In the Before Time, the Long Long Ago (i.e., before I started this blog), I would ask The Vast Wisdom of Usenet (i.e. rec.arts.sf.written) what books I should read this year. Now that I have the blog, I’m posting the question here.
Below are 100 books (or a more, counting multiple titles by a single author) of fiction I’m considering reading in 2010. With a few exceptions (like forthcoming books), they’re all books I already own in first editions. Most likely I’ll get to considerably less than 100. The first few are books I’ll probably get to (or have already read), whereas the rest are a little vaguer (and in alphabetical order by author). That’s where you come in. Tell me which of the books below I should or shouldn’t read, and why. If a book’s not on the list, it’s probably because I’ve already read it, or have no interest in it, won’t get to it this year, etc., so save your electrons instead of suggesting alternates (there are plenty of other places for that). And if I list Book #2 in a linear series, rest assured I’ve already read Book #1.
I don’t promise I’ll read all the highest rated works, but those most highly praised are considerably more likely to be added to the reading stack, which is what’s happened the previous years I’ve done this.
- Gene Wolfe: The Sorceror’s House
- John Scalzi: The God Engines
- Joe R. Lansdale: Vanilla Ride
- China Mieville: King Rat
- Steven R. Boyett: Elegy Beach
- Joe Hill: 20th Century Ghosts
- Philip K. Dick: Collected Stories Volume II or Radio Free Albemuth
- Michael Moorcock:The War Hound and the World’s Pain or The Final Programme
- Greg Egan: Crystal Nights
- Peter Ackroyd: Hawksmoor
- J. G. Ballard: Crystal World
- Iain Banks: Against a Dark Background or Matter
- John Barnes: Kaleidoscope Century or Mother of Storms
- Stephen Baxter: Traces or Mayflower II
- Peter S. Beagle: A Fine and Private Place
- Greg Bear: The City at the End of Time
- Poppy Z. Brite: Plastic Jesus
- Tobias Buckell: Sly Mongoose
- Octavia Butler: Fledgeling
- Jack Cady: The Night We Buried Road Dog
- Michael Chabon: The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay
- John Christopher: No Blade of Grass
- Susanna Clarke: Ladies of Grace Adieu
- Hal Clement: Iceworld
- Avram Davidson: The Adventures of Dr. Esterhauzy or Limekiller
- L. Sprague de Camp: A Gun for Dinosaur
- Bradley Denton: Laughin’ Boy
- Paul Di Filippo: Lost Pages or Fractal Paisleys
- George Alec Effinger: What Entropy Means to Me
- Harlan Ellison: Deathbird Stories
- John M. Ford: The Dragon Waiting
- Neil Gaiman: Fragile Things or The Graveyard Book
- John Gardner: Freddy’s Book or The Wreckage of Agathon
- Ray Garton: Night Life or Nids
- Jane Gaskell: The Serpent
- Joe Haldeman: The Accidental Time Machine
- Peter F. Hamilton: Mindstar Rising
- Robert E. Howard: Conan the Barbarian
- Nalo Hopkinson: Brown Girl in the Ring or The Salt Roads
- Shirley Jackson: We Have Always Lived in the Castle or The Lottery
- M. R. James: More Ghost Stories Of An Antiquary
- K. W. Jeter: Noir or Dark Seeker
- Ha Jin: Waiting
- James Patrick Kelly: Strange But Not a Stranger
- Stephen King: Dark Tower IV: Wizard and Glass or The Colorado Kid
- Russell Kirk: The Surly Sullen Bell (and yes, I’ve read the 2 Arkham House collections)
- Henry Kuttner and/or C. L. Moore: Mutant, Fury, Black God’s Shadow or No Boundaries
- R. A. Lafferty: Archipelago or The 13th Voyage of Sinbad
- Fritz Leiber: Night’s Black Agents
- Stanislaw Lem: Solaris
- Jonathan Lethem: Motherless Brooklyn
- Thomas Ligotti: Grimscribe, Noctuary, or The Shadow at the Bottom of the World
- Ian MacLeod: Breathmoss and Other Exhalations
- Ken MacLeod: Giant Lizards from Another Star or The Execution Channel
- Gregory Maguire: Wicked
- Barry Malzberg: Hervoit’s World
- Richard Matheson: Duel or What Dreams May Come
