The Chronicles Network Hall of Fame - Voting Thread **PLEASE READ FIRST POST**

[Nesacat]

It's a difficult choice and I think I've gone with the books I've found myself reading over again rather than the best at the moment.

1. Lord of the Rings - JRR Tolkien
2. Shadow of the Wind - Carlos Ruiz Zafon
3. Von Bek: Tales of the Eternal Champion - Michael Moorcock
4. Gormenghast - Mervyn Peake
5. Wizard of Earthsea - Ursula K LeGuin
6. The Name of the Rose - Umberto Eco
7. If On A Winter's Night A Traveller - Italo Calvino
8. The Best of HP Lovecraft: Bloodcurdling Tales of Horror and the Macabre
9. Dreams of Terror and Death: The Dream Cycle of HP Lovecraft
10. Tales of the Cthulhu Mythos

[Mouse]

Originally Posted by Culhwch

I don't see why not, J. D. I did say books, not novels, so I really have no argument anyway.

On series, I am willing to concede if they are often all in one volume, ie Gollum's vote for Wolfe, or something like The Lord of the Rings.

And Mouse - as Storm of Swords is really one book published in paperback in two parts, I'm going to take your vote for the book as a whole.

Good to see such good a response straight away. Shouldn't be too long before I can post a preliminary list...

Ok!

[Rosemary]

I can understand why some find it hard to chose!

Have eventually come up with my list, although I have to leave a lot of favourites out!

1. Sara Douglass - The Axis Trilogy
2. Tad Williams - Memory, Sorrow and Thorn
3. Ian Irvine - View From The Mirror
4. Mercedes Lackey - The Mage Winds
5. Tolkein - Lord Of The Rings
6. Steven Erikson - Memories Of Ice
7. Frank Herbert - Dune
8. David Eddings - The Belagariad
9. Marion Zimmer Bradley - The Darkover Anthology
10 Terry Brooks - Sword of Shannara

[Culhwch]

My own list:

1. Stardust, Neil Gaiman
2. The Winter King, Bernard Cornwell
3. A Game of Thrones, George RR Martin
4. Guards, Guards, Terry Pratchett
5. War of the Flowers, Tad Williams
6. Fevre Dream, George RR Martin
7. Lord of the Rings, JRR Tolkien
8. Northern Lights, Phillip Pullman
9. The Eyre Affair, Jasper Fforde
10. The Briar King, Greg Keyes

[Culhwch]

A little housekeeping... Please bear with me.

Originally Posted by Rosemary

9. Marion Zimmer Bradley - The Darkover Anthology

Rosemary, it's been pointed out to me by one of our more knowledgeable mods that Bradley published quite a few Darkover books - if you could narrow it down to one, it'd be much appreciated.

Originally Posted by elvet

Try as I might, I cannot separate a series into individual books.

In the interests of constancy, elvet, I'd appreciate if you'd try. If not, I'll take your votes as being for the first book in each series named. I do intend to take the votes individual books of a series get and combine them to come up with a seperate series list.

To everyone who posted, thank you very much. Oh, and if you haven't numbered your list I'm just going to assume they are in order top to bottom. Let me know if not. Cheers!

[j. d. worthington]

Ahem! I haven't yet finished rearranging my list. I'll try to have it in by the end of the evening (here). (Would hate to be let out on this, I've got to admit.) (Some people are so impatient..... )

[Culhwch]

J. D. - take as much time as you want. There's no deadline. Sometime in the next year would be nice, but I'm flexible. I'll just add votes as they come in...

[j. d. worthington]

Nothing like a little nudging to get me up off my fanny...

Okay, here's my list (though I hope you realize that cutting this much puts a person periliously near needing hospitalization...)

1. Tales of Mystery and Imagination, by Edgar Allan Poe
2. The Lord of the Rings, by J. R. R. Tolkien
3. At the Mountains of Madness and Other Novels, by H. P. Lovecraft
4. The Dunwich Horror and Others, by H. P. Lovecraft
5. Dune, by Frank Herbert
6. The Foundation Trilogy, by Isaac Asimov
7. The Gormenghast Trilogy, by Mervyn Peake
8. The Past Through Tomorrow, by Robert A. Heinlein
9. Again, Dangerous Visions, ed. by Harlan Ellison
10. The Cornelius Quartet, by Michael Moorcock

I'd really like to have included Dunsany's Gods of Pegana or Book of Wonder (after all, he revived fantasy as a short story form with these books), or Machen's The House of Souls (1906 Grant Richards edition), not to mention about 700 other things that I feel are darn near essentials... but I'll go with the above.

If anyone's interested: Poe's book changed the book of imaginative literature, has in one way or another influenced nearly everything that has come after, either primarily or secondarily, plus it's just a great collection of stories (I'm referring to the earlier editions, there have been several different ones, all quite good). I went with the two volumes of HPL because one has his novels, each of which has had a powerful influence and is also almost endlessly rereadable for sheer depth and texture, and yet some of his best work is in short story and novella form, hence The Dunwich Horror. Again, Dangerous Visions (I'd like to have included a book representing Ellison's work itself, because, aside from being a very powerful writer, he has had a huge impact on the field) because it either provided first sales/publications for many new writers who have since become paragons of the form, or allowed fledglings to spread their wings and show what they could do; it was also one of the best and most variegated examples of what the field could do at the time, and still provides a lot of very challenging reading. (It also, like a great number of his books, has a lot of good information for writers.) The Cornelius Quartet is, for my money, one of Moorcock's richest books both in subtleties and layers of meaning/textuality, and certainly has one of the best handlings of time and reality in a state of flux I've ever encountered, especially by the time you reach The English Assassin and The Condition of Muzak.

