rolling fantasy, science fiction, speculative fiction &c. thread

1930s...

there are other journals on there, with some vonnegut and dick, but i think i need to cherrypick by author rather than just downloading any old tosh. ereader already has 10 years of reading on it and is only 1/4 full...

yeah, Williamson, Leinster, Hamilton, Cave should be worth checking, though it's their earlier stuff and for the pulp as fuh market.

yee gods! Anybody seen the documentary?
http://shine.yahoo.com/healthy-living/real-benjamin-buttons-brothers-matthew-michael-clark-aging-193400085.html

so what was good this year ilb spec crew?

i need some books to read not by grandmasters or half-forgotten pulp authors.

I'm still working on 2010 & 11 books. I have no clue.

ha yeah i can never keep up. i think i finally read most of the Hot Books of 2006 in like 2010.

I'm liking Jim Munroe currently: Everyone in Silico and Flyboy Action Figure Comes with Gasmask. Both are old though.

I did get the new Sandman Slim book from Audible. first 20 minutes of listening were fun.

Maureen McHugh's 'After the Apocalypse' short story collection was this year, I think: that was great

Reading a new collection edited by Jonathan Strahan, 'The Edge of Infinity', which seems excellent so far: near-future hard SF confined to our solar system, is the basic brief

so what was good this year ilb spec crew?

i cant think of any fantasy novels that were outstanding. ian tergillis' alternate earth fantasy-spy novel 'the coldest war' was the sort of deliriously stupid book that i finished in a single day and then felt vaguely guilty for having enjoyed so much and joe abercrombie's newest is good while kinda proving hes running out of ways to revisit the same ground. 'the winds of khalakovo' was probably one of the best high fantasy novels i read this year but i think how much you like it depends on your ability to read the title 'the winds of khalakovo' w/o rolling your eyes

harkaway's 'angelmaker' is another speculative fiction meets spy novel (which was a thing this year, i guess) thats more self-consciously literary than 'the coldest war' and probably objectively better but grated my nerves p badly. it def deserves a mention in eoy lists but its too much an amalgamation of reddit upvotes and av club style pop culture discernment, like the fever of dream of some bored marketing analyst who spends too much work time making animated gifs of network sitcoms and complaining about hipsters on his facebook.

i havent read '2312' or 'in the mouth of the whale' but both are trad sci-fi novels that have been getting good reviews

and while i havent read much horror this year peter bell's 'strange epiphanies' is really excellent classic horror.

The Coldest War: details please!

I have to rave about the new(?) KJ Parker, Sharps. I started to write a big thing but I won't. Just read it.

Parker's books are so good at being relentlessly about politics without sacrificing the texture or appeal of the characters in the middle. This one has all of that, doubled...and swords. Lots of swords.

Tried reading "the other log of Phileas Fog" by Phillip Jose Farmer - it's a clever idea, but quite boring really.

Just got the 1967 ed of Dangerous Visions - good Christmas reading.

I keep thinking back on Parker's Engineer Trilogy, and have recommended it to a bunch of people who all enjoyed it - thanks much for that, Laurel! Even though I complained, those books have stuck with me - and I just bought Sharps.

i would actually love some lists of "essential" 90's and beyond SF from you guys. cuz i'm still stuck in the era of bellbottoms and earlier. not complaining, enjoy the old stuff a ton and its that stuff that has gotten me so excited about the genre, but for later it would be nice to know what to check out. i mean, i have to read snow crash, right? or do i? there are good suggestions on that other scifi thread i started a million years ago on ilb. will look there too. would like to think that i will get to some of the banks culture books. and i have a small shelf of kim stanley robinson now thanks to this thread.

heck, i haven't read ender's game yet and that's the 80's. everyone loves that one, i think...

For my money you can skip KSR but that's just me. The others you named are all required reading.

Scott:

THE IRON DRAGON'S DAUGHTER, Michael Swanwick, pls read it.

but people love KSR here! now what do i do? his books look interesting. we shall see.

okay, swanwick, got it. well, i don't have it, but i'll remember it.

i like KSR. I get a little bit of vertigo while reading him when I think about how much research he must have done. Have not read anything since the Mars books though.

All I can remember about the Mars books is that there are a lot of Russians in future space.

The Years of Rice and Salt is by far my favorite KSR.

Another 90s SF recommendation: Bruce Sterling's Holy Fire.

xpost that's the one I intend to (eventually) read next.

O mang, we've talked about tons of 80s-90s on here--anyway, to me, Snow Crash is very exuberant and inventive, but Diamond Age is where his deeeper talents, informed intuition and sharpening skills rassle with his dated cyber-libertarian tropes--which actually keeps things more exciting than Snow Crash, far as I'm concerned. I'd start with Gibson's early short story collection, Burning Chrome, before trying Neuromancer. Also James Tiptree Jr., Robert Reed, Maureen McHugh, Ted Chiang (maybe didn't publish til 00s? Anyway he's great), Swanwick when you're stoned (better w times of short attention span; The Iron Dragon's Daughter might provide plenty snap crackle pop) Nancy Kress (at least the early stuff, like novel Brainrose and short stories). Dozois' and Hartwell's competitive/complimentary annual best-ofs are unevern, but both series have led me to tons of great stuff (til Dozois' judgement got wildly erractic a few years ago, and scared me off more recent volumes, but 80s and 90s are pretty good).

no yeah 90's and beyond is what i was looking for. strongo reminded me that i wanted to ask about more recent stuff. the local store here had the chiang collection and i went back and it was gone. i just see newer stuff and i have no idea if its any good or not. cuz the authors are unknown to me. i do have a bunch of 90's year-end best-ofs and they are good for figuring out if i like new names.

and yeah there is probably lots of stuff on this thread to look up. i'm just lazy. and i have plenty to read. i don't want anyone to hurt themselves. i'm gonna keep my eye out for the swanwick book that jon mentioned.

i need some books to read not by grandmasters or half-forgotten pulp authors.
This reminds of something I really liked on m john harrison's blog recently, but I feel like he is persona non grata around here so I will let you look for it yourself.

