THE ILX ALL-TIME SPECULATIVE FICTION POLL RESULTS THREAD & DISCUSSION

I A Wrinkle in Time with that cover and it always sort of scared me too.

Stars My Destination being #51 = I don't care about this poll.

Hey, it's - nevermind

Cool. That's a nice contribution to this thread.

44 Stanislaw Lem - Solaris
81 points/5 votes/0 #1 votes

lem is especially awesome, he gets compared to borges sometimes. he mostly wrote sci-fi (including "solaris," which is really different from and better than both movie versions) but also really weird mysteries and a collection of reviews of imaginary books.

― congratulations (n/a), Tuesday, January 19, 2010 8:45 AM (1 year ago) Bookmark

http://i1224.photobucket.com/albums/ee366/lamp11/44Solaris.jpg?t=1301950334

xxp that's what I do

somehow I completely missed out on the happening of this literary event

appreciating the use of vintage mass market PB covers

Stars My Destination being #51 = I don't care about this poll.

were you the person annoyed abt allowing short story collections?

srsly A+ on that

xp

lamp you are a king or perhaps a mentat

generally speaking, if you are asking Alex in SF "are you the person who was annoyed" the answer is yes

just perused the noms list, ftr I totally would've voted the fuck out of dr adder

http://i1224.photobucket.com/albums/ee366/lamp11/43ACanticle.jpg?t=1301950486
43 Walter Miller - A Canticle for Leibowitz
81 points/7 votes/1 #1 vote

Walker Percy affirmed what is cryptic about Canticle by declaring that it contains a secret which either one gets or fails to get. And if one gets it, Percy admonishes, one dares not tell

― Ralph C. Wood, Friday, April 13, 2001 4:35 AM (10 years ago) Bookmark

"were you the person annoyed abt allowing short story collections?"

I don't recall arguing that they shouldn't have been allowed, but I would rather people voted/nominated their favorite story, yes.

Ed III have u ever read Infernal Devices? Excellent early Jeter and a great Victoriana piece to go alongside Powers and Blaylock.

http://i1224.photobucket.com/albums/ee366/lamp11/42TheCrying.jpg?t=1301950986
42 Thomas Pynchon - The Crying of Lot 49
82 points/5 votes/0 #1 votes

I am reading it again, for perhaps the 5th time. I thought it might prove unreadable as a result, my eyes skimming off it - but no, it's more readable than ever, slowed down, yielding up fresh treasures, probably-important passages that I have somehow not fully seen before, small sentences likewise whose minor connecting work I ponder anew.

I don't know where to begin with this extraordinary slim packet of treasures and intellectual thrills. Save to say: what's your favourite bit?

― the pinefox, Tuesday, October 25, 2005 7:26 AM (5 years ago) Bookmark

I made a mistake in reading V. before this one, didn't I

(because after that experience I'll be damned if I ever read another Pynchon novel again)

two things:

- sorry for running through these p quick but i have a dinner thing & need to get out of here reasonably soon
- crying of lot 49 is the 1st thing that i ~dislike~ on this list, some sort of ilx record

xpYou probably wouldn't like it either.

no, his shit's so hard to get a hold of I pick up whatever I stumble across, but I guess infernal devices is about to get reissued?

xp to jon

http://i1224.photobucket.com/albums/ee366/lamp11/41Flatland.jpg?t=1301951562
41 Edwin Abbott Abbott - Flatland: A Romance of Many Dimensions
86 points/6 votes/0 #1 votes

An engaging fable, worthy of being remembered for its individual, literary merits --- it thus appears somewhat oddly, among the books dealing with that rebuilding of scientific abstractions, which is the most notable architectonic achievement of our age. Flatland was invented as one would invent a game. It is the product of ingenuity, acting on material which has amusing possibilities.

-- Frank V. Morley, Saturday, October 26 1:48 PM (85 years ago) Bookmark

Someone is reissuing Jeter novels. That's crazy.

Not sure I'm qualified to comment (or to have voted in the first place, but hey): A Canticle for Leibowitz is the first book here I've read...it was responsible for me deciding at age 15 to become a priest. About three days later I changed my mind. Great book anyway.

xp - I've read Flatland too!

Morlock Night is pretty fun too. Good for K.W.

re: Jeter that's good news! Is it Subterranean Press? They did a nice omnibus of Blaylock's victorian SF not long ago.

Some serious use of Innsmouth Look in Infernal Devices iirc...

by angry robot... in a reasonably priced mass market pb to boot...

http://www.amazon.com/Infernal-Devices-Angry-Robot-Jeter/dp/0857660977/

http://angryrobotbooks.com/

I think I liked the original cover a little better.

http://i1224.photobucket.com/albums/ee366/lamp11/40Foundation.jpg?t=1301951993
Isaac Asimov - The Foundation Trilogy
86 points/6 votes/0 #1 votes

re-read the first three last year and I think they're still peerless. the idea of a three novel epic retelling Gibbons' book as a future science fiction epic was genius, and this trilogy is more relevant today than ever, everyone simply forgot.

― Milton Parker, Wednesday, January 21, 2009 5:01 PM (2 years ago) Bookmark

Surprised Infernal Devices got the re-ish treatment before Dr. Adder or the Glass Hammer too. Although I guess I'm most surprised any of his stuff is getting it.