- Ian MacDonald: River of Gods
- Maureen McHugh: Mission Child or Nekropolis
- Sean McMullen: The Miocene Arrow
- Larry McMurtry: Lonesome Dove
- Ward Moore: Bring the Jubilee
- Pat Murphy: The Falling Woman
- John Myers Myers: Silverlock
- William F. Nolan: Things Beyond Midnight or Wild Galaxy
- Naomi Novik: Throne of Jade
- Patrick O’Leary: Other Voices, Other Rooms
- Chad Oliver: The Shores of Another Sea or The Winds of Time
- Susan Palwick: The Fate of Mice
- H. Beam Piper: Lord Kalvan of Otherwhen
- Tim Powers: Three Days to Never or Pilot Light
- Alastair Reynolds: Redemption Ark
- Rudy Rucker: Master of Time & Space or The Secret of Life or White Light
- Matt Ruff: Fool on the Hill
- Salman Rushdie: Midnight’s Children
- Joanna Russ: The Female Man
- Karl Schroeder: Permanence or Lady of Mazes
- David J. Schow: Crypt Orchids
- Michael Shaara: The Herald or The Killer Angels
- Michael Shea: A Quest for Simbilis
- Lucius Shepard: Floater or Aztechs or Viator
- Lewis Shiner: The Edges of Things or Black and White
- Dan Simmons: The Terror or Hard as Nails
- Robert Sladek: Roderick
- Neal Stephenson: Zodiac or The Big U
- Charles Stross: The Fuller Memorandum (forthcoming)
- Theodore Sturgeon: Microcosmic God: The Complete Stories of Theodore Sturgeon Volume 2
- Steph Swainston: The Year of Our War
- Thomas Burnett Swann: The Day of the Minotaur
- Karl Edward Wagner: Darkness Weaves
- Howard Waldrop: The Moone World (forthcoming)
- Manly Wade Wellman: The Sleuth Patrol, The Last Mammoth or Fastest on the River
- Martha Wells: The Element of Fire
- John Whitbourne: To Build Jerusalem or Binscomb Tales
- Liz Williams: The Demon and the City
- Jack Williamson and James E. Gunn: Star Bridge
- Connie Willis: To Say Nothing of the Dog
- Jack Vance: Star King, The Languages of Pao, or Ports of Call
- Roger Zelazny: Wilderness or DonnerJack
Tags: Books, Charles Stross, Gene Wolfe, Howard Waldrop, Joe Hill, Joe R. Lansdale, John Scalzi, Michael Moorcock, Philip K. Dick, rec.arts.sf.written, Science Fiction, The Fuller Memorandum, The Moone World, Usenet
Tobias Buckell: Sly Mongoose
Good, but more, um, sordid than the previous books.
Naomi Novik: Throne of Jade
An over-long sea voyage, but the scenes in China are one of the high points of the series (which I’m still reading).
Steph Swainston: The Year of Our War
I wasn’t able to suspend disbelief for this.
Martha Wells: The Element of Fire
A good fantasy of manners, but I liked the later books in the setting better (and you don’t need to read this one first).
Liz Williams: The Demon and the City
The series continues to be good at least through the book after this one.
Surely you need to read all of them 😉
I would put Gregory Maguire: _Wicked_, Greg Bear: _The City at the End of Time_ at eh bottom of the list. _Wicked_ is well written, but the determinism left a nasty taste (or maybe I didn’t understand it ;)). The Bear is not as good as my man Hodgson.
Since you have a ridiculous number of true classics yet to read I would go:
_The Female Man_, _Solaris_, _Roderick_ (is this the _Compleat_ edition, including _Roderick at Random_?), _The Dragon Waiting_, _The Final Program_, _A Fine and Private Place_, Conan the Barbarian_, _Deathbird Stories_ (though you have already read many of these collected elsewhere, I guess), _Iceworld_, _Crystal World_
I have to put a word in for the Connie Willis. I find her generally just OK, but _TSNotD_
was hilariously funny.
For the cases where you have alternatives:
_Lady of Mazes_ is more polished and picaresque, but _Permanence_ has one neato idea.
_Languages of Pao_ too has more ideas than _Star King_: it’s not quite Stapledonian, but the cultural engineering is more central than in other Vance, where it may be more a fun background.
