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
- A Door Into Ocean – Joan Slonczewski
- Ender’s Game – Orson Scott Card
- The Foundation Trilogy – Isaac Asimov
- The Hitch Hiker’s Guide to the Galaxy – Douglas Adams
- The Demolished Man – Alfred Bester
- The Left Hand of Darkness – Ursula K. Le Guin
- The City and the Stars – Arthur C. Clarke
- Snow Crash – Neal Stephenson
- A Fire Upon the Deep – Vernor Vinge
- Darwinia – Robert Charles Wilson
runner ups
- City – Clifford D. Simak
- The Martian Chronicles – Ray Bradbury
- A Canticle for Leibowitz – Walter M. Miller, Jr.
- Hyperion – Dan Simmons
- Replay – Ken Grimwood
- The Wild Shore – Kim Stanley Robinson
- Native Tongue – Suzette Haden Elgin
- Starplex – Robert J. Sawyer
Fantasy novel
- Tigana – Guy Gavriel Kay
- Watership Down – Richard Adams
- Seventh Son – Orson Scott Card
- Good Omens – Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
- The Book of Knights – Yves Meynard
- The Witching Hour – Anne Rice
- The Initiate Brother – Sean Russell
- Nobody’s Son – Sean Stewart
- A Wizard of Earthsea – Ursula K. Le Guin
- A Game of Thrones – George R.R. Martin
runner ups
- Assassin’s Apprentice – Robin Hobb
- Someplace to Be Flying – Charles de Lint
- The Hobbit – J.R.R. Tolkien
- Dragonsbane – Barbara Hambly
- The Last Unicorn – Peter S. Beagle
- The Anubis Gates – Tim Powers
- The Dragonbone Chair – Tad Williams
novella
- …And Then There Were None – Eric Frank Russell
- The Big Front Yard – Clifford D. Simak
- Spice Pogrom – Connie Willis
- Story of Your Life – Ted Chiang
- A Boy and His Dog – Harlan Ellison
- Eye for Eye – Orson Scott Card
- A Meeting with Medusa – Arthur C. Clarke
- Ill Met in Lankhmar – Fritz Leiber
- The Last of the Winnebagos – Connie Willis
- Stardance – Spider & Jeanne Robinson
novelette
- Tower of Babylon – Ted Chiang
- The Minority Report – Philip K. Dick
- Flowers for Algernon – Daniel Keyes
- Mountain Ways – Ursula K. Le Guin
- The Bicentennial Man – Isaac Asimov
- The Moon Moth – Jack Vance
- Changeling – Barbara Hambly
- Sandkings – George R. R. Martin
- Tableau – James White
- Bluesberry Jam – Gene Wolfe
runner ups
- The Birthday of the World – Ursula K. Le Guin
- Adjustment Team – Philip K. Dick
- The Perseids – Robert Charles Wilson
short story
- Nightfall – Isaac Asimov
- Muffin Explains Teleology to the World at Large – James Alan Gardner
- Expedition to Earth (aka History Lesson) – Arthur C. Clarke
- Unaccompanied Sonata – Orson Scott Card
- Fondly Fahrenheit – Alfred Bester
- ‘Repent, Harlequin!’ Said the Ticktockman – Harlan Ellison
- Mythological Beast – Stephen R. Donaldson
- The Ones Who Walk Away From Omelas – Ursula K. Le Guin
- Just Like Old Times – Robert J. Sawyer
- The Nine Billion Names of God – Arthur C. Clarke
runner ups
- The Last Question – Isaac Asimov
- The Star – Arthur C. Clarke
- The Pedestrian – Ray Bradbury
- A Sound of Thunder – Ray Bradbury
- The Dance of the Changer and the Three – Terry Carr
2001 – 2010
SF novel
- Evolution – Stephen Baxter
- Hominids – Robert J. Sawyer
- Passage – Connie Willis
- The Time Traveler’s Wife – Audrey Niffenegger
- Warchild – Karin Lowachee
runner ups
- The Chronoliths – Robert Charles Wilson
- Survival – Julie E. Czerneda
- Radiant – James Alan Gardner
- Brain Plague – Joan Slonczewski
- The Android’s Dream – John Scalzi
- Pattern Recognition – William Gibson
- Soft Apocalypse – Will McIntosh (published in 2011, will have to wait for the next poll)
Fantasy novel
- The Other Wind – Ursula K. Le Guin
- The Crystal City – Orson Scott Card
- Magic Street – Orson Scott Card
- The Eyre Affair – Jasper Fforde
- The Historian – Elizabeth Kostova
novella
- Thousandth Night – Alastair Reynolds
- Atlantis – Orson Scott Card
- The Lifecycle of Software Objects – Ted Chiang
- Identity Theft – Robert J. Sawyer
- A Piece of the Great World – Robert Silverberg
novelette
- Hell is the Absence of God – Ted Chiang
- I, Robot – Cory Doctorow
- Counting Tadpoles – Uncle River
- Abigail & Chang – Harvey Welles & Philip Raines
- The Trial of Edgar Allan Poe – Hugh Cook
short story
- Shed Skin – Robert J. Sawyer
- An End to All Things – Karina Sumner-Smith
- Benedice Te – Jay Lake
- Faller – Will McIntosh
- The Anabe Girls – A. R. Morlan