Flatland was a revelation when I read it; I was 13 and it probably did more to make me fascinated with math (particularly geometry) than anything else in my life aside from number bases.

http://i1224.photobucket.com/albums/ee366/lamp11/39Slaughterhouse-Five.jpg?t=1301952208
39 Kurt Vonnegut - Slaughterhouse-Five
87 points/7 votes/0 #1 votes

lfam, without having read the rest of this thread, i just wanted to say that you should start with slaughterhouse-five. my dad convinced me to read it a few years ago and it was absolutely brilliant. i wish i appreciated vonnegut more in his own lifetime, but i suppose now is the time to delve into more.

― modestmickey, Thursday, April 12, 2007 9:05 AM (3 years ago) Bookmark

didn't feel qualified to vote as i hadn't read much of these in more than a decade, but 'foundation' would've been my no. 1, probably.

http://i1224.photobucket.com/albums/ee366/lamp11/38Lanark.jpg?t=1301952646
38 Alasdair Gray - Lanark
88 points/5 votes/0 #1 votes

Reading Lanark during the holidays, when I had dug myself a 6-foot deep pit of despair already, capped it rather neatly. When the Author showed up, on New Year's Eve after a fairly miserable day with embittered angry family members, I yelled "well, fuck!" and slammed it shut. But then went back to reading it, as the PS2 wouldn't co-operate with the hotel tv and I felt compelled to know the rest. It is a hellish book, full of nightmares and horrors, mysteries and dark puzzles. I thought the best part was Thaw's descent as he painted and painted the church murals.

― Jaq (Jaq), Monday, January 2, 2006 4:49 PM (5 years ago) Bookmark

oh man so many books to check out! I now feel like my ballot was childish and pedestrian...

http://i1224.photobucket.com/albums/ee366/lamp11/37Frankenstein.jpg?t=1301952696
37 Mary Shelley - Frankenstein
88 points/6 votes/0 #1 votes

Frankestein by Mary Shelley:
There is a monster.But, who is the real one?

― - H.H. -, Saturday, April 17, 2004 2:18 AM (6 years ago) Bookmark

http://i1224.photobucket.com/albums/ee366/lamp11/36Ubik.jpg?t=1301953104
36 Philip K. Dick - Ubik
89 points/6 votes/0 #1 votes

> You need Ubik. Ubik is safe when taken as directed.

GET UBIK _

> You don't see any Ubik here.

― muus lääv? :D muus dut :( (Telephone thing), Tuesday, November 9, 2010 10:08 PM (4 months ago) Bookmark

ubik?

― stirmonster, Wednesday, September 1, 2010 5:47 PM (7 months ago) Bookmark

Lot 49 & Lanark the first things to show in the category of 'things I would have voted for if I hadn't had some muddled, self-imposed voting restrictions in place'. They could make a top 20 novels of all time for me, maybe (probably a 50), but I wanted to vote a bit more narrow-genre.

fwiw lanark had the 2nd highest average placement out of any book in the top 50 & i had never even heard of it

! i'm shocked that you havent heard of Lanark!

http://i1224.photobucket.com/albums/ee366/lamp11/35Alices.jpg?t=1301953339
35 Lewis Carroll - Alice's Adventures in Wonderland & Through the Looking Glass
89 points/7 votes/1 #1 vote

I reread a great deal. Books that were amazing and lifechanging, or at least ones that made me think, often find new niches to roost in when read again because _I_ am not the same reading the book. I reread mysteries with characters I like as if visiting old friends. I reread childhood and teen novels at the rate of two or three weekly. I've read "Alice in Wonderland" and "Through the Looking Glass" more times than I can count.

― Rabin the Cat (Rabin the Cat), Monday, May 10, 2004 10:22 AM (6 years ago) Bookmark

51 Alfred Bester - The Stars My Destination

50 Yevgeny Zamaytin - We
49 Kurt Vonnegut - Cat's Cradle
48 Guy Gavriel Kay - Tigana
47 Philip K. Dick - Flow My Tears, the Policeman Said
46 Neal Stephenson - Snow Crash

45 Madeleine L'Engle - A Wrinkle in Time
44 Stanislaw Lem - Solaris
43 Walter Miller - A Canticle for Leibowitz
42 Thomas Pynchon - The Crying of Lot 49
41 Edwin Abbott Abbott - Flatland: A Romance of Many Dimensions

40 Isaac Asimov - The Foundation Trilogy
39 Kurt Vonnegut - Slaughterhouse-Five
38 Alasdair Gray - Lanark
37 Mary Shelley - Frankenstein
36 Philip K. Dick - Ubik

35 Lewis Carroll - Alice's Adventures in Wonderland & Through the Looking Glass

this is quite a strange list so far

how so?

C'mon, Vance!

crap, I didn't vote. I hope you guys voted for my nominees.

I am kind of bummed because I'm pretty certain that The Diamond Age won't place now.

i forgot that wheel of time is 12,000 pages, so...i'll just wait for the hbo version.

er, i just googled that and learned that there really is a tv adapation in the works, for hbo. someone hand me a cigar and a desk to prop my feet up onto while i yell at subordinates, i should be a tv executive

Kinda wish we had separate fantasy and sf polls tbh

...it's not for hbo, sorry. a major studio is involved, but the announcement hasn't been made yet. i don't have time for accurate googling when i have all these meetings about upcoming pilots that need decisions, ASAP *cigar smoke ring*

Read it imo

These results are a bit not good. Does anyone really put his dark materials there now

Otm