I almost left out the Gormenghast book -- not because I don't think it's important or good; it is definitely both -- but because it had not overtly influenced a great many writers, being a relatively slow seller until recent years. However, as the number of writers Peake influenced grows, it allowed me to go ahead and include a book I love and admire on the list. I did not include any of the more recent writers, as it's still early days yet on how "important" many of them will be to the field over time, and because of the limitation being set at 10. This was the hardest part, as I think a pretty good number are going to end up being as important as those I named....

[Brys]

Gormenghast has been very influential - not to the same extent LotR was, but most of what Mieville termed the new weird owes a large debt to Peake. Strangely enough, Gormenghast also had an influence on epic fantasy - Steerpike was the original boy who escaped from the kitchens in an ancient castle to become something much more important. Sadly, after the leaving the kitchens most epic fantasy diverges.

This 10 is hugely limiting - 100 is difficult enough, but with 10 I feel like I've left out far too many great authors, even when I limit myself to one book per author.

[elvet]

In the interests of constancy, elvet, I'd appreciate if you'd try. If not, I'll take your votes as being for the first book in each series named. I do intend to take the votes individual books of a series get and combine them to come up with a seperate series list.

Part of my problem is that I've only recently started reading fantasy, so I have not had the chance to read a series as the books are being produced , taking each one singley. So most of the time I jump into a trilogy and read the whole thing as a whole. I cannot even remember where 1 book starts and another picks up. Therefore it is hard for me to judge what would be the best book, as I've never read them other than in the context of the rest of the books.
I know this makes a difference. For example, with Harry Potter, I can tell you which book I like the best because I've read them independently of the others.
I'm going to edit my choices to just single books (though the list will be short), and save my favorite series for another thread.

Ok, for some reason I cannot go back to edit my original post.
Here's my new list:
Silmarillion
Lord of the Rings
The Hobbit
War of the Flowers
Fionavar Tapestry
Dragonsdawn
The Once and Future King

[Snowdog]

I would definitely have preferred separate SF and Fantasy lists, I had to leave so much out . I have a feeling that SF isn't going to get much of a look in. OTOH, I wouldn't have been able to produce a horror list at all.

My list.

Just a note: I was going to nominate The Two Towers, but since others have been putting LOTR, I will too.

1. Dune - Frank Herbert
2. LOTR - J. R. R. Tolkien
3. Lord Of Light - Roger Zelazny
4. Foundation And Empire - Isaac Asimov
5. The Forever War - Joe Haldeman
6. The Day Of The Triffids - John Wyndham
7. The Sheep Look Up - John Brunner
8. The Worm Ouroboros - E. R. Eddison
9. Gladiator-At-Law - Frederik Pohl and C. M. Kornbluth
10. The Silmarillion - J. R. R. Tolkien

[kyektulu]

Ooo great thread idea!

My faves, in no order, that would be too hard!:

1. Dragonlance, Dragons of Autumn Twighlight, Dragons of winter night, Dragons of Spring Dawning.

2. Maggie Furey, Artefacts of Power quartet.

3. Raymond E Feist, Riftwars, Magician.

4. Tolkien, LOTR.

5. David Gemmel, Legend of Deathwalker.

6. David Eddings, The Belgariad and Redemption of Althalus.

7. Ursula Le Guin, A Wizard of Earthsea.

I will add more soon.

[dwndrgn]

***Just a note to everyone replying to this thread - this is not a 'what are your favorites for general consumption' thread. This is a serious, what do you think are the 10 best speculative fiction novels, in order, to be compiled into a Chronicles list. As Culhwch stated - do not use an entire series as one entry, pick your favorite of the series and put your replies in order according to your feelings.

Lecture over (for now )

My list; and yes this was a hard task to only choose ten and in that, only single books not series.

10. Jhereg
9. Eye of The World
8. Good Omens
7. Battlefield Earth
6. Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
5. Sword of Shannara
4. Guards! Guards!
3. Callahan's Lady
2. The Pyrates
1. Voyager

Now that I see my own list, I find it not worthy. Oh well. I did the best I could and chose those that brought me further in to their respective genres or opened new worlds and ideas to me, affected me at the time and help shape my view of the world or just amazed me so much that I continue to think about them or things that happened in them on a daily basis. Now, tomorrow I might have a new list , I know, once per member. C'est la vie!

[iansales]

Eh? The original brief was for "favourite books". Nothing was said about "ten best" genre novels. For a start, "ten best" is way too contentious a subject :-)

[Winters_Sorrow]

Originally Posted by culhwch

Go away and think very carefully about your ten - yes, ten - favourite books in the realm of speculative fiction. Then rank them from first to last.

Actually, the original brief was for your 10 favourite books.
Not 10 best genre novels, just your favourite 10 books.

It's also not about contentiousness (if that's a word!) it's a purely personal list of your favourite books. Of course it's gratifying to see someone else list a book you rate, but that's not the main idea.