Found on various librarian oriented weblogs, most particularly the Librarian in Black and VALIS and I thought I'd carry it on:
“Below is a Science Fiction Book Club list most significant SF novels
between 1953-2006. The meme part of this works like so: Bold the ones
you have read, strike through the ones you read and hated, italicize
those you started but never finished and put a star next to the ones
you love.”
1. The Lord of the
Rings, J.R.R. Tolkien * High Castle Mission Zanzibar
2. The Foundation Trilogy, Isaac
Asimov*
3. Dune, Frank Herbert
4. Stranger in a Strange Land,
Robert A. Heinlein
5. A Wizard of Earthsea, Ursula K. Le Guin
6. Neuromancer, William Gibson
7. Childhood’s End, Arthur C. Clarke*
8. Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?, Philip K. Dick
9. The Mists of Avalon, Marion Zimmer Bradley*
10. Fahrenheit 451, Ray Bradbury
11. The Book of the New Sun, Gene Wolfe
12. A Canticle for Leibowitz, Walter
M. Miller, Jr.
13. The Caves of Steel, Isaac Asimov
14. Children of the Atom, Wilmar Shiras
15. Cities in Flight, James Blish
16. The Colour of Magic, Terry Pratchett
17. Dangerous Visions, edited by
Harlan Ellison
18. Deathbird Stories, Harlan Ellison
19. The Demolished Man, Alfred Bester
20. Dhalgren, Samuel R. Delany
21. Dragonflight, Anne McCaffrey
22. Ender’s Game, Orson Scott Card
23. The First Chronicles of Thomas
Covenant the Unbeliever, Stephen R. Donaldson
24. The Forever War, Joe Haldeman
25. Gateway, Frederik Pohl
26. Harry Potter and the
Philosopher’s Stone, J.K. Rowling
27. The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, Douglas Adams
28. I Am Legend, Richard Matheson
29. Interview with the Vampire, Anne
Rice
30. The Left Hand of Darkness, Ursula K. Le Guin
31. Little, Big, John Crowley
32. Lord of Light, Roger Zelazny
33. The Man in the
34.
35. More Than Human, Theodore Sturgeon
36. The Rediscovery of Man, Cordwainer Smith
37. On the Beach, Nevil Shute
38. Rendezvous with Rama, Arthur C.
Clarke*
39. Ringworld, Larry Niven
40. Rogue Moon, Algis Budrys
41. The Silmarillion, J.R.R. Tolkien
42. Slaughterhouse-5, Kurt Vonnegut
43. Snow Crash, Neal Stephenson
44. Stand on
45. The Stars My Destination, Alfred Bester
46. Starship Troopers, Robert A.
Heinlein
47. Stormbringer, Michael Moorcock*
48. The Sword of Shannara, Terry Brooks
49. Timescape, Gregory Benford
50. To Your Scattered Bodies Go, Philip Jose Farmer*
Yup.... really don't like McCaffrey - having met her at a WorldCon I can confirm that she is a truely unpleasant, arrogant person. Pratchett is a great bloke, love talking to him/listening to him, but won't read his stuff... I simply don't like humour in SF, with maybe the exception of Glenn Cook. The Moorcock isn't the best, and I'd prefer 'Warhound and the World's Pain', but that's the problem of a list. Interview with a Vampire is overhyped, overblown rubbish. As for Douglas Adams.... words do not exist to express how much I loath that book.