Book of the New Sun is my favorite novel of all time, not just the 80s. Great list by the way.

I've already mentioned my 80's recommendation under one of your previous videos, but as it's topical, I'll do it again 😀Open the Neuromancer book and see whose name is at the top of Gibson's thank-you list. Yep, Bruce Sterling. If you are scared to read Gibson's work, pick up Schismatrix Plus collection first (complete set of Shaper/Mechanist universe). It might make your transition from classic scifi to cyberpunk a lot smoother. A.Reynolds was another writer greatly influenced by Sterling's work. It's just sad no one talks about this masterpiece. Cheers!

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Good picks - I haven't yet read Blood Music - but that's gonna happen soon. Neuromancer pretty much defined SF for me and BotNS, read much more recently (including Urth of the New Sun) is now one of my fave series. Hyperion is tops. Some SF from the 80's that I really enjoyed are: - Mockingbird by Walter Tevis - The Journal Of Nicholas The American by Leigh Kennedy - The Handmaid's Tale by Margaret Atwood (happy to say this was an English text in high school) - Life During Wartime by Lucius Shapard - Ambient by Jack Womack - Consider Phlebas by Iain M Banks

The Books of the new sun are so good. An amazing read. Only the first book was publised in my country in 95 so I read it and the sequels never came. Then in like 2015 I have read it again and I have to buy the rest in English. Not an easy read thanks to the lannguage, but I loved it. Also there is a fifth book, also worth the read, this series, so amazing, please give it a go - everything about it is so amazing.

Some good books. I'm going to have to add Blood Music to my TBR list! Some other 80s books I'd personally recommend would be Dragon's Egg by Robert Forward, Wizard by John Varley, and The Many Colored Land by Julian May. 😊

I liked the contact movie so I really should read that one at some point. Book of the New Sun is one of those that I always think about reading but shy away from it.

What no Granville wilsons 'war of the computers' 😃the dark tower is just fantastic

Awesome vid! As a 90s kid I have a lot of catching up to do with 80s sff. I loved the first two Hyperion books when I read them back in 2010 but never continued with them. Also loved the Contact movie and need to read the book. Blood Music sounds like a must read for me! I liked Enders Game when I was a kid but it didn’t age well when I tried it again as an adult and found it childish. I can’t wait to try the Dark Tower!! Also I read Idoru from William Gibson and found it a quite digestible cyberpunk novel-not sure that something denser like neuromancer would be up my alley as much.

Born in ‘73 so my childhood was the 80s as well. I’ll never forget _Startide Rising_ (David Brin) and the far less remarked upon _The Heart of the Comet_ (David Brin and Gregory Benford).

Great picks! I have read and enjoyed all of your top 5. I wasn’t quite as high on Neuromancer and BotNS as some people but they are worth reading and important to the genre.

If u liked enders game but havent read the next one, you gotta pickup speaker for the dead. Its a much better book IMO. I would also recommend the genius and uncomfortable Dawn by octavia butler. And also the crazy awesome of Grass by Sheri tepper.

I loved the movie “Contact”! I wish I read the book - I’m putting it on my tbr list:))

So glad to see Neuromancer and Ender’s Game on here. Two of my favorites. One book I love from the 80s not on the list is Armor by John Steakley. One of the first sci-fi novels I read.

Some great books in there, in both your 'already read' list and the 'wanna read' list. And interesting to hear your vague comment on Orson Scott Card, with which I agree. I gave Ender's Game four stars in my review on Hardcover, mainly because the book was so much better than the movie. The abusive manipulation of the kids was troubling but I guess creating that tension is one of the book's strengths. Authors don't go far when they are too nice to their characters. Between Book of the New Sun and Neuromancer, good luck picking which one to read first. They both demand of lot of the reader but with a payoff at the end. BOTNS got either 4.5 or 5 stars from me, Neuromancer got 4.5 stars.

This video just expanded my TBR. 😅 Great video as always!

Of all of these books, I would say Neuromancer most closely matched the tone of the 80's and has reverberated to the present day. It's a literary expression of late-stage capitalism itself. I LOVE this book and I identify most closely with the cyberpunk genre - lowlife/high tech, hacking for the people! Great choices, Bart. Enjoy your summer.

Great picks and a lot that I have on my TBR you're making me antsy to read

Never heard of Blood Music. Sounds like it kind of takes inspiration from Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde. I do like books that deal with internal/external changes (like Upgrade by Crouch or Change Agent by Suarez), so this one may need to go on my TBR. 👍

There are times when you are reading a book that you think the author has strokes of genius. Hyperion, The Brothers Karamazov and East of Eden are three novels that did that for me. Also, The Terror by Simmons. Wow, that is a great Winter read. My daughter was born in the 80's. Good times. Alf, Land of the Lost, Xena and the Apple II.

That's a stellar list! I would add Michael Bishop's 'No Enemy But Time' (1982), a wonderfully written time travel novel and one of my favourite reads so far this year, and 'Speaker for the Dead' (1986), the sequel to Ender's Game and a much better novel in my opinion.

