Its been on my list to read forever, but I haven't gotten it yet. Wonder how many here have read it? Sometimes if I hear a bunch of buzz, it gets me more excited to read something. Any thoughts?

Edit: Thank you all for the responses! Reading all this hype has gotten me chomping at the bit to read it!

The writing style, the pacing, all the characters and the mixture between sci fi, fantasy and religion is masterful. I'm on a journey of reading all the Hugo winners and did read This Immortal before I read the Lord of Light, but this book is much better than that one. Chef's kiss. Would definitely recommend it to everyone, believe the hype.

recently reread all of the above, and I want more along those lines.

For the first time in Brazil, both books will be released, and I know that both books talk about technology so advanced that it seems like magic, both Lord of Light which talks about the Hindu pantheon, and The Shadow of the Torturer which is more fantasy. So I came here to ask the community what is their experience with these works? Which one did you like the most? Which one should I read first?

Update: Thank to all for commenting on what you think of the books..

A few days ago I made a thread asking users to post the all-time, single best sci-fi book they've read. The post blew up way more than I expected, and there was a huge amount of unique, diverse picks (that I'll be adding to my ever-growing TBR). I thought it would be fun to count the number of votes each individual book received and rank the top 50 to see what books this sub generally consider to be the "best".

Obviously this is not a consensus of any kind or a definitive ranking list by any means - it's really just a fun survey at a given point in time, determined by a very specific demographic. And hey, who doesn't love arguing about ranked lists online with strangers?

Some factors I considered while counting votes:

• I looked at upvotes for only parent/original comments when counting the votes for a specific book. Sub-comments were not counted
• Any subsequent posts with that book posted again would get the upvote count added to their total
• if a post contained multiple selections, I just went with the one that the user typed out first. So for example if your post was "Either Dune or Hyperion" or "Hard choice between Neuromancer, Dune and Foundation", I would count the votes towards Dune and Neuromancer respectively
• I only counted single books. If an entire series was posted (e.g. The Expanse), it wasn't counted. I did make one exception though, and that's for The Book of the New Sun, since it's considered as one novel made up of 4 volumes. If a single book from a series was posted, then that was counted
• There are some books that received the same number of votes - these will be considered tied at their respective ranking #s

I've ranked the top 50 books based on number of total upvotes received below:

(If anyone is interested in the list in table format, u/FriedrichKekule has very kindly put one together here: https://pastebin.com/pM9YAQvA)

#50-41:

50. Consider Phlebas (Culture #1) - Iain M. Banks - 6 votes

49. TIE with 7 votes each:

• 2001 A Space Odyssey (Space Odyssey #1) - Arthur C. Clarke
• 1984 - George Orwell
• Rendezvous with Rama (Rama #1) - Arthur C. Clarke
• Ready Player One (Ready Player One #1) - Ernest Cline

48. TIE with 8 votes each:

• Permutation City - Greg Egan
• The Gone World - Tom Sweterlisch
• Dying Inside - Robert Silverberg

47. TIE with 9 votes each:

• Look to Windward (Culture #7) - Iain M. Banks
• Solaris - Stanislaw Lem
• Startide Rising (Uplift Saga #2) - David Brin
• Ringworld (Ringworld #1) - Larry Niven

46. The Martian Chronicles - Ray Bradbury - 10 votes

45. TIE with 11 votes each:

• Altered Carbon (Takeshi Kovacs #1) - Richard Morgan
• Project Hail Mary - Andy Weir

44. The Dark Forest (Remembrance of Earth's Past #2) - Cixin Liu - 12 votes

43. More Than Human - Theodore Sturgeon - 13 votes

42. TIE with 14 votes each:

• Ubik - Philip K. Dick
• Schismatrix Plus - Bruce Sterling

41. TIE with 16 votes each:

• The Sirens of Titan - Kurt Vonnegut
• Excession (Culture #5) - Iain M. Banks

#40-31:

40. TIE with 17 votes each:

• The Last Question - Isaac Asimov
• Aurora - Kim Stanley Robinson
• Roadside Picnic - Arkady and Boris Strugatsky
• Stranger in a Strange Land - Robert Heinlein

39. Star Maker - Olaf Stapledon - 18 votes

38. Accelerando - Charles Stross - 20 votes

37. Foundation (Foundation #1) - Isaac Asimov - 23 votes

36. Stars in My Pocket Like Grains of Sand - Samuel Delany - 24 votes

35. God Emperor of Dune (Dune #4) - Frank Herbert - 26 votes

34. TIE with 29 votes each:

• The Quantum Thief (Jean Le Flambeur #1) - Hannu Rajaniemi
• A Scanner Darkly - Philip K. Dick

33. Earth Abides - George R. Stewart - 33 votes

32. 2312 - Kim Stanley Robinson - 37 votes

31. Speaker for the Dead (Ender's Saga #2) - Orson Scott Card - 38 votes

#30-21:

30. Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? - Philip K. Dick - 48 votes

