Books, books, books

[allana]

The most significant SF/F novels from 1953-2006 according to Time.

Bold the ones you've read, strike-out the ones you hated, italicize those you started but never finished and put an asterisk beside the ones you loved.

The Lord of the Rings, J.R.R. Tolkien *
The Foundation Trilogy, Isaac Asimov
Dune, Frank Herbert
Stranger in a Strange Land, Robert A. Heinlein
A Wizard of Earthsea, Ursula K. Le Guin *
Neuromancer, William Gibson
Childhood's End, Arthur C. Clarke
Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?, Philip K. Dick
The Mists of Avalon, Marion Zimmer Bradley
Fahrenheit 451, Ray Bradbury
The Book of the New Sun, Gene Wolfe
A Canticle for Leibowitz, Walter M. Miller, Jr.
The Caves of Steel, Isaac Asimov
Children of the Atom, Wilmar Shiras
Cities in Flight, James Blish
The Colour of Magic, Terry Pratchett*
Dangerous Visions, edited by Harlan Ellison
Deathbird Stories, Harlan Ellison
The Demolished Man, Alfred Bester
Dhalgren, Samuel R. Delany
Dragonflight, Anne McCaffrey *
Ender's Game, Orson Scott Card
The First Chronicles of Thomas Covenant the Unbeliever, Stephen R. Donaldson
The Forever War, Joe Haldeman
Gateway, Frederik Pohl
Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone, J.K. Rowling*
The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, Douglas Adams*
I Am Legend, Richard Matheson
Interview with the Vampire, Anne Rice
The Left Hand of Darkness, Ursula K. Le Guin
Little, Big, John Crowley
Lord of Light, Roger Zelazny
The Man in the High Castle, Philip K. Dick
Mission of Gravity, Hal Clement
More Than Human, Theodore Sturgeon
The Rediscovery of Man, Cordwainer Smith
On the Beach, Nevil Shute ***** I love this book to bits
Rendezvous with Rama, Arthur C. Clarke
Ringworld, Larry Niven
Rogue Moon, Algis Budrys
The Silmarillion, J.R.R. Tolkien
Slaughterhouse-5, Kurt Vonnegut
Snow Crash, Neal Stephenson
Stand on Zanzibar, John Brunner
The Stars My Destination, Alfred Bester
Starship Troopers, Robert A. Heinlein
Stormbringer, Michael Moorcock
The Sword of Shannara, Terry Brooks
Timescape, Gregory Benford
To Your Scattered Bodies Go, Philip Jose Farmer

In other book news, I'm currently reading The Dirty Bits for Girls (edited by India Knight) which is such a blast from the past.  I vividly remember books being furtively passed round the classroom, especially during Guidance classes--has there ever been a worse name for sex-ed/common sense/life education? --and that's exactly what this bok is. All the dirty bits. I may not remember the teachers' names, but I do remember girls giggling over a copy of Forever while the teacher blushingly demonstrated how to put a condom on a humorously enormous cucumber.  I was usually excluded from this sort of stuff, on the grounds that I was "too innocent" for this stuff, or "you'll never have a boyfriend anyway, 'cos you're black, so you don't need to know about sex."  I went to school with some real charmers.

When you've read your way through all the 80s bonkbusters--ahh, Judith Krantz! Jilly Cooper! Jackie Collins! Pat Boothe!--and ferreted out your dad's porn collection by the age of 12, Judy Blume holds bugger all interest.  Now, if they'd been passing round The Story of O or anything by the Marquis de Sade, I'd have been more intriegued.  Dad's porn was very vanilla and I only got round to reading that lot when I borrowed them off the shrink who lived upstairs when I was in Uni.

Talking of bonkbusters, does anyone recognise the following rambling reminiscence?

Black hardback, white lilly/orchid on the front, woman marries domineering man who has her clit pierced (non con) and a little gold bell hung from it so that he can hear her coming (boom-boom!).  I remember extravagant lifestyles, lots of champagne, sex on beaches and it wasn't by any of the above writers... it lived over on the other side of the adult section, near the R's--I found it at the same time I discovered "Miss Read" and her charming recollections of rural village life.  Now there's eclectic reading for you!

