One of our favorite features here at GetGlue is our Top Lists. Not only do they show what’s popular with our users, but they also include individual lists that break our categories into genres and subgenres. We’d like to make these as complete as possible, and we just updated our list of essential sci-fi novels.
Speculative fiction is an undeniable favorite with our users, and we want to make sure that our list reflects your favorites as well as the genre’s best titles for you to discover. Our list is filled with literary classics, popular essentials, and the newer books that are currently capturing your imagination.
Before the revamp, we had a number of the genre’s classics, such as Dune, Strangers in a Strange Land, and Neuromancer. However, we want to make sure that our picks show science fiction’s rich past as well as its vibrant present. Our list now includes contemporary favorites such as the gasp-inducingly good Hunger Games, Boing Boing blogger Cory Doctorow’s Little Brother, and Twilight author Stephenie Meyer’s sci-fi foray The Host.
Adding award winners is also a big priority when improving our lists. The Hugo and Nebula ceremonies are like the Oscars of science-fiction and fantasy writing, except with less Harry Winston jewelry present. Title holders such as Dan Simmons’s Hyperion, Vernor Vinge’s A Fire Upon the Deep, and Greg Bear’s Darwin’s Radio are now in their rightful place at GetGlue as part of the list.
We also recognize that our original list could be more diverse. Samuel R. Delaney has been a force in literary science fiction for decades, and his Dhalgren now sits on our list with works from other genre giants such as Isaac Asimov and Arthur C. Clarke.
Octavia E. Butler’s wonderful Kindred — a story about a modern black woman who travels back in time to save the life of her white ancestor — is on school reading lists for a reason, and we’re happy to add it to ours. Other deserving female authors — such as Margaret Atwood, Lois McMaster Bujold, and Connie Willis — are now included on the list as well.
Because science fiction isn’t just about space, we want to add environments and titles such as the post-apocalyptic wasteland of A Canticle for Leibowitz and the futuristic dystopia in Brave New World. And no sci-fi list would be complete without The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy. There may not be much actual science, per se, in Douglas Adam’s the side-splittingly hilarious classic, but it’s a fine antidote to the more serious stories of alien invasions and worlds ending.
We hope you’re reminded of a forgotten favorite or exposed to a book that will change your way of thinking about the universe. Like our other top lists, our picks for essential science fiction novels are forever evolving and improving. We’d love your feedback on the list. Does this feel more complete than its last incarnation? Is there anything we’ve missed?
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