SciFi and Fantasy Book Club discussion

Inspired by all the "best of" lists coming out now, I'd like to ask everyone here--what makes something a "must read?"

And what would be the 20 books (SFF or otherwise) you think everyone needs to read cover to cover?

I would never call a book a "must read," but for the sake of the discussion, such a book should have a combination of literary merit and the distinction of being commonly read and referenced.

I will put forth a list of 20 books for your consideration:

Dune
Fahrenheit 451
Jurassic Park
2001: A Space Odyssey
Hamlet
Murder on the Orient Express
Foundation
I, Robot
A Gentleman in Moscow
Death on the Nile
The Lord of the Rings
War of the Worlds
The Three-Body Problem
The Phantom Tollbooth
The Picture of Dorian Grey
A Wrinkle in Time
1984
The Giver
Charlotte's Web
Rendezvous with Rama

Yes, I too have a problem to call something a 'must read' for other folks. Some of the - in my opinion - very best SFF books are nothing I would recommend to others, because they are special for my taste.

Off the top of my head, I would go with those 5 ones for a beginning (for more I have to go soul searching)

Children of Time by Adrian Tchaikovsky
The Fifth Season by N.K. Jemisin
Small Gods by Terry Pratchett
Hyperion by Dan Simmons
The Way of Kings by Brandon Sanderson
The Left Hand of Darkness by Ursula K. Le Guin


ETA: added a sixth, because I think everbody should have read a LeGuin

Dang, Brandon, that's a pretty compelling list right there.

another strong list, Gabi!

I feel like J.E.D.D. Mason- the combo of Must Read and choosing only 20 books is short circuiting my brain.

Not counting all the books that are probably must-reads that I myself have not read.

I am interested to see what others list as their must reads. Hoping to get a few of these "must reads" completed next year.

I guess my must reads are those books that make our communication with each other easier and more fun.

For example instead of Brandon's Hamlet I would say Romeo and Juliet would be a "more" must read. It gives us all a head start in understanding West Side Story which gives us all a small understanding in larger issues.

1984 is perfect, who hasn't seen or used the term Big Brother when refering to X watching your every move?

For us sci-fi fantasy nerds, in order to get
"all" the in-jokes, clever references or mood setting comments, perhaps....

The Hobbit, or There and Back Again
1984
The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe
Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone

- I almost deleted this comment, I am not sure how convinced I am by this argument and I am fairly certain I have no idea what a must read is.

XD

these are both great, and I agree!

Hank,

I think you're on the right track. The must reads are generally ones that help provide a common reference point for people trying to communicate.

Thinking about this from a movie perspective, movies like The Wizard of Oz (Judy Garland version) and Star Wars (1977) are touchstones for people from multiple generations and are constantly being referenced.

Back to books, there are many stories and events from Genesis, Exodus, and the four Gospels that are widely known and referenced, and there are plenty of reasons to give them a read.

A lot of books come to mind, some aren't SFF. In no specific order, those that were important for me and I would recommend (I didn't include books in Portuguese here):

Pride and Prejudice
Love in the Time of Cholera
The Robots of Dawn
Brave New World
The Hunchback of Notre-Dame
The Book of Imaginary Beings
The Handmaid's Tale
Cosmos
The Neverending Story
The Wonderful Wizard of Oz
Letters to a Young Poet
Wuthering Heights
The Physician
The Mote in God's Eye
The Phantom of the Opera
The Way of Kings
The Martian
Between Two Thorns
The Diabolic
Children of Time

Leticia, I think I will take your list for the non-SFF books -they look interesting.

Have fun! It's difficult to keep the list to 20 books.

Agree the must reads are the ones that give the landmarks to the landscape, and I think this is a really interesting question for SFF partly because it seems to me that a lot of attempts to include SFF in a review of the canon get it wrong. (*glares at Boxall's 1001 Books You Must Read Before You Die*) Not sure I have it in me to narrow to 20 of my own suggestions, but the one I would add to those already listed as being foundational for a lot of other stories is Alice's Adventures in Wonderland / Through the Looking-Glass. (I reread them both a few years ago and then suddenly Alice references were everywhere.)

I think the only thing that makes a book a 'Must Read' is when you are speaking to someone whom you assume shares the same 'taste' in reading as you. Then conversation sparks between you as your casual banter turns into a shared universe of loves and hates, for a book that was hated could be shared between book friends just as much as a book loved. Many times this gives you and your friend a better comparison when speaking of books in general.

When I'm speaking to someone that shares my taste of adventure my 'Must Read' tends to have a deep love or adoration confliction. Kvothe and Denna is probably the best example of this from the Kingkiller Chronicle. Another is Wade and Artemis from Ready Player one, or even Locke and Sabetha from Gentlemen bastards.

