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Underground > Books, Criticism & Writing >

Best SciFi book ever

  
  

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rizla mission
13:04 / 18.12.02
Agreed on The Sparrow - through most of the book I thought it was pretty smug and longwinded and not terribly interesting, but the ending ... complete fucking heart of darkness.. exceptional.
 
 
at the scarwash
17:44 / 18.12.02
Do we have to go with just one novel, or a sequence of novels which were concieved as a whole? If the latter is the case, I'd vote for the Book of the New Sun, by Gene Wolfe. Stylistically innovative on a par with anything in mainstream fiction, beautiful use of language, intricately plotted, bonus points for killer world-building skills, poses interesting questions about memory, time, and history, as well as our ambiguous relationship with technology and science.
 
 
Cat Chant
18:36 / 18.12.02
Oh my God, though, I can't believe I forgot this - I've only just finished it, as well: C. J. Cherryh's Cyteen. I know fuckall about genetics but this is another fantastically holistic universe, and I absolutely love the gendering of the characters: beautiful m/m couple, one of whom is sexually assaulted early in the book and remains a nervous wreck throughout (which i like because so often boys in boy-written fic are assaulted in order to prove how hard they are and how entirely they can get over it: it's a nice intervention into that convention), as against the kick-arse main female character, the incomparably evil, powerful, fucked-up, and sympathetic Ari Emory. Sigh.

The Sparrow is on my list to read - thanks for the reminder - as is Shikasta and the rest of Doris Lessing's series (if that's what you were referring to?), but I've never quite managed to start them.

I've heard that the aforementioned Woman at the Edge of Time kicked off the cyberpunk genre, by the way, which surely gives Marge Piercey some points for "influence"?
 
 
nuberty
01:39 / 02.01.03
My $.02:

Kim Stanley Robinson's Mars trilogy. Great near future reveolution tale. Has it's slow points but has great science and political paarts.

Arthur C Clarke. The Rama series and many of his short stories. This guy is the master and wrote both epic and intimate tales.

Harry Turtledoves World War Series. Dodgy alternative series about aliens invading during ww2 but one of the fastest page turners i've ever read.
 
 
STOATIE LIEKS CHOCOLATE MILK
03:02 / 02.01.03
Oh! Oh! And David Zindell's "Neverness" series- The Broken God, in particular, is truly awe-inspiring. Quantum physics, fractal maths, BIG religions, crusades, drugs, and a protagonist who's taken a vow of pacifism. And warrior-poets, possibly my favourite ever idea in a skiffy novel. Absolutely beautiful.
 
 
Twig the Wonder Kid
15:32 / 21.01.03

You ask the question and then moan when everyone says Neuromancer. It's the answer to your question - it IS the greatest sci-fi novel of all time.

One quick mention for a previously unmentioned - Childhood's End by Arthur C Clarke, probably a bit hippy by today's standards (but then you can't get much more hippy then Dune) but still had some great ideas. Independence Day done right.

Dare I say End Of Eternity by Asimov too, or is that too pulp?
 
 
The Natural Way
09:32 / 22.01.03
I don't think I can answer this one, really.

I love Vonnegut, I enjoy Dick (but he does exhause me a bit), Gibson's nice in an icecold-neony way and I dig on Noon (esp Pixel Juice and Cobralingus)....don't ask me to choose! But I don't read that much Sci Fi, so I'm not sure my opinion counts for much, anyway.
 
 
The Natural Way
09:37 / 22.01.03
Is Murakami Sci Fi? Bob Wilson? Modzero mentioned Borges earlier.... Do comics count? What if the reason you like, say, 'The Handmaid's Tale' has fuck all to do with its Sci Fi elements? What's the criteria here?

Yours confused and billballered,

Ballusrunce.
 
 
Our Lady of The Two Towers
15:41 / 22.01.03
I found Childhood's End an incredibly depressing, pessimistic view of humanity's future, but I guess it was the mental image of all these kids standing around aimlessly.

Neuromancer? Another 10 years should probably do it for people to forget that abortion of a novel.
 
 
STOATIE LIEKS CHOCOLATE MILK
16:07 / 22.01.03
I loved Neuromancer and still consider it a classic, though I think Gibson's writing has improved immeasurably since then. Best ever, though? Not sure.

Wait till I finish Delany's Dhalgren . That's shaping up for a serious headfuck. And I have had it described to me as "the best sf novel ever" by various people whose judgment I trust.

I'm assuming (sorry, it may have already been said, but I'm on a slow connection and in a hurry) that Bester's Tiger, Tiger/The Stars My Destination has already been mentioned? Not necessarily the best skiffy novel, but has to be in the running for the best space opera, surely?
 
