Books III: Return of the Book

[effex]

It's been a while since I've done one of these! And it's nothing like complete, but whatever.


Currently Reading:

Soul Music by Terry Pratchett


To-Read Pile:

Men at Arms by Terry Pratchett
Feet of Clay by Terry Pratchett
Lords and Ladies by Terry Pratchett
Kushiel's Dart by Jacqueline Carey
The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms by N.K. Jemisin
The one quivo recommended to me with the title I can't remember by It's Sitting In A Bag In My Room


Just-Read Pile:

Small Gods by Terry Pratchett
Witches Abroad by Terry Pratchett
The Color of Magic by Terry Pratchett
Archer's Goon by Diana Wynne Jones
Year of the Griffin by Diana Wynne Jones


There is maybe a theme here.

Notes: I really, *really* enjoyed Small Gods - I dig Pterry's thinky thoughts on Belief. I really, *really* disliked Year of the Griffin (why, DWJ?) - it was... disjointed and painfully heteronormative (did you really have to pair up everyone at the end, DWJ? Woe?).

And hey, anyone have any articles/guides on the SF&F genre for someone new to it? A 'So You Want To Read SciFi And Fantasy' type deal, maybe.

Comments

[cimorene]

I don't know of any sff primers, but I kind of feel that starting by reading is the best way when what you're talking about is a genre. I immediately thought, "What book would I give a neophyte as an introduction to sff?"

But then I realized that I'm not sure I'd even know where to start! It's just so broad that it encompasses whole vastly different genres. Do you start with epic fantasy, cyberpunk, space opera, pulp, Pern ripoffs, A Boy And His Dragon, modern fantasy, "hard" sf? Modern or classic? Neil Gaiman and Diana Wynne Jones, or something like Samuel Delany, or something more like Connie Willis?

I suppose for fantasy I'd start with a really awesome novel - if they are Harry Potter-positive, then a modern fantasy, either Jones or Gaiman or possibly Nina Kiriki Hoffman if they're maybe more into something weirder - probably Robin McKinley if they seem likely to go for epic high fantasy or Pamela Dean's Tam Lin if they're a fairytale type.

If they seem likely to be more interested in sf, then maybe a short story collection of second wave stuff - I always enjoy those, or CJ Cherryh's Foreigner or Vonda McIntyre's Starfarer for different types of space opera, or Samuel R. Delany if they seem likely to fall for the sheer overpowering weight of his intellect. Oh, or Greg Bear if they are male and into geeking out over "hard science" a la Jurassic Park. (Presumably there must be women who can read Greg Bear and get past his weirdly horrible characterization of women, but it is hard for me to quite picture how this could occur). Oh, or an apocanovel if they seem to like disaster movies and stuff! Although I don't usually like those myself, so I'd probably have trouble choosing one.

[effex]

Hmmmmmm. The requester is one of the ladies in the bookclub (there are members! so exciting!) - she's never read in SFF and is looking for an introduction before tackling our reading list - I'm not sure how much prep one needs for Kushiel's Dart but I've been soaking in the stuff since I was wee, so. Hmm.

In the meantime, this is really excellent advice. I'll see if there are some short stories I can set her up with.

[elspethdixon]

This is heavily biased towards novels, because I rarely read short stories that aren't fanfic. It's also, unexpectedly, very female author centric.

Fantasy starter kit:
The Hobbit (because LotR is the source from which about 70% of post-Tolkien fantasy derives, but the trilogy itself is long and the language is offputting to many reader for some reason. Whereas anybody can read the Hobbit, because it's more like YA).
The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe
The Wizard of Oz (Frank L. Baum) and Gregory Maguire's Wicked.
American Gods, by Neil Gaiman. Urban fantasy/mythology for those who like fantasy to be a little closer to horror, and prefer things grounded in a real world setting.
Ursula K. LeGuin's Earthsea series.
Something by Patricia A. McKillip -- I particularly liked the Riddlemaster of Hed trilogy.
Death of the Necromancer by Martha Wells
Something by Terry Pratchett - Small Gods? Reaper Man? Hogfather? Guards! Guards!? Feet of Clay?
Lisa Barnett & Melissa Scott's Point of Hopes
Sabriel by Garth Nix
Guy Gaviel Kay's Fionavar Tapestry and The Lions of Al-Rassan.
George R.R. Martin's Song of Ice and Fire series - if you're only gong to read one epic fantasy series, it should be this one.

Sci-fi starter kit:
Isaac Asimov short stories.
Ray Bradbury's Fahrenheit 451
The Heritage of Hastur or The Shattered Chain by Marion Zimmer Bradley (or another Darkover novel of your choice)
Any one of Lois McMaster Bujold's Vorkosigan books - maybe The Vor Game?.
Steven Barnes' Lion's Blood for alternate history that *isn't* about Hitler, the Confederacy, or racefail.
The Snow Queen by Joan D. Vinge
Startide Rising & The Uplift War by David Brin
Starship Trooper by Robert Heinlein, with option follow-up reading of Joe Haldeman's The Forever War, for those who find the politics of Starship Troopers enraging.
Spock's World by Diane Duane. because no sci-fi recs set is complete without a ST tie-in, and this is the best of them.
Brown Girl in the Ring by Nalo Hopkinson
Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
Debra Doyle & James D. MacDonald's The Price of the Stars and sequels. Space opera with genderbending protagonist.
Karen Lowachee's Warchild,/i> and Burndive

Online short fiction:
When we were robots in Egypt by Jo Walton
We have always spoken Panglish by Suzette Haden Elgin
The Parable of the Shower by Leah Bobet

Oh, I *like* this game

[effex]

You are amazing, thanks tons for these lists! I agree 100%, with a couple of additions -

Under Fantasy I'd throw in something 'urban' - probably Butcher's 'Storm Front' (or Harris' 'Dead Until Dark', if they're into the vampire thing) - and also 'Good Omens' because I add it to every list ever.