To me this gives a real purpose for the motivation behind the main characters actions. For example, how Darrow acts after losing EO in Red Rising. Personally I feel that rage, the loss, the motivation to do something crazy, to gamble hard against all odds.

These aren't going to satisfy ever readers needs when speaking of a Must Read but to someone who shares the same feelings about these books, we might find within each other a special list of recommendations that fuels a specific desire we share when reading similar novels. I enjoy the Mistborn a lot but I don't get that same particular vibe with Vin. Shallan and Kaladin started developing this and then the energy dissipated for me.

I think I enjoy this situation most. The Romeo and Juliet, the Samson and Delilah. Possibly because I'm more Fantasy driven, I enjoy the knight fighting on behalf of the princess. The Jon Snow and Ygritte development just gets me everytime.

Should we compose the list into 20 fantasy and 20 SF, or 10 of each?

Fantasy:
The Name of the Wind
Shōgun
A Game of Thrones
The Way of Kings
Outlander
The Lord of the Rings
Homeland
A Wizard of Earthsea

ScienceFiction:
Ready Player One
Morning Star
Old Man's War
The Circle
The Giver
The Martian

I’m also not sure there are 20 must read books. I think there’s enough of a Venn diagram of overlapping concepts that there are many paths to being fluent in SFF. That said, the more books we have read in common the easier it will be to make & get references.

Yeah, I tried and even squeezing my head I only got 14. I'm sure there is plenty I haven't read yet but now I feel like i'm just trying to fill the list.

Must reads = a book that will add to your experience of the world or a book that was a building block/first of its kind in a genre

Dune by Frank Herbert
Macbeth by William Shakespeare
The Wonderful Wizard of Oz by L. Frank Baum
The Lord of the Rings (all 3) by J.R.R. Tolkien
Sherlock Holmes: The Complete Novels and Stories, Volume I by Arthur Conan Doyle
The Handmaid's Tale by Margaret Atwood
The Metamorphosis by Franz Kafka
Rebecca by Daphne du Maurier
Orlando by Virginia Woolf
Dhalgren by Samuel R. Delany - do not read this if you're not into graphic sex scenes and violence.

I might add more later

Brandon, you list is near perfect. I’d swap Romeo and Juliet for Hamlet though too.

This is really hard. Wicked hard if you happen to be from New England. Particularly with it not limited to SFF. For myself, I will stick to fiction. The order does not imply a ranking, only when it hit my mind.
1 Lord of the Rings
2 Dune
3 1984
4 Brave New World
5 The Iliad and The Odyssey (taken as one)
6 War and Peace
7 Musashi
8 The Water Margin
9 Foundation Trilogy (taken as one)
10The Mote in God's Eye
11 Atlas Shrugged
12 The Greenlanders
13 Njal's Saga
14 The Killer Angels
15 The Martian
16 The Left Hand of Darkness
17 The Winds of War and War and Remembrance (taken as one)
18 All Quiet on the Western Front
19 Game of Thrones
20 The Source

I know this leaves out many books that one could argue are more critical that the ones I listed, but these are ones that significantly affected me when I read them. I think that meets the criteria.

beautiful comments, AMG, I think your list and reasoning are valid and good

I really like your take on this AMG, thank you for sharing all the memories! 😊

Those are some interesting choices, AMG, and thanks for the reasoning behind the choice.

Too hard to come up with 20 so I'll just toss in a handful.

For me the biggest thing of all is story and originality. I most admire books that are the first of their kind. Clearly TLOTR and 1984 are watershed books but others include:

Trainspotting
Catch-22
The Orphan Master's Son
The Sirens of Titan
Chimera
The Stone Cage
The Day of the Triffids
The Zero Stone and its sequel
Wolf Hall
The Last Magician probably the best Australian novel I've read
The Book Thief

And for sheer storytelling power, just about anything by Bernard Cornwell (historical novelist).

I haven't given this much thought but those are all cracking books.

My number 1 book as of late is The Dispossessed — not only for its quality of story but its big ideas as well; specifically, its exploration of governance in counterpoint to The Moon is a Harsh Mistress. Still relevant today and, I suspect, into the near future.

yes yes yes!

I'll list some I recommend to folks, but it always depends on the person and their likes if I think its a must read if you will.

The book that changed my life was Borderlands/La Frontera: The New Mestiza by the late Gloria E. Anzaldúa, it is a non fiction book though.

