The SF Book Club's "The Most Significant SF & Fantasy Books of the Last 50 Years (1953-2002)"

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Put together by the Science Fiction Book Club.

  1. 1.

  2. 2.
    Foundation Trilogy
    by Isaac Asimov

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  3. 3.
    Dune (Dune Chronicles, Book 1)
    by Frank Herbert

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  4. 4.
    Stranger in a Strange Land
    by Robert A. Heinlein

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  5. 5.
    A Wizard of Earthsea (The Earthsea Cycle, Book 1)
    by Ursula K. Le Guin

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  6. 6.
    Neuromancer
    by William Gibson

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  7. 7.
    Childhood's End
    by Arthur C. Clarke

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  8. 8.
    Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?
    by Philip K. Dick

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  9. 9.
    The Mists of Avalon
    by Marion Zimmer Bradley

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  10. 10.
    Fahrenheit 451
    by Ray Bradbury

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  11. 11.

  12. 12.
    A Canticle for Leibowitz (Bantam Spectra Book)
    by Walter M. Miller Jr.

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  13. 13.
    Caves of Steel (Robot City (Paperback))
    by Isaac Asimov

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  14. 14.
    ?
    Children of the Atom
    by Wilmar H. Shiras

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  15. 15.
    Cities in Flight
    by James Blish

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  16. 16.
    The Colour of Magic (Discworld Novels)
    by Terry Pratchett

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  17. 17.
    Dangerous Visions : The 35th Anniversary Edition
    by Harlan Ellison

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  18. 18.
    ?

  19. 19.
    The Demolished Man
    by Alfred Bester

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  20. 20.
    Dhalgren
    by Samuel R. Delany

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  21. 21.
    Dragonflight (Dragonriders of Pern Trilogy (Paperback))
    by Anne Mccaffrey

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  22. 22.
    Ender's Game (Ender Quartet)
    by Orson Scott Card

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  23. 23.

  24. 24.
    The Forever War
    by Joe Haldeman

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  25. 25.
    Gateway (Heechee Saga)
    by Frederik Pohl

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  26. 26.
    Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone (Book 1)
    by J.K. Rowling

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  27. 27.
    The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
    by Douglas Adams

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  28. 28.
    I Am Legend (ties into movie)
    by Richard Matheson

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  29. 30.
    The Left Hand of Darkness (Remembering Tomorrow)
    by Ursula K. Le Guin

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  30. 31.
    Little, Big (P.S.)
    by John Crowley

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  31. 32.
    Lord of Light
    by Roger Zelazny

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  32. 33.
    The Man in the High Castle
    by Philip K. Dick

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  33. 35.
    More Than Human
    by Theodore Sturgeon

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  34. 37.
    On the Beach
    by Nevil Shute

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  35. 38.
    Rendezvous with Rama
    by Arthur C. Clarke

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  36. 39.
    Ringworld
    by Larry Niven

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  37. 40.
    ?
    Rogue Moon
    by Algis J. Budrys

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  38. 41.
    The Silmarillion
    by J.R.R. Tolkien

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  39. 42.
    Slaughterhouse-Five
    by KURT VONNEGUT

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  40. 43.
    Snow Crash (Bantam Spectra Book)
    by Neal Stephenson

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  41. 44.
    Stand on Zanzibar
    by John Brunner

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  42. 45.
    The Stars My Destination
    by Alfred Bester

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  43. 46.
    Starship Troopers
    by Robert A. Heinlein

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  44. 47.
    Stormbringer (Elric)
    by Michael Moorcock

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  45. 48.
    The Sword of Shannara
    by Terry Brooks

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  46. 49.
    Timescape
    by Gregory Benford

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  47. 50.
    To Your Scattered Bodies Go (Riverworld Saga, Book 1)
    by Philip Jose Farmer

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This is a community list. You can contribute, edit, or help maintain it by adding it to your lists.
Created by Robot Co-op on Nov 30, 2005.
 

Comments

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GabeGrey
Tucson

From the source... — 1 year ago

I made a personal list from the source, I won’t make any changes :)

http://www.listsofbests.com/list/54759


hollyroger
Riverton

Where's Stranger in a Strange Land? — 1 year ago

That’s one of my all-time favorite SF books. It’s entertianing, well written, and like the best SF stories, has startling significance to our society and lives. It deserves to be here!


Slaughterhouse Five — 2 years ago

A masterpiece of a book,but its no Sci-Fi. Read it anyway.


The Sword of Shannara was terrible — 2 years ago

I own it and I can’t even finish the first 10 pages or so. Terrible sentence structure, run-on’s, fragments, it needs a good editor badly, and that’s just for starters

i think the list might be a little more useful if the sets of books were listed idividually so people could check them as they finish them. Good list over all though


buocl
Medina

Corrections — 2 years ago

Someone decided to add a bunch of new stuff to this list, which I deleted. This is a definitive list, if you want to have different books on it, make your own list.


JudithKD
New Hampshire

sf has two components to its readership: — 3 years ago

one are the people who read it to be entertained. The other are the people who read it to be entertained and want it to also have literary content.

Both componets have the entertainment requirement. How people are entertained doesn’t necessarily have anything to do with the type of writing.

Sword of Shannara was written to entertain. If you want your fantasy to be literary as well, read George Martin, Tolkien, or some such. But both are valid, whatever your particular taste may be.

Everyone doesn’t have to have the same taste or standards. If we did, sf probably wouldn’t exist as a genre at all!

jkd


photopoppy
Eugene

Stormbringer — 3 years ago

I can’t take anything seriously as a best of anything with lines like:

“It was now a yellow morass of molten rock that, though cool, rolled about with a purposeful air.”

Rock? Rolling about with a purposeful air? What?


Sevenx
Vancouver

Kind of a weak list... — 3 years ago

I have problems with this list… it’s lacking in many, many regards.

Authors that are missing: George RR Martin, Glen Cook, Steven Eriksson. The list goes on and on.

-Erik.


Prince Mu-Chao
Maple Grove

Disappointing... — 3 years ago

No Lem?


JudithKD
New Hampshire

I've looked at or skimmed all of these... — 3 years ago

I was an sf bookseller for a long while, after all. The ones that I checked that I’ve read but have not graded “worthwhile” or “not” I am certain I read, but not what I thought of them.

Mostly, this means I haven’t reread them in the past 10 years or so.

jkd



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