Forever shaped the genre?!
November 28th, 2020I included this news in my October 22nd newsletter, but forgot, until now, to post it here. If you haven’t yet signed up for my newsletter, you really, really should. It’s fun, it’s once every four weeks (with an occasional special issue), and it’s the best way to stay in touch.
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My 2013 indie novel, The Red: First Light, marked my return to novel-length science fiction after a hiatus of many years. To the surprise of just about everyone, including me, it became a Nebula-award nominee, and was later re-published by Simon & Schuster’s Saga Press, as the first of a trilogy.
Again to my surprise, it’s just been included on a list of “15 recent sci-fi books that forever shaped the genre.” (Recent as in the last 15 years.) The list appears at the gaming and entertainment website, Polygon.
This list is, of course, just one man’s opinion. (Thank you, Andrew!) I can’t help but observe that the Red trilogy is rather obscure compared to nearly every other included title.
Of those other titles, I’ve read ten and tried two more without finishing them. How about you? How many of the books on this list have you read?
Posted on: Saturday, November 28th, 2020 at 5:15 am
Categories: Reviews.
Tags: The Red: First Light
November 28th, 2020 at 4:25 pm
I’ve read nine of them and have three more in my already bought TBR pile. (Or perhaps I should say I read 11 of 17 as he counts your The Red trilogy as one book.)
Interesting list. I added one to my want-to-read list. I would have swapped out others. For example I wouldn’t include Aurora as I don’t think it especially “important”. (Just KSR trying to bore us to death, especially in the second half.)
Anyway, nice to make such a list, no?
November 28th, 2020 at 6:39 pm
The three Young Gods in the 1990s were:
– Linda Nagata
– Kathleen Ann Goonan
– Eric S. Nylund
And in that order.
I need to cycle through all the books again. I have all three of you guys gathered together in shared boxes. I think of all of you as a set.
I also need to read Nylund’s Dry Water, again.
I can’t tell you how many times that I have read Dry Water. I bought that in mass market when it first came out, then finally tracked it down in hardback in 2003.
There were times that I would get up from bed, late at night, walk in the dark to the book sitting on the shelf, and place it on my desk to read the next day. It’s been too long.
Thanks…
November 29th, 2020 at 9:06 am
I’ve read The Windup Girl, The Martian, your Red Trilogy, and The Three-Body Problem. If those books are an indication of what the other books on the list are like, I would say if anyone wants to get excited about science fiction, these books would do it. I zoomed through all six of those books. They were all exhilarating. It confirmed to me that writing is still superior to any other medium out there. So many amazing ideas. They all created in me a sense of wonder, which I believe is the hallmark of great books.
November 30th, 2020 at 10:13 am
For me, too, a sense of wonder is an aspect of the best, most memorable books. Lists like this though, are really interesting to me because they make it clear, through people’s reactions, how individualistic reading preferences are. My tastes overlap those of the author of the piece, but definitely diverge at other points!