Some other non fiction books I recommend: Silencing the Past: Power and the Production of History and Decolonizing Methodologies: Research and Indigenous Peoples

For those who like Urban Fantasy:
The Others series starting with Written in Red or Mercy Thompson starting with Moon Called

Or fantasy in general: The Way of Thorn and Thunder, The Fifth Season, Wayward series starting with Every Heart a Doorway, Stormlight archives starting with The Way of Kings

Those who like historical fiction: Kindred, Mexican Gothic, And I Darken and Outlander

Some authors I recommend for SF lovers: Octavia E. Butler, Ursula K. Le Guin, Rivers Solomon- I really like the botm read The Vanished Birds or genre benders like Thursday Next that starts with The Eyre Affair or Jane, Unlimited

Dark books or heartbreaking but lovely books: Challenger Deep, The Deep, I Stop Somewhere, Sawkill Girls, The Female of the Species, We Are the Ants

whoops I think this is more than 20

I love making lists of books, and I often chime in on social media when people are asking for recommendations, often mentioning the same few books, though it varies a bit depending on who is asking.
As of now, here are my 20 'Must Reads' in the SFF genres. I read ~300-350 books per year, so over time my top 20 lists change a lot as I come across even better books. I also tend to leave out the super-obvious titles, since many people interested in these genres already have been recommended those titles.

1. Simple Prayers, by Michael Golding
2. The Every, by Dave Eggers
3. The Goblin Emperor, by Katherine Addison
4. Clockwork Angels, by Kevin J. Anderson
5. Jingo, by Terry Pratchett
6. Pattern Recognition, by William Gibson
7. Ender's Game, by Orson Scott Card
8. If the Stars are Gods, by Gordon Eklund and Gregory Benford
9. The City of Dreaming Books, by Walter Moers
10. Vermillion Sands, by J.G. Ballard
11. Seed, by Rob Ziegler
12. Aurora, by Kim Stanley Robinson
13. Artemis, by Andy Weir
14. An Unkindness of Ghosts, by Rivers Solomon
15. All the Birds in the Sky, by Charlie Jane Anders
16. Gormenghast, by Mervyn Peake
17. The Cosmic Puppets, by Philip K. Dick
18. The Outsider, by Stephen King
19. No One is Here Except All of Us, by Ramona Asubel
20. Hazards of Time Travel, by Joyce Carol Oates

If I wanted to make a list, I'd choose the books that "if everyone would read this, the world would be a better place." For example The Princess and the Goblin and The Golden Name Day. Those are 'must' reads, imo.

Of course, I mean, read it in your formative years and take it to heart.

But as Amy (Other Amy) says, "the ones that give the landmarks to the landscape" are too many to narrow to twenty. And what about all the poetry that gives us so many SF titles, like the one that includes the line about Golden Apples of the Sun, and To Your Scattered Bodies Go?" Imo, the kind of lists showing up here are chasing rainbows. All we can do is keep learning all our lives... read & converse, widely & attentively.

(Ok, granted, maybe I'm feeling a bit cranky, because there are a lot of books mentioned above that I've tried to read and won't finish, a lot that I won't try, and a lot that I've never heard of. So, in my world they're far from musts....)

Well that was the other mission of this thread, to say what a "must read" is. Because I don't think that as an adult I've said "you must [consume anything]." So it sounds like for you, Cheryl, a must read list is most beneficial if it's about things that make the world a better place. What would that list look like?

I like the idea of landmark lists...there are a lot of books that are so referenced and in conversation with earlier or later works that I know I've had "aha" moments when I read them in sequence. (Ex. Moon is a Harsh Mistress and Dispossessed. Those are inextricably communicating around each other).

I also like the idea of lists for people who love like I do. I have a few friends who can say "Add this immediately to your TBR" and I know that that isn't a must-read like I am a lesser person for not having read it, or bound to miss important historical moments, but that this person knows me well enough to say I will really like something. That list would be extremely specific and personal, I think.

And this post is also because I was somewhat cranky. Around this time every year, as I mentioned, there's usually a "best books of the year/ 100 books to read before you die / best books in the US" and other lists that always just feel...kinda arbitrary and stale to me? So I was curious what the group thought!

I think it comes to taste. Maybe we should have headed the must read with a topic first.

If you loved video games in the 80s then you MUST READ ready player one.

Or something like that?

Allison wrote: I like the idea of landmark lists...

I agree that landmark books are very important (and the stories on that list can change, depending on the times), but a "must-read" (in addition to being well written) should also deal with big ideas.

Allison wrote: I also like the idea of lists for people who love like I do. "

Exactly! I recommended Usurper of the Sun to a colleague because they liked The Three-Body Problem; they both deal with big ideas with regard to first encounters.

For this reason, I have a bunch of different top 10 bookshelves; top 10 manga, top 10 sci-fi, top 10 self-actualization...

I think different top lists for different genres is a good idea, though I'm still focused on the fabulous. (I feel like some pretty good canon lists exist outside SFF, but not much in the way of good resources for SFF.) I started to make a stab at top tens for different genres of SFF, but I couldn't quite decide on the scope of the project. Maybe SFFBC could make a Listopia of must reads (or two, one for SF and one for fantasy)? Just throwing an idea out there.

that could be fun, Amy! Would you help us spearhead that?

Sure I can do that.

Science fiction list is here.

Fantasy list is here.

thank you!