Definitely Tiptree! There was a really good collection of her short stories published about 20 years ago that I really liked. I can't remember the name of the story, but my favorite one was about the space freighter female worker who mutineed, killed the entire (male) crew, and then took the ship to a planet where the being with whom she had been subconsciously connected with all of her life lived. She couldn't live in the planet's atmosphere, so they just gazed at each other through the ship windows until she finally decided to venture out so they could touch briefly until she finally died from exposure.
My whole life, I've never loved anything else.
Oz ,'Him'
Literary Buffistas 3: Don't Parse the Blurb, Dear.
There's more to life than watching Buffy the Vampire Slayer! No. Really, there is! Honestly! Here's a place for Buffistas to come and discuss what it is they're reading, their favorite authors and poets. "Geez. Crack a book sometime."
Kathy A - Dec 21, 2011 7:16:27 am PST #17103 of 28288
We're very stretchy. - Connie Neil
Fred Pete - Dec 21, 2011 7:43:45 am PST #17104 of 28288
Ann, that's a ferret.
Oh, "Vintage Season"! Yes!
And I don't know whether Shirley Jackson fits into fantasy, but she's definitely worth reading.
Ginger - Dec 21, 2011 8:08:10 am PST #17105 of 28288
"It didn't taste good. It tasted soooo horrible. It tasted like....a vodka martini." - Matilda
Some novels, as I think of them:
- Asimov, Foundation trilogy
- Arthur C. Clark, Childhood's End
- James Blish, A Case of Conscience, the Cities in Flight books
- Gordon Dickson, Soldier, Ask Not and maybe a few more Dorsai books
- Joe Haldeman, The Forever War
- Heinlein before he lost his marbles, including the juveniles (but not Podkayne of Mars), Starship Troopers, The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress, The Puppet Masters and Glory Road
- Vonda N. McIntyre, Dreamsnake
- Clifford Simak, City, Waystation, Time and Again, All Flesh is Grass, Why Call Them Back from Heaven?
- Fritz Leiber, Ill Met in Lankhmar
- LeGuin, The Left Hand of Darkness, The Lathe of Heaven
DavidS - Dec 21, 2011 8:09:30 am PST #17106 of 28288
"Look, son, if it's good enough for Shirley Bassey, it's good enough for you."
Does anybody really like reading Asimov? I think he's an incredibly shitty writer. His characterizations are weak. I know he's in the canon, but I would never recommend him.
Some of the robot short stories and that's it.
Ginger - Dec 21, 2011 8:16:11 am PST #17107 of 28288
"It didn't taste good. It tasted soooo horrible. It tasted like....a vodka martini." - Matilda
The short story is far and away Asimov's best form, but the Foundation trilogy was so influential (including inspiring Paul Krugman to be an economist) that it's de rigueur for an overview of the genre.
Toddson - Dec 21, 2011 8:19:49 am PST #17108 of 28288
Friends don't let friends read "Atlas Shrugged"
In regard to "The Cold Equations" - several years ago someone wrote a short story with the genders reversed (woman pilot, young boy) and solved the damn thing.
-t - Dec 21, 2011 8:24:48 am PST #17109 of 28288
I am a woman of various inclinations and only some of the time are they to burn everything down in frustration
I actually read that before I read Cold Equations (it was about 20 years ago, btw).
Kathy A - Dec 21, 2011 8:27:40 am PST #17110 of 28288
We're very stretchy. - Connie Neil
Does anybody really like reading Asimov? I think he's an incredibly shitty writer. His characterizations are weak. I know he's in the canon, but I would never recommend him.
I really haven't read him in decades, which is why I'm loving the recommendations so I can both catch up on stuff that's new to me, and revisit stuff I haven't read since college. When I picked up Canticle last year, I really appreciated finding out that it holds up to rereading after the end of the Cold War.
(And rereading Watership Down five years ago after only reading it once in 1980 was one of the best things I've read in the past decade--I'd forgotten how damn good that book is!)
Ginger - Dec 21, 2011 8:27:44 am PST #17111 of 28288
"It didn't taste good. It tasted soooo horrible. It tasted like....a vodka martini." - Matilda
I haven't seen that. It would certainly be a much different story.
-t - Dec 21, 2011 8:31:39 am PST #17112 of 28288
I am a woman of various inclinations and only some of the time are they to burn everything down in frustration
It's called The Cold Solution by Don Sakers (I was right, published in 1991).