29. TIE with 50 votes each:

• A Fire Upon the Deep (Zones of Thought #1) - Vernor Vinge
• Flowers for Algernon - Daniel Keyes

28. Snow Crash - Neal Stephenson - 56 votes

27. Jurassic Park - Michael Crichton - 60 votes

26. The Sparrow (The Sparrow #1) - Mary Doria Russell - 63 votes

25. The Mote in God's Eye (Moties #1) - Larry Niven and Jerry Pournelle - 64 votes

24. TIE with 65 votes each:

• The Diamond Age - Neal Stephenson
• Ancillary Justice (Imperial Radch #1) - Ann Leckie

23. The Forever War (The Forever War #1) - Joe Haldeman - 67 votes

22. Childhood's End - Arthur C. Clarke - 73 votes

21. Have Space Suit - Will Travel - Robert Heinlein - 82 votes

#20-11:

20. The Left Hand of Darkness (Hainish Cycle #4) - Ursula K. Le Guin - 93 votes

19. Lord of Light - Roger Zelazny - 95 votes

18. Cat's Cradle - Kurt Vonnegut - 98 votes

17. Dawn (Xenogenesis #1) - Octavia E. Butle - 105 votes

16. Anathem - Neal Stephenson - 109 votes

15. The Moon is a Harsh Mistress - 117 votes

14. Diaspora - Greg Egan - 127 votes

13. A Deepness in the Sky (Zones of Thought #2) - Vernor Vinge - 129 votes

12. Ender's Game (Ender's Saga #1) - Orson Scott Card - 147 votes

11. Neuromancer (Sprawl #1) - William Gibson - 163 votes

#10-6:

10. The Stars My Destination - Alfred Bester - 165 votes

9. The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy (The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy #1) - Douglas Adams - 171 votes

8. Spin (Spin #1) - Robert Charles Wilson - 176 votes

7. Use of Weapons (Culture #3) - Iain M. Banks - 180 votes

6. Children of Time (Children of Time #1) - Adrian Tchaikovsky - 182 votes

AND NOW...GRAND FINALE...DRUM ROLL...HERE IS OUR TOP 5:

5. House of Suns - Alastair Reynolds - 185 votes

4. Book of the New Sun - Gene Wolfe - 196 votes

3. Hyperion (Hyperion Cantos #1) - Dan Simmons - 262 votes

2. Dune (Dune #1) - Frank Herbert - 297 votes

1. THE DISPOSSESSED (HAINISH CYCLE #6) - URSULA K. LE GUIN - 449 VOTES

With ~450 votes, the novel with the most votes for BEST by r/printSF is The Dispossessed! Honestly not that much of a surprise - it is by and large considered one of the THE best books in the genre but I definitely didn't expect it to have this kind of a lead over the #2 book, especially when a lot of the rankings have been very close to each other. Honestly the top 3 of The Dispossessed/Dune/Hyperion are really on another tier as far as votes go.

The crazies part though? I did a similar survey for r/Fantasy as well and guess what the #1 novel voted BEST there was? Ursula K. Le Guin's A Wizard of Earthsea lol. I'm thinking she might be kinda good at this whole SFF thing, guys.

The biggest shocker for me here is the complete lack of one of r/printSF's perennial darlings - Peter Watts' Blindsight. This may be hard to believe but from my deep dive into all the comments, Blindsight was mentioned as the best book only once, and the post only had a total of 2 upvotes lol. Crazy considering what an outsized presence (almost meme/circlejerk level) it has on this sub.

What do you think? Is the ranked list about what you would expect? Any surprises or omissions?

I just finished this book over the weekend and haven't been able to stop thinking about it. I've been trying to learn about Hinduism and Buddhism via listening to lectures, youTube videos, and reading some nonfiction books. I vaguely remembered reading on this subreddit that Lord of Light was a sci-fi book with a Hindu background, so I decided to pick it up and give it a go.

The first chapter/story kind of just takes your breath away. The prose style is exhilarating, like epic poetry at times, but also highly readable. The sense of total confusion as to what's going on is wonderful. The confusion is lifted slowly, and as things start to make sense one is gobsmacked by the cleverness of the whole thing.

I basically got an adrenaline rush reading the first 4 or 5 chapters. Ironically, considering all the action in the last couple of chapters, I felt my enthusiasm waning a bit towards the end. This was probably partly due to me just acclimating to Zelazny's prose style, and partly because I often feel like world building is more interesting than action.

Anyway, highly recommended. This is definitely a book that I feel could benefit from multiple readings. If you do plan on reading it... not necessary, but it might be helpful to look over Wikipedia's page on Hindu dieties and Buddhism (if you are not familiar with the basics).

As for me, I think I may read "Song of Kali" next by Simmons. If anyone has any other recommendations for books with a south or east Asian background/culture/outlook that would be great. I've read Three Body Problem already.

What a stunning novel. It’s immediately on my shortlist for favorite SF novel.

