From the Glen Weldon article:

Gary K. Wolfe, again: "It surprises me a bit that you have to get down to #20 (Frankenstein) before you come to the first work by a woman, or that there are only 5 women authors in the top 50."

I am the opposite of surprised.

Me too, Dana.

James Nicoll has a list of the women: [link]

Shocking and disappointing that LeGuin doesn't show up until #45, in fact after McCaffrey and MZB. Seriously? ::sigh::

I'm about to be blasphemous, I think, but I don't care much for LeGuin. Unless her stuff for adults is better? I read all the Earthsea books for a class in college and was bored to tears. I found that she wrote really fantastic dialogue, but people hardly ever spoke, and that all the narration was presented in an almost condescending tone, as if I were supposed to know the story already.

Unless her stuff for adults is better? I read all the Earthsea books for a class in college and was bored to tears.

LeGuin's YA is not the same as her adult fiction. However if you found the Earthsea novels boring then I don't think you would like her adult work, either.

all the narration was presented in an almost condescending tone, as if I were supposed to know the story already

Yes, because it's a legend. I wouldn't say it's condescending, but the narrative convention, especially for the first one, is that this is basically "The Legend of Sparrowhawk: The Early Years". The imaginary audience already knows who Ged grows up to be.

So we traded picks and made our own top ten of just Fantasy and I like our list better.

I like yours better, too. I don't know all of those, but the ones I know, I like. And I'm not even that big on fantasy -- you two should do a separate SF list too.

The NPR list is exactly what people should expect from an internet poll. Well, I'm slightly surprised that Neil Gaiman is only listed 4 times, but other than that.

The NPR list is exactly what people should expect from a internet poll

Really? I think it's very good for an internet poll. May not be *my* picks, but I would probably enjoy reading many of those books, and I've known about but not been tempted by Hec's list for a while now.

Yes, because it's a legend. I wouldn't say it's condescending, but the narrative convention, especially for the first one, is that this is basically "The Legend of Sparrowhawk: The Early Years". The imaginary audience already knows who Ged grows up to be.

I understood that, but it still just bothered me. I don't know. I think perhaps I would have liked them better in that class had they not immediately followed The Once ad Future King, which is basically my favorite book of all time. We had also just read The Golden Compass and Wicked, which I adored.

I'm sorry! I might give LeGuin another chance, because everyone who is not me seems to love her.

I loved the Earthsea books when I read them as a kid. When I tried to reread as an adult? They bored me to tears and I couldn't even get through the first one. But I'm not a huge SF/Fantasy reader either.

I couldn't get into the Earthsea books (only tried to read them as an adult) but I generally love LeGuin. Try The Dispossessed or The Left Hand of Darkness, zuisa. Or Those Who Walk Away From Omelas if a short story will do. Hey, you said you needed to read more SF, I'm helping!

I'm on a fantasy novella and short story kick right now and it is convincing me that I am definitely not a hardcore fantasy fan. What I like of the genre I like a whole lot, but what I don't like really irritates me.

I think it's very good for an internet poll.

It is a great list of the SF books most likely to be popular among people who'd visit the NPR website. I'm not saying I hate the books. Well, I do hate some of them, but I like a lot of them too. But I already know what books the internet likes. I don't know why it's interesting to keep rediscovering the same things about the same people over and over -- are people online normally so reticent about expressing what they are fans of that we need to draw them out?

I like having ways to discover new things. A curated list, where I know who is recommending things and whether we have similar tastes, is of some use to me when I am looking for new things. A vaguely defined "poll" of an unspecified number of anonymous people just tells me... that a website wants to drive up their traffic.