 
Whisky Priestess
16:54 / 22.01.03
I know they may not be the best ever, but Michael Marshall Smith's "Spares" and Only Forward" are essentially the same book and, as such, deserve a mention. I just really like the guy's style. Whatever happened to him?

Plus for mood and weirdness I would definitely nominate Russell Hoban's "Fremder". Beautifully written, with a weird inexplicable atmosphere that just makes me love it to death. It belongs to the small and exclusive club of books I'd die happy having written (also includes Mervyn's Peake's Titus Groan and especially Gormenghast - do they count BTW?)

I'd be interested to hear if anyone else has read Fremder and what they thought. Odd to think that the same guy wrote "The Mouse and His Child".
 
 
sleazenation
19:37 / 22.01.03
I'm with runce here - there are so many good books (comics, films etc) why choose? although i do think slaughterhouse 5 is fantastic...
 
 
Captain Zoom
21:23 / 22.01.03
Perhaps Calculting God by Robert Sawyer? Philosophy meets Science in a contemporary setting. Or maybe I'm just biased 'cause he's Canadian. Robert Charles Wilson's The Perseids and other stories is a great book, but I don't know if the criteria calls for complete novel or not.

Yeah, I'm gonna vote Rob Sawyer. Best I've ever read, anyway.

Though Arthur C. Clarke's Childhood's End is a close second.

Zoom.
 
 
arcboi
22:48 / 22.01.03
My shortlist would be:

Stranger In A Strange Land
Great satire on organised religion

I Am Legend
Pulp fiction at its best - and a great scientific take on vampires

Slaughterhouse 5
Just because

Consider Phlebas
Space opera at its best

VALIS
u-know!
 
 
Saint Keggers
00:46 / 23.01.03
I rather liked the whole "War Against The Chtorr" series by David (I wrote the Trouble with Tribbles) Gerrold. The first book is rather mediocre but from then on its just amazing. In a nutshell its how the world resists an invasion by an alien ecology.
 
 
Spatula Clarke
02:26 / 23.01.03
Whisky> MMS dropped the Smith and, along with it, the SF. His last, The Straw Men came out last year. It's as addictive as his previous novels, but that's more down to his writing style than anything else - plotwise it's a bit bland, with little of the imagination that Only Forward and the others were filled with. It's also an extremely obvious attempt to woo the American film industry.

If you like his sci-fi stuff, you should check out Jon Courtenay Grimwood's Arabesque trilogy - Pashazade, Effendi and a third yet to be published. They owe a huge debt to MMS, but are more than just cover versions - the stories are original and exciting (if you can forgive a couple of minor plot holes and abandoned strands), even if the characters aren't.

I've not got one overriding 'best sci-fi book ever', and this shouldn't be taken as a suggestion for title contender, but recently I've really enjoyed Alastair Reynolds' Revelation Space novels. Again, if you break the plots down into their most basic form, they're far from original - RS is a take on the 2001 alien artifact/'Watcher' story, Chasm City is yr standard SF Noir - but they're eminently readable books nonetheless. Space opera novels that manage to step over the problem that normally goes hand-in-hand with such books - a lack of solidly-drawn protagonists. They're also bloody long, but manage not to feel like it when you're reading them. I'm aiming to read the third - Redemption Ark - pretty soon.

By the way, I absolutely detest Neuromancer - read it when I was about 14, and even then it struck me as all style, no substance.
 
 
Burning Man
16:15 / 23.01.03
David Gerrold's War Against the Chtorr Series. Deals not only with Giant Man Eating Worms from Outerspace, but the collapse and subsequent rebuilding of civlization after the plagues. Great books because they extrapolate into the future our psychology and politics/entertainment.
 
 
STOATIE LIEKS CHOCOLATE MILK
16:45 / 23.01.03
Oh, and of course, Matheson's "I Am Legend". Great fun which only attempts importance right at the end... of course, making it work better. (Though also on my list of books in which unpleasant stuff happens to dogs, which always upsets me.)
 
 
Jack The Bodiless
05:14 / 24.01.03
Let's not forget Michael Marshall Smith's short stories, collected in What You Make It, most of which are great - I love 'Diet Hell' and 'Hell Hath Enlarged Itself'. Only Forward is still his best book, although Spares is a reasonably close runner up. The Straw Men isn't sci fi, as has been mentioned, but it's very well written, sufering only from the same thing the previous novel (One Of Us) suffered from - a lack of proper closure, and the 'twist' in the tail is telegraphed too early. I doubt it's an effort to 'woo Hollywood', however, as he's sold the basis behind both Only Forward and Spares (the latter would make a wonderful Spielberg movie, and indeed Dreamworks have owned the option for years.

I like Neuromancer, but prefer Neal Stephenson's Snow Crash. How can you not love a novel who's main character is a ninja pizza delivery expert named Hiro Protagonist?