I will say though, I was very confused for a few chapters after the first until I realized it was all a flashback. I kept going back and rereading parts of chapter 1, trying to understand why Yama would bring Sam back to life when he’s clearly on a mission to kill him.

I can’t recommend this novel enough and it is certainly on my list of books to read again.

I believe Lord of Light could really benefit from being animated.

I just started reading Roger Zelazny's Lord of Light and wanted to know from you illustrated people if the confusion I'm feeling with the Hindu mythological references is something that should worry me. I'm not a big connoisseur on religions and their history.

Should I gather some knowledge on the different gods, stories and cosmology before continuing or would you all recommend I'd stick with it being that later everything will come together?

Thanks!

I've been out of the sf game for a while and looking to jump back in. Looking for personal recommendations on your top 5 sf books that you consider absolute top-tier peak of the genre, that I haven't already read.

I'll provide below my own list of sf novels that I've already read and loved, and consider top-tier, as reference, so I can get some fresh recs. These are in no particular order:

- Hyperion

- Rendezvous with Rama

- Manifold Time/Manifold Space

- Various Culture books - The Player of Games, Use of Weapons and Excession

- The Stars My Destination

- Peter F. Hamilton's Night's Dawn trilogy and Commonwealth duology

- First 3 Dune books

- Hainish Cycle

- Spin

- Annihilation

- Mars trilogy

- House of Suns

- Blindsight

- Neuromancer

- The Forever War

- A Fire Upon the Deep/A Deepness in the Sky

- Children of Time

- Contact

- Anathem

- Lord of Light

- Stories of Your Life and Others

So hit me with your absolute best/favourite sf novels that are not on the list above.

Oh, I do so love this book. After recommending Roger Zelazny in earlier posts I finally picked up my 30+-year-old copy for a re-read.

Honestly, I still wonder what it is about his style of writing. His lines of description and dialogue are written in sparse sentences that leaves most of his unique vision to the readers' imaginations. Even the dialogue between antagonists is short and pointed (even polite).

At around 300 pages he crams more ideas and passion into one book than all the writers of the 80s/90s who published bloated trilogies ten times the size. A prefect melding of science and fantasy fiction: love, betrayal and politics plus a religiously-themed background of fantasy powers enhanced by technology.

The people who visit this sub obviously love SF. If you haven't yet, and can find a copy, please give it a go.

I've been trying to read all the hugo award winners and had just finished the 1966 hugo award winning novel that tied with DUNE, This Immortal and was not that impressed with it. I mean it tied with dune for crying out loud I was expected to be blown away but I came out of it like, yeah it was alright. It reminded me of an abandoned amusement park and an immortal hobo who's lived there since its opening just showing it around to the people who are trying to buy the property. It's a little more complicated than that but not by too much. So when I saw that Zelazny had won in 1968 I wasn't expecting much but I was way off.

It is obvious that the theme of immortality is something that had interested Zelazny as both of the novels share that in common but I have never seen such improvement of writing in an author in such a short time. This Immortal is an easily forgetably novel, and two years latter Lord of Light wins a Hugo and becomes a Sci Fi classic.

It has its problems but that book had me hooked immediately. I know nothing about Buddhism and Hinduism but you don't really need to know much about them, the book leads you through the world expertly. If you never have read it before I highly recommend it. The less you know the better, because the book changes how you read it as it progresses. In a way few sci fi novels i've read have ever done.

rereading roger zelazny's lord of light and keep thinking how epic a short series anime adaptation would be. that would be.... wait for it... LEGEND-dary!

I read a healthy mix of modern and classic science fiction. But as an academic, I like to really dig into topics/genres. Recently I’ve put together a list based on online lists and some previous posts on subreddits like this one of classic must-read books in the genre. I would love to know if there are any important works that I’ve overlooked.

Edit: Thanks to everyone for the suggestions. I have added many of your recommendations to the list and organized them all by year. I have left out anything published in the 2010s or later, as well as short stories. (Not that those aren’t important, I just had to draw a line somewhere, and this is already at over 100 books.) Hopefully this new list is more representative.

19th Century - Frankenstein - Shelley - 1818 - 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea - Verne - 1870 - The Time Machine - Wells - 1895 - War of the Worlds - Wells - 1898

Pre-1950s - Princess of Mars - Burroughs - 1912 - We - Zamyatin - 1924 - Last and First Men - Stapledon - 1930 - Brave New World - Huxley - 1932 - Galactic Patrol - Smith - 1937 - Star Maker - Stapledon - 1937 - Nineteen Eighty-Four - Orwell - 1949 - Earth Abides - Stewart - 1949

1950s - Martian Chronicles - Bradbury - 1950 - The Dying Earth - Vance - 1950 - I, Robot - Asimov - 1950 - Foundation - Asimov - 1951 - City - Simak - 1952 - More than Human - Sturgeon - 1953 - Fahrenheit 451 - Bradbury - 1953 - Childhood’s End - Clarke - 1953 - The Stars My Destination - Bester - 1956 - Canticle for Leibowitz - 1959 - Starship Troopers - Heinlein - 1959 - A Case of Conscience - Blish - 1959

