Top 10 Enlightening SciFi Books for Curious Minds

[earthpigg]

http://www.geekosystem.com/power-grid/10+Banned+Science+Fiction+Novels/

#10 Shade's Children by Garth Nix
#9 The Giver by Lois Lowry
#8 The His Dark Materials Trilogy by Philip Pullman
#7 Stranger in a Strange Land by Robert A. Heinlein
#6 Nineteen Eighty-Four by George Orwell
#5 Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury
#4 A Wrinkle In Time By Madeline L'Engle
#3 Slaughterhouse-Five by Kurt Vonnegut
#2 Brave New World by Aldous Huxley
#1 A Clockwork Orange by Anthony Burgess


I've read 7 of those 10. And you?

What book(s) that you have read would you add to the list, and which book(s) that you have read would you nix from the list to make room?

(No nixing books that you have not read)

[forrestcupp]

I was going to say Brave New World. Glad to see it's #2.

[krapp]

Per the link, this is a list of 10 books controversial with school librarians; in any case, most of these are hardly enlightening books.

Addressing your list as one of enlightening books:

The Giver is an anti-egalitarian, anti-communist tirade for American grade schoolers; 1984 is only the most famous (and tired) example of a very expansive genre of fictions, with Fahrenheit 451 as yet another overrated example (possibly because librarians find clever a book about burning books); L'Engle writes cute fables but little more; Kurt Vonnegut is unimaginative SF; Huxley was a hack; and Clockwork Orange is a gimmicky imitation of the author's favorite hobby (reading Finnegans Wake). (Also, Kubrick's adaptation is dreadfully boring.)

Where's Philip K. D!ck? Where's Olaf Stapledon?

[el_koraco]

H.P Lovecraft, At the Mountains of Madness.

[Random_Dude]

I think I only read 3 of the ones listed there.

I find strange that there's no Philip K. D!ck in there. I've only read "Do androids dream of electric sheep?", "A Scanner Darkly" and "Ubik" and loved them all, especially the last two.

Cheers :cool:

[Grafens]

Yeah where's Philip K D!ck

I'd add Dune by Frank Herbert
Also Arthur C Clarke

I've read four books from that list.

[drawkcab]

http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1190865869l/17961.jpg

[HappinessNow]

I would also have placed Philip K. **** on the list:

Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?

[underquark]

Dune - Frank Herbert
The Door Into Summer - Robert A Heinlein
The Player of Games - Iain M Banks
Bio of a Space Tyrant - Piers Anthony
The Martian Chronicles - Ray Bradbury
The Saga of Pliocene Exile - Julian May
The Galactic Milieu Series - Julian May

To name but a few. I know that most of my list are actually a series of books but they do build up complete worlds/universes throughout the series. The Door Into Summer is just a good story (actually a bit Philip K Dickish, IMHO), as is The Player of Games.

[gnomeuser]

I read 1984 once every few years, it is for my money one of the best books ever written.

His Dark Materials is also one of my favorites, though I find the sections criticizing religion some what inelegant compared to the rest of the story.

I read Fahrenheit 451 once upon a time and recently bought it as an audiobook.

Likewise I got Brave New World on an audiobook sale just yesterday, it is one of those books I have always been meaning to enjoy, this way I may find time to do so.

As for A Clockwork Orange, I suspect I like most people enjoy the movie but have never actually read the book.

I am more of a fantasy fan when it comes to fiction, and in general prefer non-fiction for reading.

[LowSky]

No Asimov, Herbert, or Clark?

This list is BS...

[krapp]

This list is BS...

The list is a list of controversial books, not necessarily good/bad books, so the thread was made more or less stillborn.

[goodbyemrevans]

even if the thread was misbegotten, i'm making my own list - i wouldn't say so much "less" canonical as "differently" canonical:

it's not in order


stars in my pocket like grains of sand
dhalgen samuel r delany

more than human theodore sturgeon

camp concentration thomas disch

the female man joanna russ

the stars my destination alfred bester

solaris stanislaw lem

childhood's end arthur c. clarke

the rediscovery of man cordwainer smith

the dispossessed ursula k leguin

this is off the top of my head, but i would argue for any of these as more 'mind-expanding' on two fronts:
1. more radical possibilities for human existence, particulary social organization, but including fundamental existential questions as well
2. mind-expanding 'in themselves' as works of art
i'd argue for any of them over those crusty ol' dystopias in the first list

[dozycat]

Don't forget these two:

Snow Crash


Kiln People

And the great Issac Asimov and his universe of foundation.

[Throne777]

The list doesn't have The Illuminatus! Trilogy on it by Robert Shea & Robert Anton Wilson. It's therefore wrong.

[Lucretius]

Phillip Jose Farmer - Dark is the Sun

or the Riverworld series

[jhonan]

Rendezvous with Rama - Arthur C Clarke

[t0p]

Philip K.**** is a must on any serious SF reader. A Scanner Darlkly is flamin' great,
as is Flow My Tear, The Policeman said, Do Androids Dream Of Electric Sheep, nd... well, everything damn thing I've read of his was great. Check him out.

It's nice to see one Vonnegut make it onto your list; but Slaughterhouse Five? Read The Sirens of Titan -that's real SF

</end of tuppence'orth>

[krapp]

even if the thread was misbegotten, i'm making my own list - i wouldn't say so much "less" canonical as "differently" canonical:

it's not in order


stars in my pocket like grains of sand
dhalgen samuel r delany

more than human theodore sturgeon

camp concentration thomas disch

the female man joanna russ

the stars my destination alfred bester

solaris stanislaw lem

childhood's end arthur c. clarke

the rediscovery of man cordwainer smith

the dispossessed ursula k leguin

this is off the top of my head, but i would argue for any of these as more 'mind-expanding' on two fronts:
1. more radical possibilities for human existence, particulary social organization, but including fundamental existential questions as well
2. mind-expanding 'in themselves' as works of art
i'd argue for any of them over those crusty ol' dystopias in the first list

/thread as they say.

[HappinessNow]

I would also have placed Philip K. **** on the list:

Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?


Philip K.**** is a must on any serious SF reader. A Scanner Darlkly is flamin' great,
as is Flow My Tear, The Policeman said, Do Androids Dream Of Electric Sheep, nd... well, everything damn thing I've read of his was great. Check him out.

It's nice to see one Vonnegut make it onto your list; but Slaughterhouse Five? Read The Sirens of Titan -that's real SF

</end of tuppence'orth>

Not sure why the censoring out of an author's name?

http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-uzTUPxDWYp4/TdDqsgoLVVI/AAAAAAAAB_c/EVHwH8sqJwY/s1600/ANDROIDS+COVER.jpg