Hm...that could explain why I don't like most fantasy either.