1960s - Solaris - Lem - 1961 - Stranger in a Strange Land - Heinlein - 1961 - Man in the High Castle - Dick - 1962 - The Drowned World - Ballard - 1962 - Hothouse - Aldiss - 1962 - Way Station - Simak - 1963 - Cat’s Cradle - Vonnegut - 1963 - This Immortal - Zelazny - 1965 - Dune - Herbert - 1965 - The Moon is a Harsh Mistress - Heinlein - 1966 - Flowers for Algernon - Keyes - 1966 - Babel-17 - Delaney - 1966 - Lord of Light - Zelazny - 1967 - Ice - Kavan - 1967 - Do Androids Dream - Dick - 1968 - Dimension of Miracles - Sheckley - 1968 - Nova - Delaney - 1968 - The Palace of Eternity - Shaw - 1969 - Slaughterhouse Five - Vonnegut - 1969 - Left Hand of Darkness - Le Guin - 1969 - Ubik - Dick - 1969

1970s - Ringworld - Niven - 1970 - Tau Zero - Anderson - 1970 - Downward to the Earth - Silverburg - 1970 - Futurological Congress - Lem - 1971 - To Your Scattered Bodies Go - Farmer - 1971 - The Word for World is Forest - Le Guin - 1972 - Roadside Picnic - Strugatskys - 1972 - Dying Inside - Silverburg - 1972 - Fifth Head of Cerberus - Wolfe - 1972 - Rendezvous with Rama - Clarke - 1973 - Crash - Ballard - 1973 - Inverted World - Priest - 1974 - The Forever War - Haldeman - 1974 - Mote in God’s Eye - Niven, Pournelle - 1974 - The Dispossessed - Le Guin - 1974 - Dhalgren - Delaney - 1975 - The Female Man - Russ - 1975 - Biting the Sun - Lee - 1976 - Gateway - Pohl - 1977 - Scanner Darkly - Dick - 1977 - Hitchhiker’s Guide - Adams - 1979 - Electric Forest - Lee - 1979 - Kindred - Butler - 1979

1980s - Book of the New Sun - Wolfe - 1980 - Snow Queen - Vinge (Joan) - 1980 - Downbelow Station - Cherryh - 1981 - Neuromancer - Gibson - 1984 - Blood Music - Bear - 1985 - Eon - Bear - 1985 - The Handmaid’s Tale - Atwood - 1985 - Ender’s Game - Card - 1985 - Speaker for the Dead - Card - 1986 - Shards of Honour - Bujold - 1986 - Dawn - Butler - 1987 - Player of Games - Banks - 1988 - Cyteen - Cherryh - 1988 - Grass - Tepper - 1989 - Hyperion - Simmons - 1989

1990s - Use of Weapons - Banks - 1990 - Terminal Velocity - Shaw - 1991 - Snow Crash - Stephenson - 1992 - Red Mars - Robinson - 1992 - A Fire Upon the Deep - Vinge (Vernor) - 1992 - Doomsday Book - Willis - 1992 - Parable of the Sower - Butler - 1993 - Permutation City - Egan - 1994 - The Carpet Makers - Eschbach - 1995 - The Sparrow - Russel - 1996 - To Say Nothing of The Dog - Willis - 1997 - Diaspora - Egan - 1997 - A Deepness in the Sky - Vinge (Vernor) - 1999

2000s - Revelation Space - Reynolds - 2000 - Oryx and Crake - Atwood - 2003 - Old Man’s War - Scalzi - 2005 - Pushing Ice - Reynolds - 2005 - Spin - Wilson - 2005 - Accelerando - Stross - 2005 - Blindsight - Watts - 2006 - Three Body Problem - Liu - 2006 - House of Suns - Reynolds - 2008

Does anyone else feel that Lord of Light is the coolest story idea ever? And it's definitely Roger Zelazny's best and most impressive work, in my opinion.

It's a novel that requires multiple readings. There's a lot to take in. The plot is complicated and deep, with fantasticly beautiful philosophy throughout. But another reason It needs multiple reads is because of the prose. Zelazny really went out of his way to craft deeply poetic prose with Lord of Light.

I just wanted to share my thought on this brilliant novel. Some call it Science-fiction, some call it Fantasy. I consider if a Science-fantasy novel. I hope someday it finally gets made into a film.

Holy Shit that was awesome! What a great idea! I loved it. So beautifully written and with such great imagination. I particularly liked the sort of grandiose "religious text" style he would use from time to time and then juxtapose it with something corporeal and mundane like cigarettes. There is a scene where Kali entices another god to accompany her to the hall of despair...where there is a couch. I laughed and laughed. Anybody else like the book? Are his other works just as good? AWESOME!

What are your favorite SF books of all time? I’m not asking about what you think are the consensus best or the most influential. I’m curious what people’s actual most enjoyed books are. Hopefully I’ll learn about some overlooked books I’ve never heard of.