I also really enjoyed Greg Bear's novel Darwin's Radio - as usual he blinds you with science while introducing characters that feel as real as all fuck it. Ditto for Eon - I haven't read Eternity, which is supposed to be the sequel - which is a little spoiled by the arrival of the aliens, possibly a first for a post Star Wars novel.

Of course Julian May wrote some pacy, witty, intricate sci fi adventure stories in the Saga Of The Exiles (The Many Coloured Land, The Golden Torc, The Nonborn King, and The Adversary)which still has the best one line concept for any book EVER, and the following Intervention and Milieu Trilogy (Jack The Bodiless, Diamond Mask and Magnificat. I like them soooo much. Reeking of mythology, Jungian thought, and able to create vivid, magnetic character you give a rat's arse about.

Um... David Conway's Metal Sushi is a collection of six short stories by the ex-singer in My Bloody Valentine. Kind of like what would have happened if William Gibson had tried to write Lovecraft in the style of William Burroughs.

Of, and can't leave this one without the usual mention to the two (for me) masters of sci fi. Alfred Bester for Tiger! Tiger (one of the most exciting sci fi novels ever written, with more wonderful ideas being born in every chapter) and The Demolished Man, which comes close but can't match Tiger.... Extro not bad either.

And Harlan Ellison. One of the most respected writers in the field, despite the fact that he don't sell shit over here because people are shit. Although I admire him as a person more than the prose of his that I've read, he's still as close to a genius as sci fi has ever got.

That's too many, and I haven't even touched on Douglas Adams/b> or Orson Scott Card yet. I don't like Jeff Noon much, and Ian M. Banks is someone I've been meaning to get into for a while. Oh, and Ian Watson for The Fire Worm which is wonderful and strange.

The best? Tiger! Tiger!, of course. It's pretty near matchless.
 
 
Our Lady of The Two Towers
12:34 / 25.01.03
I guessed the twist in 'One of Us' because it was numbingly blatant. I think all his books are written to be easily transferrable to film, so much so that I don't understand why Dreamworks (IIRC) is taking so long over 'Spares', which would surely be a piece of piss. I think I read somewhere that he's considering doing an Iain M. Banks thing, Michael Marshall Smith will write sci-fi fantasy, Michael Marshall is a straight thriller kind of a man.

I also put in a shout for Bester, having enjoyed both The Demolished Man and The Stars my Tyger Tyger for their genuinely soulful qualities.
 
 
John Adlin
18:21 / 25.01.03
OK. Why Neurmancer.
Becase its a fusion of radical ideas. (20 years later history has proven those which worked and which didn't. Hey hindsights a wondefull thing.)
Becase it kick started the Litery Genre of Sci Fi in much the same way Punk blew away the Dionosaurs of Prog Rock. Before Neuromancer the genre was all Larry Niverns Ringworld and L R Hubbards Battlefeld Earth. Big themeed-Grandiouse space operas, The Cyberpunk Movemnt pervesely broght a touch of humaity back in the form of belivable heroes, Flawed Characters and recogniasable locations.
And Becase it wasn't written as a Sci Fi novel, if rumours are to be belived Gibson wrote it on a Typewriter as a dystopian Horror novel.
Yeah its a bit patchy in parts and the dialoge seem stilted, thats part of its charm for me, Count Zero and Mona Lisa O, are more professional but Neuromancer is a raw first album type of book, Its a Greetings From Asbury Park-Stone Roses 1'st album kind of book.
And it falls into the description of Sci Fi.
 
 
Foust is SO authentic
02:52 / 26.01.03
Zoom, as much as I loved Calculating God - I in fact own a signed hardcover - I'm not sure I'd call it the best ever.
 
 
pointless and uncalled for
10:16 / 26.01.03
People always answer the same: Neuromancer

Which is people are wrong and should not be trusted with anything.

The answer to this question is most definitely Dick's, A Scanner Darkly. Clearly this shows that stoaties Bagpuss hair channels cosmic wisdom and we should all bow in his glorious presence.

I am merely delighted that I managed to have scored with a lucky guess.
 
 
Austrian Puppet Master
08:23 / 28.01.03
I have not read ALL posts, so I could repeat myself...however, my favorites are:
A Clockwork Orange (My native language is german, so I needed the half book to manage out the meaning of most of the russhian-english words)
Do Androids dream of electric sheep (I have not read it yet, but I guess it's very good)
I guess 1984 and Brave new World are good as well...
 
 
The Natural Way
15:08 / 28.01.03
Take it to the PM!

My fave is when Peter Jackson is Starship Traveller in a black hole. I like it when adventure GAME BOOK!
 
 
Twig the Wonder Kid
15:40 / 05.02.03

"War Against The Chtorr"

Christ, I hadn't heard that title since I was twelve. A book I bought cause it had the most awful shlock pulp sci fi cover but turned out to contain a cracking tale.