Why is he persona non grata? I've never read a word, but that's because I know his name but nothing else about him or his work.

Maybe that's too strong. I think his biggest fan here was Martin S, who is no longer with us. I am also a fan, but a think some, like ledge and thomp, think he is too curmudgeonly. OK here is the link, http://www.goodreads.com/author_blog_posts/3256529-cat-roofer-mars, but be warned that he may trackback and say rude things about us.

He can chastise me for not getting around to his work.

I should do that too. Scott, the most recent round-up I've read (still reading, now and then) is Year's Best SF 15 (Hartwell & Cramer, 2010). It's got me wanting to check out more by Vandana Singh, Robert Charles Wilson, Ian Creasey, Peter Watts (who's put most if not all of his short fiction online, free access), and even Bruce Sterling, who I've never gotten to before, but "Black Swan", though tricky-dicky as evah, as me bugging. (I've tried to describe these writers' YBSF15 stories upthread.) Gene Wolfe and Nancy Kress aren't up to their usual standard, a lot of so-whats offered by others, but looking fwd to Geoff Ryman's "Blocked", p. 328, Charles Oberndorf's "Another Life" p. 373 (think I talked about his Sheltered Lives on here before; great contagion-as-normalcy). Most recent novel most relevant to this thread: Colson Whitehead's Zone One, which I also xposted (don't usually care about zombies, but it's got the grand, differently-focused visualization of Frankenstein's 1818 edition. without being anachronistic)

x I've got to proofread these posts, sorry.

Peter Watts! Yesssssssss. I loved the stand-alone book--the trilogy ones got kind of brutal read in a row but maybe you'll approach them difftly/better.

post-90s sff: I have heard great things about Kage Baker and wanna investigate soon.

just went into the bookstore down the street and they had some interesting 2011/2012 story collections. even a new zombie collection that looked neat. and they DID still have the ted chiang collection but i didn't feel like spending 16 bucks at the moment. it'll be there...

Paul Krugman: Asimov's Foundation novels grounded my economics

sam delany said something in his paris review interview to the effect that a movie or tv mini-series version of foundation would make socialists of every prepubescent nerd in the country.

given the age i read them, i'm wondering if he's not right.

man wouldn't that be a nice counterweight to all the young randians out there

i was a young randian!

i think i read atlas shrugged twice when i was a teen. i just liked the tortured genius part, i didn't care about the politics.

okay, because i as a person make no sense whatsoever i passed on the 16 dollar chiang collection and later today went to the used (and soiled) book pit where cranky oldsters "debate" our capitalist system from very VERY well-worn chairs and spent 50 bucks on oldster SF. i couldn't help myself for some reason.

Well that's it, this thread's not speaking to you anymore.

but i got cool stuff:

despatches from the frontiers of the female mind (1985 u.k. collection of sf by women)

harlan ellison - partners in wonder (never seen it. ellison collabs with bloch, van vogt, sturgeon, silverberg, etc)

harlan ellison - from the land of fear

thomas m. disch - camp concentration (i snatch up ALL disch i see. rare as hen's teeth around here! and sometimes they are in sf, horror, lit, poetry, etc. so you gotta keep your eyes peeled)

science fiction - today and tomorrow (awesome looking Penguin lit crit collection with essays by pohl, herbert, sturgeon, dickson, etc. i love this kind of thing. kinda interested in SF lit crit/history almost as much as i am in the actual fiction. cuz i'm like that)

dangerous visions (been meaning to buy this forever. and the other dangerous visions too)

dick - the divine invasion (nice hardcover edition for 7 bucks!)

dick - the man in the high castle (nice hardcover edition for 7 bucks!)

frederik pohl - the early pohl (again, nice hardcover edition)

harlan ellison - approaching oblivion

joe haldeman - infinite dreams

samuel r. delany - driftglass (another nice hardcover. all these were book club editions, but still...)

i'll get into the modern age of tomorrow someday, i promise.

In my heaviest sf-reading days there was a group of S-authors who kept me reliably busy and satisfied -- Sterling, Swanwick, Stephenson, (Lucius) Shepard. (I remember Green Eyes and Life During Wartime being very good.)

Agreed with Scott on Disch -- acquire on sight! Fundamental Disch, edited by Delany, is one of the best sf short story anthologies ever published.

http://www.goodshowsir.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2010/08/femalemind.jpg

I have this! It's odd. The stories are remarkable and some polished gems but it solidified for me that I don't like sf/f short stories. Too much world-building to dip into and then be thrown back out of.

Jesus Christ, sorry. It didn't look that big.