It’s a long time since I read _White Light_ – my recollection is it was rough around the edges but mindblowing (perhaps you should read all three)
_Giant Lizards from Another Star_ is a collection of essays and shorts, so suffers from unevenness but more variey, _the Execution Channel_ is a competent near-future/alt-hist similar in feel to _The Star Fraction_ etc.
_The Salt Roads_ v. _Brown Girl_, but both good.
_Mother of Storms_ over _KC_
I’ve read several on this list. Here are the ones I liked…
Michael Chabon – The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay. I loved this book. It’s about the adventures of two earlier comic book creators. I was once a huge comics fan, so this book was made for me. If you’re not so much into comics, you’d probably prefer one of his later books.
Philip K. Dick — Collected Stories Vol. II — I loved this. PKD works through most of his common themes in clever variations.
Joe Haldeman – The Accidental Time Machine. Fun, well-written, classic-style hard sf novel.
Nalo Hopkinson – Brown Girl in the Ring. Nicely done sf novel with Caribbean influences, set in near future Canada.
K. W. Jeter – Noir. I always find Jeter’s work to be fun, and this one’s no exception. Near-future sf with some horror elements, but also a fair amount of humor. The only person I know who read this book and didn’t like it works as a manager. The book takes potshots at supervisors.
Pat Murphy – The Falling Woman. Seminal slipstream work. It’s a well-written novel about a middle-aged archaeologist and her daughter, with no real speculative fiction components. I liked it and would recommend it to several people, but am not sure if it would be your thing.
John Sladek – Roderick. I loved this satirical robot novel when I read it as a 21-year-old computer science student in the early 80s. It’s extremely clever and written in a stream-of-consciousness style that requires close attention, but can be rewarding.
Neal Stephenson – Zodiac. This is a clever and humorous eco-thriller, surprisingly well-written for such an early novel.
Liz Williams – The Demon in the City. It’s a fun supernatural thriller, set in a fascinating Asian world. It’s not as good as The Snake Agent, which must be read first.
And here are the ones I don’t recommend…
George Alec Effinger – What Entropy Means to Me. This is an early GAE novel told in an experimental style that doesn’t quite work for me. The Arab trilogy and The Wolves of Memory are much better.
Michael Moorcock – The Final Programme — This is very much a 60s novel. It seemed heavily dated when I read it in the the early 80s. You’d have more fun watching an Austin Powers movie.
Karl Schroeder – Lady of Mazes. People with the initials “W. S.” and “D. G. H.” keep telling me that he’s a hot new hard sf writer. But I’ve read two books by Schroeder, including this one, and keep getting disappointed. The recent Greg Egan novel, Incandescence, covers similar material and is so much better.
Connie Willis – To Say Nothing of the Dog. A time travel element is a framing device for Willis to attempt a classic British humor novel. It failed for me on every level, and made me want to set it down and reread Wodehouse or Sayers. It’s an injustice that this book won the Hugo over Bruce Sterling’s Distraction
I want to borrow the MR James when you are done. 😉
But of course, you know the two books you are missing.
Gordath Wood and Red Gold Bridge, of course.
» John Barnes: Kaleidoscope Century or Mother of Storms
I consider both of these “squicky” Barnes but think KC is more focused and a better book.
» Greg Bear: The City at the End of Time
I read over half the book before admitting that I was bored out of my skull. Liked the characters (only reason I probably read that much), but ugh.
» Michael Chabon: The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay
I’m another big comics fan, so take this with that in mind–I think it’s a great book.
» Maureen McHugh: Mission Child or Nekropolis
I liked McHugh’s earlier books a lot but haven’t been able to get into either of these yet.
» Pat Murphy: The Falling Woman
Had to read this for an SF/F college class. I liked it a lot. IIRC, I believe it’s better written than _The City, Not Long After_, but I liked TCNLA better.
» Neal Stephenson: The Big U
I read this after _Snow Crash_ and _Cryptonomicon_ and enjoyed it quite a bit. It’s not as well-written, but if you’ve ever been connected with a large university, you should enjoy it.
» Martha Wells: The Element of Fire
Martha Wells’s books contain intelligent and interesting characters. If you like stories where the characters have to improvise [tactically], with good world-building, I highly recommend this.
» Connie Willis: To Say Nothing of the Dog
Eh, not my favorite Willis. OTOH, a friend who loved _Three Men in a Boat_ also loved this book.