Is this now considered a classic? I never even knew it was completed trilogy. I'll have to track down a copy.

"Consider Phlebas".

If forced to pick a Bank's I'd go for "Use of Weapons". But then I think you'd be stretched to try and argue any of his works were amongs the best sci-fi books EVER. They're fun but ultimately disposable, like his non-genre lit.

"Slaughterhouse 5"

stretching the definition (what IS the definition) but a stunning book nonetheless. It'd be on my list for greatest book of all time, regardless of genre.

Apologies for lazy criticism but Michael Marshall Smith is just shite.
 
 
Our Lady of The Two Towers
16:18 / 05.02.03
Care to explain? I have a few problems with 'Spares' because although it's a different story MMS manages to make it seem like he's trying to write 'Only Forward-Lite' and am not too keen on the unresolved end of 'Straw Men' but otherwise I think he's a pretty good writer. Not perfect by any means.

I think I'm going to have to go for 'Perdido Street Station' if I haven't already.
 
 
Twig the Wonder Kid
13:48 / 06.02.03

"Spares" being the only one I have read and hence what I judge my opinion on.

I just thought it was dull and unoriginal, which is the greatest sin in literature.

In my world authors wouldn't waste our time unless they've something no-one's said before.
 
 
at the scarwash
01:12 / 11.02.03
I think with a little less posing in the mirror and saying "Rarr tiger," and "who's the coolest razorboy?" William Gibson could be a good writer. Some cracking ideas, especially in all tomorrow's parties. But really, he's hardly the writer of the best sci-fi novel ever. He's just not good enough of a writer. I stand by Gene Wolf. But I admit that he hasn't been as influential as many others. I'd put a vote in for More Than Human by Ted Sturgeon, but I think his short stories are far superior. But dammit, the man's style sparkles.

The Three Stigmata of Palmer Eldritch is my favorite Dick novel. I think that the ideas of the Valis period are very good, but they're really just recycled Gnosticism, and that doesn't make them great. Actually, I think it gives them some of the disagreeable quality of certain Christian historical novels, in that they exist as a framework to contain his revelation more than they do as an art piece. The best period, in my opinion, is the end of the 60s and early 70s.

Yes yes yes Alfred Bester, by the way.
 
 
beatorbebeat
16:04 / 18.02.03
The Illuminatus Trilogy, hands down. The coolest book to incorporate the Masons, The 60's and a serious bent on the powers of the world. Looks into the absurdity of peoples perceptions of the world.
 
 
Our Lady of The Two Towers
08:30 / 08.10.03
I wonder if eight months has changed or added to anyone's views (plus I'm doing the sci-fi buying for my library!)
 
 
lord nuneaton savage
11:25 / 08.10.03
For those with more of a bent for 'experimental', 'transgressive' literature, I would warmly recommend 'Blood Electric' by Kenji Siratori. It's a hard read but once you get the hang of it it becomes very rewarding. An unjustly neglected book in my view.
 
 
STOATIE LIEKS CHOCOLATE MILK
16:16 / 08.10.03
Boundaries become blurred... I know I've argued vociferously (if that's a word that actually applies when you're just typing) for others, which I stand by, but...

how's about "Gravity's Rainbow?" It has a humungous amount of SF tropes, and is a wonderful book to boot. Although, being Pynchon, it seems to fall into that category whereby you can have zombies, UFOs AND Godzilla (Vineland) and still be considered mainstream, just cos it's well-written...
 
 
We're The Great Old Ones Now
20:41 / 08.10.03
Neuromancer was epochal, in the sense that it defined a brief moment in science fiction and possibly also in the western world. It was like something Arthur C. might have written if the eighties had been his decade. It wasn't the best SciFi book ever - as if you could actually have such a thing.

Neal Stephenson's Snow Crash took Neuromancer's angsty techno and made it cool again, just when I thought Cyberpunk was pretty much toast. It took that kind of apocalyptic world and stripped it of noir and gave it some humour and a sense of how weird and funny haha life could be - something Neuromancer sorely lacked. In Neuromancer, no one ever slips on a banana skin. In Snow Crash, they have to pick their way between them - something I feel enormous sympathy for.

No one's mentioned Eric Frank Russell's masterworks yet - Three to Conquer or Next of Kin. Sheer, joyful pulp SF with just enough smarts to keep you hooked.

And then there's Zelazny's Eye of Cat. I love that book.

I could go on and on...
 
 
PatrickMM
21:58 / 08.10.03
Philip K. Dick's The Man in the High Castle. It's got the usual great PKD concepts, really strong characters, and a narrative that twists nimbly between fiction and reality. Great stuff all around.

But if you're including comics as books, nothing tops The Invisibles for me.
 
  

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