All-time best SF & fantasy novels & stories, v2

The other day I posted my first thoughts on how I would vote in the Locus poll, which is open until the end of the month. I’ve changed a small number of things and added some runner ups. One thing that I neglected the first time was that the order of the votes matters — I tried this time, but putting these novels and stories in order is extremely difficult.

A note on two books that you might expect to find here, Dune and The Lord of the Rings — I have read these books but it was too long ago and I need to read them again to decide what I think of them (and I intend to read them again).

Here are my second thoughts on my votes…

1901 – 2000

SF novel

  1. A Door Into Ocean – Joan Slonczewski
  2. Ender’s Game – Orson Scott Card
  3. The Foundation Trilogy – Isaac Asimov
  4. The Hitch Hiker’s Guide to the Galaxy – Douglas Adams
  5. The Demolished Man – Alfred Bester
  6. The Left Hand of Darkness – Ursula K. Le Guin
  7. The City and the Stars – Arthur C. Clarke
  8. Snow Crash – Neal Stephenson
  9. A Fire Upon the Deep – Vernor Vinge
  10. Darwinia – Robert Charles Wilson

runner ups

  1. City – Clifford D. Simak
  2. The Martian Chronicles – Ray Bradbury
  3. A Canticle for Leibowitz – Walter M. Miller, Jr.
  4. Hyperion – Dan Simmons
  5. Replay – Ken Grimwood
  6. The Wild Shore – Kim Stanley Robinson
  7. Native Tongue – Suzette Haden Elgin
  8. Starplex – Robert J. Sawyer

Fantasy novel

  1. Tigana – Guy Gavriel Kay
  2. Watership Down – Richard Adams
  3. Seventh Son – Orson Scott Card
  4. Good Omens – Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
  5. The Book of Knights – Yves Meynard
  6. The Witching Hour – Anne Rice
  7. The Initiate Brother – Sean Russell
  8. Nobody’s Son – Sean Stewart
  9. A Wizard of Earthsea – Ursula K. Le Guin
  10. A Game of Thrones – George R.R. Martin

runner ups

  1. Assassin’s Apprentice – Robin Hobb
  2. Someplace to Be Flying – Charles de Lint
  3. The Hobbit – J.R.R. Tolkien
  4. Dragonsbane – Barbara Hambly
  5. The Last Unicorn – Peter S. Beagle
  6. The Anubis Gates – Tim Powers
  7. The Dragonbone Chair – Tad Williams

novella

  1. …And Then There Were None – Eric Frank Russell
  2. The Big Front Yard – Clifford D. Simak
  3. Spice Pogrom – Connie Willis
  4. Story of Your Life – Ted Chiang
  5. A Boy and His Dog – Harlan Ellison
  6. Eye for Eye – Orson Scott Card
  7. A Meeting with Medusa – Arthur C. Clarke
  8. Ill Met in Lankhmar – Fritz Leiber
  9. The Last of the Winnebagos – Connie Willis
  10. Stardance – Spider & Jeanne Robinson

novelette

  1. Tower of Babylon – Ted Chiang
  2. The Minority Report – Philip K. Dick
  3. Flowers for Algernon – Daniel Keyes
  4. Mountain Ways – Ursula K. Le Guin
  5. The Bicentennial Man – Isaac Asimov
  6. The Moon Moth – Jack Vance
  7. Changeling – Barbara Hambly
  8. Sandkings – George R. R. Martin
  9. Tableau – James White
  10. Bluesberry Jam – Gene Wolfe

runner ups

  1. The Birthday of the World – Ursula K. Le Guin
  2. Adjustment Team – Philip K. Dick
  3. The Perseids – Robert Charles Wilson

short story

  1. Nightfall – Isaac Asimov
  2. Muffin Explains Teleology to the World at Large – James Alan Gardner
  3. Expedition to Earth (aka History Lesson) – Arthur C. Clarke
  4. Unaccompanied Sonata – Orson Scott Card
  5. Fondly Fahrenheit – Alfred Bester
  6. ‘Repent, Harlequin!’ Said the Ticktockman – Harlan Ellison
  7. Mythological Beast – Stephen R. Donaldson
  8. The Ones Who Walk Away From Omelas – Ursula K. Le Guin
  9. Just Like Old Times – Robert J. Sawyer
  10. The Nine Billion Names of God – Arthur C. Clarke

runner ups

  1. The Last Question – Isaac Asimov
  2. The Star – Arthur C. Clarke
  3. The Pedestrian – Ray Bradbury
  4. A Sound of Thunder – Ray Bradbury
  5. The Dance of the Changer and the Three – Terry Carr

2001 – 2010

SF novel

  1. Evolution – Stephen Baxter
  2. Hominids – Robert J. Sawyer
  3. Passage – Connie Willis
  4. The Time Traveler’s Wife – Audrey Niffenegger
  5. Warchild – Karin Lowachee

runner ups

  1. The Chronoliths – Robert Charles Wilson
  2. Survival – Julie E. Czerneda
  3. Radiant – James Alan Gardner
  4. Brain Plague – Joan Slonczewski
  5. The Android’s Dream – John Scalzi
  6. Pattern Recognition – William Gibson
  7. Soft Apocalypse – Will McIntosh (published in 2011, will have to wait for the next poll)

Fantasy novel

  1. The Other Wind – Ursula K. Le Guin
  2. The Crystal City – Orson Scott Card
  3. Magic Street – Orson Scott Card
  4. The Eyre Affair – Jasper Fforde
  5. The Historian – Elizabeth Kostova

novella

  1. Thousandth Night – Alastair Reynolds
  2. Atlantis – Orson Scott Card
  3. The Lifecycle of Software Objects – Ted Chiang
  4. Identity Theft – Robert J. Sawyer
  5. A Piece of the Great World – Robert Silverberg

novelette

  1. Hell is the Absence of God – Ted Chiang
  2. I, Robot – Cory Doctorow
  3. Counting Tadpoles – Uncle River
  4. Abigail & Chang – Harvey Welles & Philip Raines
  5. The Trial of Edgar Allan Poe – Hugh Cook

short story

  1. Shed Skin – Robert J. Sawyer
  2. An End to All Things – Karina Sumner-Smith
  3. Benedice Te – Jay Lake
  4. Faller – Will McIntosh
  5. The Anabe Girls – A. R. Morlan

This entry was posted on Monday, November 5th, 2012 at 9:31 pm and is filed under My thoughts. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

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