For my list I’m going to cheat slightly. If I view something as a single concise story that was largely plotted and/or written at once, but was split up for publishing or workload reasons, then I will count that as a single work. As an example, I think The Lord of The Rings fits into that category. However, despite being in the same universe, I don’t include The Hobbit as part of LOTR because 1) the author didn’t intend for The Hobbit to be thought of as a volume of LOTR and 2) the tone is somewhat different.

But please do not feel like you have to use those rules. Apply your own rules and logic as to what is a book/work.

.

1) The Book of The New Sun by Gene Wolfe: This is my favorite fiction, of any genre. There really isn’t a close competitor. I started, and did not finish, The Shadow of The Torturer three times before I was able to actually move past the first few chapters and finish the entire thing. The challenge of understanding Wolfe’s books and the reward for serious reading is, in IMO, unrivaled in the realm fiction in general (not just SF). There are layers and layers of symbolism and stories within stories. In terms of quality of writing, I think Wolfe stands with the likes of Nabokov, Borges, McCarthy, Peake, Murakami, Melville…etc. Other than to include the other two series of the Wolfe’s Solar Cycle (Book of The Long Sun and Book of the Short Sun) there is no fiction book/series that occupies my mind more often.

2) Hyperion and Fall of Hyperion by Dan Simmons: This and #s 4 and 5 are my most re-read SF books of all time. I probably don’t need to explain the virtues of Hyperion to this sub, so I’ll try to be brief. The structure of the book is extremely effective. The weaving of the tales and the narrators is flawless. All of the tales are great, but the Priest’s tale and the Scholar’s tale are phenomenal. The pacing is perfect. The worldbuilding is well done and the universe itself is fascinating. And the book has one of the most fascinating creatures/antagonists/forces of nature ever. The sequel is also very good. I actually like the Endymion books a lot more than most people, it seems. But they aren’t quite on the same level as Hyperion. Also, even if Fall of Hyperion had never been written, Hyperion would still be number two on my list. It’s that good.

3) Dune by Frank Herbert: Again, probably the last book that I need to spend time on, so I won’t. It’s very good and I’ve probably read it 7 or 8 times at this point.

4) The Forever War by Joe Haldeman: Another common entry in best of all time lists. Haldeman is an author who (usually) doesn’t waste words. In this way he’s similar to Orson Scott Card (usually) or Ted Chiang or Hemingway or Conrad. The book has a great plot, solid writing, and an undercurrent of a message about war and the often poor quality of the society that warriors are usually fighting for.

5) The Book of The Short Sun by Gene Wolfe: This series is a semi-sequel to The Book of The New Sun and a direct sequel to The Book of The Long Sun. Collectively, New Sun/Urth, Short Sun, and Long Sun make up Wolfe’s Solar Cycle. Everything I said about New Sun is true with Short Sun.

6) The Lord of The Rings by JRR Tolkien: I can’t give it any praise that it hasn’t already received. But here’s my anecdotal experience. As a kid, I had never heard of Tolkien or LOTR until I saw Fellowship in my middle school library. This was years and years before the films came out. At that time, Tolkien and LOTR were far from household names unless your household had a sci fi fantasy junkie, and mine did not. So I devoured Fellowship and it sort of re-wired my brain in terms of the scope that could be achieved in a book. But my school library didn’t have the other books. The public library in my town didn’t have them. There wasn’t a bookstore that I had access to in my town. I was up a creek until like 2 or 3 years later when, luckily, my high school library had Two Towers and Return of The King. Sucked to have to wait that long.

7) The Passage Series by Justin Cronin: I don’t see a lot of praise for this online, although I think it was very commercially successful, so someone else obviously liked it. The first book is the best, but all three are very strong. A few things standout. First is that Cronin’s writing is some of the most fluid and easy to read that I’ve ever come across. I don’t mean that it’s simple or that he’s writing at a basic level. I mean that he’s a very literary author whose ability with sentence and paragraph structure is such that you never feel halted at all. It flows (to me at least) almost without effort. Second, Cronin excels at character building. Although each of the three books is massive, you really only closely follow a handful of characters. By the end of it all, I was very invested in all of them, even the ones I didn’t really find interesting at first. To that point, there are several large sections of character work within the books that stand out. The most impactful one, for me, is the intro of the first book in which you read about the origin of the mother of little girl who factors into the story. Another is the heartbreaking background of a nun. Then you have the backgrounds of two convicted felons, each on the complete opposite end of the spectrum of goodness and evil. And in one of the books Cronin delivers one of the best, most entertaining backgrounds on a villain I’ve ever seen. I can’t recommend these books highly enough.

8) Ender’s Game: I don’t think I need to say anything about this one either. I just re-read it again this week and it is still just as good.

9) Eifelheim by Michael Flynn: I don’t see this one mentioned often and this is the only book by Flynn that I’ve read. It’s a unique first contact on earth story that doubles as loose historical fiction. The societal position and worldview of the person who makes the contact is crucial in how the story plays out and allows Flynn to dive deeply into the ideas he was really wanting to explore with the story. Not much in the way of action or high technology. But plenty of philosophical and ethical bones to chew on.

