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chrispenycate · 15th June 2006, 10:23 AM

Liked JD’s list. Disagreed (of course) with some of the books, none of the authors. Still, I’d add some of the very olds : H.G.Wells (The Time Machine, War of the worlds) Jules Verne (20,00 leagues under the sea) and Aldous Huxley (Brave new world) and George Orwell (1984) (for conspicuous erudition)
Some Fred Pohl ? “Man plus“, or “†he space merchants“ perhaps ? (never forgetting that with most of these writers, if you like the book you can look for more of that author’s work, and with a few exceptions (Bester and Spinrad from the previous list) will probably not be disappointed.
Since this is under “classic“ I’m not going to fill in any of the newerworks ; indeed I question the Kim Stanley Robinson entries (not as books, merely from age) and question if we shouldn’t put some of the unashamed space opera romps in (EE “Doc“ Smith’s Lenseman series) or some of Simac’s nostalgia for an America that never existed…
Ransack your local library for that lot, then come back when you’ve read them. There will be plenty more suggestions waiting (and so many short stories, too)

15th June 2006, 10:23 AM	#4 (permalink)
chrispenycate resident pedantissimo Join Date: Aug 2005 Posts: 2,980 Blog Entries: 4	Re: Classic SF Primer Liked JD’s list. Disagreed (of course) with some of the books, none of the authors. Still, I’d add some of the very olds : H.G.Wells (The Time Machine, War of the worlds) Jules Verne (20,00 leagues under the sea) and Aldous Huxley (Brave new world) and George Orwell (1984) (for conspicuous erudition) Some Fred Pohl ? “Man plus“, or “†he space merchants“ perhaps ? (never forgetting that with most of these writers, if you like the book you can look for more of that author’s work, and with a few exceptions (Bester and Spinrad from the previous list) will probably not be disappointed. Since this is under “classic“ I’m not going to fill in any of the newerworks ; indeed I question the Kim Stanley Robinson entries (not as books, merely from age) and question if we shouldn’t put some of the unashamed space opera romps in (EE “Doc“ Smith’s Lenseman series) or some of Simac’s nostalgia for an America that never existed… Ransack your local library for that lot, then come back when you’ve read them. There will be plenty more suggestions waiting (and so many short stories, too)