And for SciFi... something by McCaffery, I think, maybe one of her less failtastic Pern books (The Harper Hall books are always popular). Also Butler's Lilith's Brood/Xenogenesis series. And 'Ender's Game,' even though my hate for OSC is bright and pure.


I've read most of these - yay, geek!points for me!(

Re: Oh, I *like* this game

[elspethdixon]

See, I left OSC off the list on purpose, because I hate him, but yeah, I definately should have included Butcher and Butler. If you're going for urban fantasy with vampires, though, I'd recommend Guilty Pleasures over Sookie Stackhouse - it's early, pre-Mary Sue&gratuitous pr0n!Hamilton, and probably more influtential than Harris, given that it's basically the book that started the vampire romance with butt-kicking heroine genre. And maybe Warren Ellis's Extremis run on Iron Man, for the post-human aspect. And also Peter S. Beagle's The Last Unicorn, I think. And maybe an Andre Norton novel or two - I adored her books when I was in middle school.

My favorite Anne McCaffery/Pern books are the Dragonflight/Dragonquest/The White Dragon trilogy, probably because I was too young at ten to notice the fail, but the Harper Hall books are probably a more accessible intro that doesn't contain dragon-enabled dub-con.

And there should probably be at least one Mercedes Lacky book on there. Maybe Oathbound, the Tarma & Kethry anthology? And Barbara Hambly's Time of the Dark trilogy.

And Haroun and the Sea of Stories, because seanchai will not stand for me to leave it out.

edited to add; this is really an English-language-centric list, though. It would be awesome to get some recs for English translations of sci-fi and fantasy that isn't from the US, Canada, England, and Australia.

Re: Oh, I *like* this game

[effex]

Yes, yes, and yes, though I have no idea which Norton book I'd include.

Ha, I was thinking about adding Lackey - not the Magic books, those are freaking depressing (no matter how influential) but yeah, Oathbound. Or which were the ones with the ~soulbond~? The Arrow books? Man, it's been a long time.

Western-centricness is a major concern for the bookclub list, too - time to do some research.

[zanzando]

The non-English perspective, I can haz it.
This will be in no particular order, and there will be books, authors and websites. Some of these will be hard to get (or occasionally nonexistent in English). I'm going to mention them anyway, because they might still be translated, or there might be others who speak the language in question.

- Bernard Werber - a French author. His most famous work is Empire of the Ants (Les Fourmis), but my favourite is L'Empire des Anges.
- Os Dias da Peste by Fábio Fernandes, a Brazilian author.
- The Science Fiction & Fantasy Translation Awards (blog), they always have great recs.
- The SFWA European Hall of Fame (anthology)
- Philippine Speculative Fiction Sampler (zine)
- The Apex Book of World SF, edited by Lavie Tidhar, an Israeli writer whose work you should also check out. In relation to that, The World SF News Blog.
- The Witcher series by Polish author Andrzej Sapkowski. It's a bit "blockbuster fantasy", but the ironic humour is cool (So is the video game, but you know ...).
- Uh, Jules Verne, Victor Hugo and Alexandre Dumas*obviously*.
- Anything Pierre Bordage has ever written, pretty much.
- TesseractsQ, an anthology of French Canadian authors
- a couple of the Japanese light novels - Kino's Journey especially comes to mind
- The Carpet Makers by Andreas Eschbach (German) ((Carpets of HUMAN HAIR btw))
- Wolfgang Hohlbein (German) - God, this dude was my favourite author growing up. He's ridiculously prolific, and only the manga adaptation of his fantastic Magic Moon trilogy has made it to the US. I'd rec Märchenmond (Magic Moon), Krieg der Engel (with the inept guardian angel, LOL, ILU [Spoiler]), Unterland, Die Chronik der Unsterblichen, Die Templerin and its follow-ups (yes, a female templar, who is in love with a Tuareg warrior and saves the Christian king's life and is totally badass, re-read now plzkthanx (said king has leprosy and is also totally badass!)), ...
- Walter Moers (German), who does have English translations! *recs City of Dreaming Books like whoa* He's famous for his incredibly intricate wordplays and word-mysteries, so I don't know how well that translates.
- Pierre Grimbert (French)
- Henri Loevenbruck (French), the Gallica series especially. (Ha, translations available in several languages - but no English.)
- Jean-Louis Fetjaine (French)
- Pierre Pével (French) - one of his books has just been translated into English (The Cardinal's Blades), and I've seen it described as "The Three Musketeers meets The Dirty Dozen with added dragons". Which is pretty accurate.
- On that note, the Grand Prix de l'Imaginaire, a French prize for "fantastic" literature, is a great source for books to read.
- Licia Troisi (Italian)
- W. J. Maryson (Dutch)
- Margit Sandemo (Norwegian Swedish)
- Stanislaw Lem (Polish, also: Duh. It's Stanislaw Lem.)
- Dmitry Glukhovsky (Russian), more specifically his novel Metro 2033. The sequel (surprisingly, Metro 2034) is available online - in Russian.
- Sergey Lukyanenko (Russian), the Night Watch tetralogy.
- Micha Pansi (Swiss), a female fantasy author who also plays guitar in a heavy metal band. Just thought I'd add that little tidbit.
- Carlos Ruiz Zafón (Spanish)
- Liliana Bodoc (Argentinian)
- Mária Szepes (Hungarian) - The Red Lion
- Michael Ende (German) - Neverending Story, Momo (!!! READ IT !!!)

[effex]

*_______________________*

[zanzando]

:D