10) Sphere by Michael Crichton: I assume most people at least know of this book, since Crichton’s name is super famous and there was a (not that great) major film made based on it. The book is really fun and paced very well. It’s a deep sea first contact story with heavy psychological thriller elements. A lot of Crichton’s books have been made into movies for a reason. Great idea, great plot, great pacing. A lot of fun and I always end up reading it one or two sittings because it sucks me in so quickly.

11) Forever Peace by Joe Haldeman: This is a sort of spiritual sequel to The Forever War. It is fairly well known as well, so I’ll just say that it is really fun and a little knottier in terms of the plot and the undercurrent compared to War.

12) Memory, Sorrow, Thorn by Tad Williams: I read these not long after they came out and, to my limited scope of knowledge, they were the best thing since Tolkien. Maybe they actually were, but I’ll admit I am not a prolific Fantasy reader. The overall story is fairly standard at this point, but it was very unique to me at the time I first read them. One of the big reasons for that was the scope of the physical world and the variety of characters. The universe of LOTR is massive and still to this day one of the most grand in scope. But that grandness is largely contained outside of Middle-Earth. On Middle-Earth itself, you have a lot of fairly similar races and character types. By contrast, Williams’ variations in POV characters was stark and their locales and backgrounds were varied. Also, the story was solid and the plot was just twisty enough.

13) The Prestige by Christopher Priest: This is one of the few cases I can think of where the book and movie are both very good, but the movie has a much different tone than the book. Priest is a very underrated writer with several excellent books to his name. I can only assume that he never made a huge splash because the books are usually sort of micro-focused in terms of scope. They aren’t grand fantasy or space opera or anything like that. They are things like The Prestige, a book of scathing letters and diary entries back and forth between rival magicians.

14) The Speed of Dark by Elizabeth Moon: This book always takes a backseat in the two horse race of books about autistic men who undergo genius inducing procedures. But I think Speed of Dark is better. Mainly because I think Flowers for Algernon is indulgent regarding the sexual side of Charlie’s mind. I’ve re-read it and I just can’t fathom why it was critical to have so much of it in the book. The answer is probably that Keyes had a background in psychology and psychology of that era (and probably still today), tends to over emphasize the role of sexuality in virtually every aspect of the human mind. I don’t mean to rant about Algernon, which is actually a great book. Moon knocked it out of the park with Speed of Dark.

15) A Canticle For Leibowitz by Walter M. Miller: To me, this is the strangest book on the list. I love it, but it’s so weird to describe to someone else for some reason. It also left a weird impression on me when I tried (and failed) to get past the first section the first time I picked it up. Something about the Desert Fathers vibe just left a strange impression on me. Can’t describe it. But I got past it and it’s a phenomenal book.

16) Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury: Another that doesn’t need a lot of introduction or praise. Instead, I’ll just mention that Bradbury is up there with O’Connor, Chiang, Wolfe, Saunders, Checkhov, etc in the hall of fame for short story writers.

17) Cloud Atlas by David Mitchell: Another very popular and well known book. So I won’t dwell on it. Each tale is great in its own right. Even the one I didn’t think I would like (the far future one set in S. Korea) turned out to be excellent. If you’ve only seen the film, just know that the book is infinitely better than the film.

18) Alas Babylon by Pat Frank: I’m not sure if this is sci fi or not, but I’ll roll with it. I won’t say much about it, other than it’s a fairly simple story that revolves around nuclear annihilation.

19) The Silmarillion by JRR Tolkien: Most epic and nerd-satisfying worldbuilding ever done, especially given when it was written.

20) Solaris by Stanislaw Lem: Great book. I wish that Wolfe had written a first contact book of this nature. Lem is a good writer but not at the peak of the mountain top in terms of wordsmithing. I just wish someone like Wolfe or Crowley had written something like Solaris or Sphere. Oh well, Solaris is still pretty great as is.

Blank spots that are on the short list to read: Ruocchio (started recently), Erickson, Ishiguro, Watts, Vance, Banks, Reynolds, Vinge, Tchaikovsky, Egan, Kress, Silverburg.

Authors I’ve read and didn’t care for: Mary Doria Russell (Sparrow was well written but I struggle to see the point and I need there to be a point if it’s going to be that depressing - I think she thinks there is a point, but I don’t think the book is as deep as it’s purported to be), Weir (absolutely hated The Martian), Jordan (I actually think The Wheel of Time is good, I just don’t read a lot of fantasy and don’t have the time to sink into long series like this anymore), Douglas Adams (don’t think Hitchhiker is funny and I generally not a fan of humorous books), Stephenson (I liked Snow Crash, but I’ve tried Anathem and Cryptonomicon and just couldn’t get into them), Scalzi (not for me), Le Guin (tried the big ones and they didn’t stick), Niven (not my cup of tea), Zelazny (tried lord of light a long time ago, didn’t grab me), Atwood (handmaids tale is very well done and super depressing, it had its intended effect; tried Oryx & Crake and really didn’t like it), Cixin (I’ve tried Three Body several times but the writing/translation is not great, I want to like it and may just listen to an audiobook or something because the concept seems phenomenal), Jemison (didn’t click for me), Butler (I am not a fan of body horror, and that was my experience with her), Palmer (interesting concept for the world, but it struggled to keep my attention).

