Greatest SF novel of all time? And why?
POSTED BY: FREESOUP
UPDATED: Monday, August 10, 2026 16:37
VIEWED: 25112
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I guess the reason I read scifi and fantasy is to simply escape and be entertained by a creative story. I don't want to be preached at or lectured to, and I don't really want a life changing experience. Seems to me that Heinlein lays it on a bit too thick.
Damn, don't make me agree with you.
Actually that is exactly why I like Heinlein, he makes me think, makes me want to challenge his arguments. I find that entertaining, while more escapist fantasy and scifi, just don't appeal to me.
Oh well, if everyone were the same, nobody would be different.
"Wash, where is my damn spaceship?"
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I cant really pin down the "greatest SF novel of all time" i've read so many damn good books in my time.
What I will say is that I just finished a series of books called "The Honor Harrington series" by David Weber and gorramit! this series of books kicks ass! No really, you guys have got to read them and rave on with me.
The books follow a young female spinxian as she rises through the ranks in the Manticoran military. The spaceship physics are so believable. I would really love to go into great detail about it all here but i prolly wouldnt do it any real justice..
Read Them! if you love Sci Fi and space battles Read Them! and message me thanking you for getting you onto them.. great books..
First book in the series is called "On basilisk Station" check it out!
Wash - "Did he just go crazy and fall asleep?"
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Drakon:
I was rather torn myself. I ended up coming down on the line question of 'book as art' in terms of best SF novel ever, and for my money nothing Heinlein did exceeded Dune artistically.
Now, as me who my favorite SF author of all time is, and his initials would happen to be RAH. However, I would lean toward The Moon is a Harsh Mistress over Starship Troopers, but then my family got out of the military and became anarchists.
One that I'm eagerly awaiting the reprinting of is Beyond This Horizon. Ever pick that one up?
We don't know who put this cup of life into our hands. But when we go our bones will bake upon the burning sands. 'Cause we walk but once among the living, so no regrets and no forgiving- it's hard to dance when you're down upon your knees. And these are dark days indeed.
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Veteran, just so you know, I took a literature class a couple of years ago in which we read MS's Frankenstein, and I got shouted down by the class and the professor when I called it science fiction rather than "gothic." They were complaining that "Noooooo! It's gothic literature because of the setting! It's got castles and stuff! Wah! Science fiction is stupid! Wah!" And no matter how many times I pointed out that "Look, the guy animated a bloody corpse in his basement using science that doesn't exist in real life," they refused to accept even my offer of a compromise in calling it gothic with science fiction elements.
Personally I think that they're all a bunch of literature snobs who have marginalized the genre of science fiction so much that they can't accept that something they liked could possibly be scifi, regardless of how many corpses are reanimated without use of magical powers.
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Hope you enjoy them.
You should be aware there are also four books in the related The Book of the Long Sun, and a trilogy sequel, The Book of the Short Sun.
I would also recommend his novels PEACE, The Fifth Head of Cerberus and FREE LIVE FREE and his various short story collections.
Remember, the Encyclopedia of Science Fiction calls Wolfe a "trickster", and he's playing a very deep game indeed.
BTW, you were apparently the fellow behind the welcoming porn for people from the Official Board (and now back up again, so please everybody come visit: I've lured Adam Baldwin back: he's currently in Greece filming a movie: www.thefreediver.org if you're interested.), and I can neither find the thread of welcome, nor could my sweetie and I make out what the two women were saying on the video clip. Are they fellow Browncoats? And where do you get the Blue Sun T-shirts they were wearing (my sweetie really wants to know).
Thanks.
Oh, and I'm a longstanding fan of George "Railroad" Martin myself since I first met him at the 1977 WorldCon in Phoenix, Arizona, not long before that really horrible divorce and him sleeping in Roger Zelazny's garage in New Mexico for a year. The next trilogy will be published soon if you check his website. "Winter is coming", indeed.
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Ayuh. Brian Aldiss (authour among many other things "Frankenstein Unbound") describes Mary Shelley's Frankenstein as the first true work of SF.
And recall that she wrote it in a contest to write the scariest novel at a country home with the other guests, including her husband Persse Bysse Shelley ("Ozmandias") and Lord Byron among others. Not bad for a teenage wife!
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Ayuh. Brian Aldiss (authour among many other things "Frankenstein Unbound") describes Mary Shelley's Frankenstein as the first true work of SF.
And recall that she wrote it in a contest to write the scariest novel at a country home with the other guests, including her husband Persse Bysse Shelley ("Ozmandias") and Lord Byron among others. Not bad for a teenage wife!
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Originally posted by bobothebrave:
I'm gonna have to second freesoup and vote for Wolfe's Book of the New Sun (I haven't read Urth of the New Sun, the coda volume; but from what I've heard the first four were the ones originally conceived of as a single long novel, with Urth being a separate continuation). I don't think that there's a single SF novel (and very few "literary" ones) that can match it for the sophistication of its telling, the richness of its world, and the depth of its feeling. As the layers of the story are peeled away and the world's secrets revealed, there's just an indescribable sense of exhilaration.
Have I ever mentioned how talented, intelligent and wise you are? EXCELLENT choice!
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Quote:
Originally posted by bobothebrave:
I'm gonna have to second freesoup and vote for Wolfe's Book of the New Sun (I haven't read Urth of the New Sun, the coda volume; but from what I've heard the first four were the ones originally conceived of as a single long novel, with Urth being a separate continuation). I don't think that there's a single SF novel (and very few "literary" ones) that can match it for the sophistication of its telling, the richness of its world, and the depth of its feeling. As the layers of the story are peeled away and the world's secrets revealed, there's just an indescribable sense of exhilaration.
Have I ever mentioned how talented, intelligent and wise you are? EXCELLENT choice!
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Quote:
Originally posted by bobothebrave:
I'm gonna have to second freesoup and vote for Wolfe's Book of the New Sun (I haven't read Urth of the New Sun, the coda volume; but from what I've heard the first four were the ones originally conceived of as a single long novel, with Urth being a separate continuation). I don't think that there's a single SF novel (and very few "literary" ones) that can match it for the sophistication of its telling, the richness of its world, and the depth of its feeling. As the layers of the story are peeled away and the world's secrets revealed, there's just an indescribable sense of exhilaration.
Have I ever mentioned how talented, intelligent and wise you are? EXCELLENT choice!
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