Good times! The 80s were so recent (b. 1972) that I don't think much about them when it comes to sci-fi productivity--until I look at a list of the greats (mine from worldswithoutend). Loved your list! I would have Douglas Adams on my list, for sure. Actually, that would be my whole list. I haven't read anything else from the 80s unless you count Lem translations. Wait! "Robots of Dawn" came out in the 80s. I managed to read that. Looks like I have some catching up to do. Just picked up "Riddley Walker" (about a post-apoc world that's been bombed into the stone age, so many won't count it.) Also need to finish "Handmaid's Tale" (another iffy inclusion). What next?! 🤔🤷‍♂

Five great books that I read in the 1980s as well, although I didn’t get along with ‘The Gunslinger’ at the time. Now, after finishing the entire Dark Tower series, I’ve come to really appreciate’The Gunslinger’. That hardcover edition of ‘Hyperion’ is beautiful. The cover art reminds me of H. R. Giger’s art for the movie ‘Alien’.

It would be good for you to review Thomas Sowell. Maybe “Black Rednecks & White Liberals”? Just so you can counter your points of views on certain books that you may have read and gain some moral perspective on matters. Thank you in advance

I loved this airport video! I have Klara and the Sun on my Libby hold list. I’ve been wanting to get to Ishiguro for a long while!

Glad you're enjoying Revelation Space! One of my favourite SF series

Alastair Reynolds is one of my favorite sci-fi authors. Have you read his Prefect Dreyfus Emergencies? They are excellent.

„Clara and the Sun” definitely on my list!

Yes! I'm excited to see what you think about Revolation Space. The first is my favorite, but people tend to like the second the best. Absolutely incredible series! I've only read the trilogy so I'll need to get back into that universe sometime this year.

So many books and so little time! Hope you have a great reading summer. Happy reading.

Thank you, Bart.Your enthusiasm is contagious. I've read about 80% of all that Stephen King write and I confess I've kept The Dark Tower at a distance feeling no particular attraction to it. Now I have a growing itch to check it out. Seven 🛸

Wind through the keyhole is the lesser book in the series, if your going to read it do so before the final book the dark tower (you'll understand why the way it ends)

Ahh, the great conundrum : Do I read the filler books that sit between the main novels? There should be a law against writing them. 😀 I'm currently reading The Sun Eater series and half way through I decided to go back for the fillers. I just want them out of the way so I can get back to the main story. They fill some gaps but they also break into the flow of things.

The more you read the series, the more you appreciate ‘The Gunslinger’ until the end when you want to read it again. Enjoy the journey! There’ll only be one first time.

Love your passion!

I would say there’s nothing wrong with reading Wind Through the Keyhole next at all. I did it the other way around and read it when it came out, a year or two after my second read of the main series and it was nice to go back and revisit the ka tet at that particular period in the timeline. But I think either way is fine. Love that you love Wizard and Glass though, that’s my favourite of the series. Did you know there is a whole comic book series called Gunslinger Born which goes far more into Wizard and Glass related matters? It’s excellent as well!

I've only just become aware of 'The Wind Through the Keyhole'. It wasn't a part of the original publication. I'll have to get on that immediately. Most of my Dark Tower series books have drifted away, and I'm giving serious thought to collecting them again. I read this series (too many) years ago, but your enthusiasm is so joyful, it makes me want to read it again. I'm so happy for you that you've found a series that you truly love. Keep up the great work, Bart.

Adding these to my tbr

Yes, great book. The start had great atmosphere, true. But the ending had an emotional heft to it that I wasn't expecting at all. So, I'd say a strong finish to a very well-written book. Good video. Thanks.

Great haul! Always cool when you can find old copies of books still in good condition.

Another great video. 👏👏👏

ministry of time i thinks its sci-fi romance, just so you know

Way Station is a good one! And Wolves of the Calla is my favourite book of the DT series. I've read Alien Clay by Adrian Tchaikovsky at the beginning of this month - and wow! this was way better than I ecpected. The ending was absolutely gorgeous. My favourite book by him is still Children of Time, but this comes right after that one.

Read Way Station as a teen and loved it. Read the whole Dark Tower series which was excellent. I have My Name is Legion on my TBR. Haven't read No Country for Old Men, but I have read Blood Meridian. Brutal, but worth the read. Also have Endurance on my TBR. I need to move this one up.

Hooray for Wizard and Glass! So glad you’re loving The Dark Tower. I loved Behave and Determined. Sapolski is so good at explaining scientific concepts in a clear, understandable way. Great haul! 😊

Great haul! I’ve got Darwinia sitting on the shelf ready for my science fiction project, but I won’t get to it until early next year. I know very little about it but the premise sounds interesting. Ooo, The Ministry of Time - I really want to read that! Will look forward to hearing what you think of that one. Happy reading, you’ve certainly got plenty of good stuff to keep you going for a bit! 😀

When I see you and other YT booktubers find old copies of classic SF I'm mindful of how much I miss cover art by reading mostly ebooks. This was highlighted for me by doing an image search on Way Station covers. So many different designs over the years. When I'm reading a physical book I pick it up and the cover is the first thing I see. But with ebooks I pick up the e-reader and I'm straight into the text, no cover in sight. Sometimes I've found myself asking "What is the title of this book I'm halfway through?" It sounds silly when i say it like this, but it's one of the benefits of 'real' books.