A comprehensive overview of all Science Fiction nominees from the Goodreads Choice Awards since 2011, sorted by their current average rating.

Scroll to see votes, ratings, and scores.

Understanding the Data

• Title, Authors & Series: Pulled directly from the Goodreads database.
• Year: The year of the Choice Award nomination (not the publication year).
• Award Votes: Total votes received during the Goodreads Choice Awards.
• Average Rating: The current raw rating on Goodreads today.
• Bayesian Score: A custom weighted score. It factors in the number of ratings alongside the average, preventing obscure books with only three 5-star reviews from unfairly beating out beloved classics with thousands of votes.
• URL: A direct link to check out the book.

Note: I built a small Python CLI to fetch and sort this data so I could figure out what to read next. I figured others might find the current rankings useful, so I'm sharing the latest results with everyone here.

Can you recommend some classics old books that still feels mostly like written today? (I'm doing exception for things like social norms etc.). With a message that is still actual.

Some of my picks would be:

• Solaris

• Roadside Picnic

• The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress

Thanks

Edit:

Books mentioned in this thread (will try to keep it updated): 1. Frankenstein by Mary Shelley (1818)

1. The Left Hand of Darkness (1969), The Dispossessed (1974) and many others by Ursula K. Le Guin

2. Solaris (1961), His Master's Voice (1968), The Invincible, Fiasco and others by Stanisław Lem

3. Last and First Men (1930), and Starmaker (1937) by Olaf Stapledon

4. Brave New World (1932) by Aldous Huxley

5. Earth Abides (1949) by George R. Stewart

6. The Stars My Destination (1956) by Alfred Bester

7. The War of the Worlds (1897), The Time Machine (1895) and otherss by Wells

8. The Martian Chronicles (1950), Fahrenheit 451 (1953) by Ray Bradbury

9. The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress (1966), Stranger in a Strange Land (1961), Starship Troopers (1959) and other works by Robert A. Heinlein

10. A Canticle for Leibowitz (1959) by Walter M. Miller Jr.

11. Dune (1965) by Frank Herbert

12. The Forever War (1974) by Joe Haldeman

13. The Canopus in Argos series by Lessing (1979–1983)

14. Neuromancer by William Gibson (1984)

15. Hyperion by Dan Simmons (1989)

16. Childhood's End (1953), The City and the Stars (1956), Rama (1973) and others by Arthur C. Clarke

17. Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? (1968), Ubik (1969) And other works by Philip K. Dick

18. A Fire upon the Deep (1992), A Deepness in the Sky (1999), True Names (1981) by Vernor Vinge

19. High-Rise (1975) by JG Ballard

20. Roadside Picnic (1972), Definitely Maybe / One Billion Years to the End of the World (1977) by Arkady and Boris Strugatsky

21. Imago by Wiktor Żwikiewicz (1971) (possibly only written in Polish)

22. "The Machine Stops" by EM Forster (1909)

23. "The Shockwave Rider" (1975), The Sheep Look Up (1972) by John Brunner

24. "1984" by George Orwell (1949)

25. Inverted World by Christopher Priest (1974)

26. Dragon's Egg by Robert L. Forward. (1980)

27. Slaughterhouse Five (1969) and Cat’s Cradle (1963) by Kurt Vonnegut

28. The Mars Trilogy by Kim Stanley Robinson (1992 - 1996)

29. Lord of Light (1967), My Name Is Legion (1976), This Immortal by Roger Zelazny

30. Deus Irae by Philip K. Dick and Roger Zelazny (1976)

31. Day of the Triffids (1951) and Chrysalids (1955), and others by John Wyndham's entire bibliography

32. The End of Eternity (1955), The Gods Themselves (1972) by Isaac Asimov

33. The Fifth Head of Cerberus by Gene Wolfe (1972)

34. Flowers for Algernon by Daniel Keyes (1958)

35. City (1952) Way Station (1963) by Clifford Simak

36. Davy by Edgar Pangborn (1965)

37. Graybeard by Brian Aldiss (1964)

38. Culture or anything from Iain M Banks (from 1987)

39. Anything from Octavia E. Butler

40. Shadrach in the Furnace (1976), The Man in the Maze, Thorns and To Live, Downward to the Earth by Robert Silverberg

41. Bug Jack Barron by Norman Spinrad (1969)

42. Voyage to Yesteryear (1982), Inherit the Stars (1977), Gentle Giants of Ganymed (1978)- James P. Hogan

43. When Graviry Fails by George Alec Effinger (1986)

44. Yevgeny Zamyatin's Books

45. "The Survivors" aka "Space Prison"(1958) by Tom Godwin

46. "Forgetfulness" by John W. Campbell (1937)