If you passed "dirty books" around class, hid at the back of libraries and looked at nude photographs/art, and sniggered every time somone said "turgid" in biology, then this would make a good read and probably a very good Christmas present.

Comments

[kraftpistole.livejournal.com]

I had, I think, one "dirty" book passed on to me, and it wasn't all that dirty [and I was warned about it]. The rest I read by myself, in the back of the library or the bookstore. I never told anyone, nor did I want to. It was more interesting, for me, when nobody knew that I knew. They thought I was the most virginal thing ever. But when I was 10 or so, I was drawing porn, and wanking off to it--though I had no idea what, exactly, I was doing.

Mum found it, by mistake. She didn't hit me. Instead, she made me destroy all of it. I tried to salvage it... only to realize that, once discovered, it no longer had the same power.

So I drew more. And kept it better hidden.

Hnh. Haven't thought about this in years.

[glam-ang.livejournal.com]

Drawing your own porn is definitely more impressive than just being able to ferret out any vaguely dirty book in the library! I have to say that when mum kept removing naughty books from my room, it just made it even more exciting. Forbidden fruit and all that....

[kraftpistole.livejournal.com]

Exactly. I mean, why where they hiding it? It had to be something interesting. [laugh] It's weird, though, 'cause Mum never talked about sex with me... but I still knew what it was somehow, even before they started talking about it in Biology class. And even then Mum never said anything beyond, "Your father and I love each other" and "Some day..." Any and all questions I had were answered by fiction, imagination, comics, and Metal.

[bella-cheval.livejournal.com]

I was usually excluded from this sort of stuff, on the grounds that I was "too innocent" for this stuff, or "you'll never have a boyfriend anyway, 'cos you're black, so you don't need to know about sex."

WHAT. THE. FUCK???

[shakes head and mutters]

My introduction to porn was a book called Mandarin Orange Sunday. It was cheezy as fuck and almost verging on major MarySueness but it was fun.

[glam-ang.livejournal.com]

You have to remember that I was the only black kid at high school for years, and the only mixed race family in town, too. Rural/remote community, too, which didn't help.

[anavrinny.livejournal.com]

Harold.. someone? Wrote a lot of books that sound like the one you described ;)

.. and yeah I'm with you. My mother had a lot of those soft-core porn books (which I started reading very young, hell she let me read all her other books!)

[glam-ang.livejournal.com]

Not Harold Robbins, alas. This was written by a woman.

Mum had a few racy books, but it was when we went to Barbados that I got my real introduction. Her sister had mountains and mountains of soft-core and hard-core porn books, and since I was sharing a room with her... I read them all :) I was 11.

[evaine.livejournal.com]

Frank Yerby. The Foxes of Harrow and The Golden Hawk amongst others. As well as Rosemary's Baby. I was... um... not quite 12. My mom never censored my reading, I read those books quite openly. She just told me to come to her with any questions I might have about what I read. I never did though. *LOL* Oh, and those Harold.. someone books? We had those too - Harold Robbins. Very racy back in the day.

And the book that got passed around in high school? One of the ones I remember was The Godfather by Mario Puzo. Page.. um... 72? When Sonny takes the bridesmaid up against the door. This WAS the early 70's, remember. *LOL*

[glam-ang.livejournal.com]

Heh, they mention that scene in The Godfather in the introduction to the collection--I had no idea it was originally a book!!

Mum and dad tried to censor my reading once they actually paid attention to what I was reading. I remember mum sending dad into my bedroom to try and explain to me why I shouldn't be reading The Clan of the Cave Bear.

Ahh... Harold Robbins. Absolutely obsessed with huge breasts. I remember him writing a scene with a structural engineer being asked to make the perfect bra for some well-endowed starlet :P

[evaine.livejournal.com]

Ah, yes, I remember that scene. Taken from real life, that was. Howard Hughes, who was an engineer by trade, if I'm not mistaken (you know the RICH and wacky recluse?), he once designed a bra for the well-endowed actress, Jane Russell (she, who in later years did the Playtex "Cross My Heart" bra commercials on TV). It was while she was making the film Outlaw, I think.

*grin*