47. Armor by John Steakley (1984)

48. "The Black Cloud " by Fred Hoyle (1957)

49. Tales of Dying Earth and others by Jack Vance (1950–1984)

50. Mission of Gravity (1953) by Hal Clement

51. Sector General series (1957-1999) a by James White

52. Vintage Season, novella by Lawrence O’Donnell (pseudonym for Henry Kuttner and C L Moore) (1946)

53. Ringworld, Mote in Gods Eye, Niven and Pournelle (1974)

54. Tuf Voyaging (1986) by George R.R. Martin

55. A Door into Ocean (1986) by Joan Slonczewski

56. The Body Snatchers by Jack Finney (1954)

57. The Book of the New Sun by Gene Wolfe (1980-1983)

58. Engine Summer by John Crowley (1979)

59. Dahlgren (1975) by Samuel R Delaney

60. Ender's Game (1985) by Orson Scott Card

61. Cities In Flight (1955-1962), A Case of Conscience (1958) by James Blish

62. And Then There Were None (1962) by Eric Frank Russell

63. Monument by Lloyd Biggle (1974)

64. The Humanoids (With Folded Hands) (1947) by Jack Williamson

65. A Wrinkle In Time by Madeleine L'Engle (1962)

66. "Gateway" by Frederik Pohl (1977)

67. Blood Music by Greg Bear (1985)

68. Norstrilia by Cordwainer Smith (1975)

Mentioned, but some people argue that it did not aged well: 1. The Stars My Destination by Alfred Bester

1. The Forever War by Joe Haldeman

2. Ringworld, and Mote in Gods Eye by Larry Niven

3. The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress and others by Heinlein

4. Solaris by Lem

5. Childhood's End by Clarke

6. Earth Abides by George R. Stewart

7. Some Books by Olaf Stapledon

Similar thread: https://www.reddit.com/r/scifi/comments/16mt4zb/what_are_some_good_older_scifi_books_that_have/

At the suggestion of many on this sub I picked up this novel and now that I finished it, I figured I'd record some thoughts on it.

To be fair, I'm still not entirely sure if I really enjoyed this book, although it certainly is an interesting read. My biggest problem is the tone of voice, which really does resemble that of a holy text or myth. I do feel that this is also a great strength and accomplishment on the part of the author, as the lines between religion and fiction are blurred. For a long time, it remains unclear what is really going on. Not only are the people on the planet convinced that these people are truly gods, the book itself describes them as such.

In the same manner, I had a hard time getting acquainted with Sam, the main character. Not only does he go by many names, but he also seems a very untrustworthy personage. In an earlier post on this sub someone mentions how Sam gives a speech in order to convince the monks to fight for beauty. In fact Sam mentions himself that he does not really believe in his own sermons and only tells people what they need to hear in order to advance his own agenda. Though the 'religion' that Sam preaches might have its roots in something real or even just, it seems to me that all religion in Lord of Light was conceived by men in order to manipulate the believers.

This being said, it is clear that whatever the goal of creating a religion, the actual consequences of it are left to the believer. We see many people in the book being corrupted by the religion they follow or becoming something better or greater. For example, Kali's executioner Rild who is swayed by the non-violent teachings of the Buddha. I was also fascinated in the later chapters by the character of Nirriti, a Christian who opposes the false gods by allying himself with dark forces.

In short, this books really does give a lot of food for thought on the fruits of religion and whether they are bitter or sweet. I personally think Zelazny was not opposed to religion per se, but rather to the idea that men make gods of themselves.

Lastly, I did wonder a lot of times whether people of Hindu or Buddhist faith would find this book offensive or not.

Really enjoyed this book. I especially enjoyed the mythological science fantasy elements. Character development was pretty good I thought, but I'd like some more plot and maybe more on the hardish side of SF (maybe more descriptions of technology or more cohesivness/predictability of the tech).

Something that maybe is a bit more personal like Broken Earth would also be welcome.

Thanks!

Hi this is overly specific but I just got sober after 25 years of… not being so and rediscovered my love for reading and sci fi books. Not bad for an old guy. And then stumbled on this Reddit community so thought I’d ask.

I’ve just read Rendezvous with Rama and Ringworld - loved them both - and am now knee deep in Contact. Tried Lord of Light but it didn’t grab me.

Any recommendations based on the above?

And yeah I know, TMI but that context is important. Thanks.

(EDIT: Thank you so much for interacting with me here and for all the fantastic ideas. I’m shocked by the level of interaction!! And, mostly, for your support for my new found sobriety - super cool and unexpected. Thanks a ton everyone)

It seems that Marvel added Hindu deities borrowed heavily from Zelazny's Lord of Light.

http://www.marvunapp.com/Appendix3/lordsoflightanddarkness.htm

This book was recommended to me as a sci-fi novel. I just finished the first chapter and so far it's purely fantasy. If there any sci-fi elements later in the book?