THE 25 BEST SCIENCE FICTION BOOKS I'VE EVER READ (PHASE TWO)  

I appreciate how incredibly independent this list is when compared against the rest of the SF community, and the amount of care you put into explaining why these works are so important. You’ve spurred me into seeking out more books than anyone else on book tube. Just ordered a copy of Molly Zero. Thanks!

Really enjoyed this. A few of these books are completely new to me. Really need to expedite the Ballard and Priest titles I have on hand in the reading order.

this series (and channel in general) is such a gift. my love of and fascination with SF only deepens with each of your videos. thank you and bravo!

I came here after Bookpilled mentioned your channel many times, and I must say that this was a very informative video that made me put many more books unto my to-read list, but most importantly I thought it was really nice to see someone who loves books so much, the enthusiasm glows off the screen. Thank you!

Time well spent!! Thank You! I was in England from 1986- 1990. Bought Pringle's 100 best SF books and then colllected them all....with a lot of nice hardback editions. They all disappeared during a divorce. Retired now with some time to read so may have to start my search for some of these again!!

Yes, definitely read "Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?" but no, don't "forget Blade Runner" (1982). Great book. Great film.

I am pleased that you gave the movie "Blade Runner" its due both as cinema and for helping to resurrect Phillip K. Dick. For me, the movie is simply the best SF cinema ever made and has no equal. The novel is also excellent, and the title alone is masterful. Well done.

May happiness rain down on you for your selection of "1984" as the best SF novel ever. It is one of the few novels I have ever read twice, I recommend it to everyone, and I finally convinced my wife to read it and coincidentally she completed it TODAY ! I think of it as more borderline science fiction/ political fiction dystopia, but it is so chilling. I believe that 1984 and "Brave New World" taken together describe the strange amalgam of so much of Western society today. BTW, I was listening to a radio program today and the speaker said that the forthcoming Penguin edition of 1984 will undergo changes to make it more "acceptable" and "accessible" to modern readers who may be offended by Orwell's masterpiece. How tragic it would be if this is true, and if so, does Penguin realize how they are the Big Brother that validates Orwell's warning to us?

I just subscribed. I found out about your channel by way of Michael K. Vaughn's channel when he mentioned your "100 Must Read Science Fiction Novels". Hats off to Mr. Vaughn for guiding me here.

Wot no schlocky space opera!? This is a serious list with some serious depth of expertise on show. Top drawer. PS I can't see Crash as SF (or sci fi😊) and didn't much enjoy it either. Horses for courses.

One your finest Stephen. You've got to be the very best and most erudite commentators on the sf scene. You've really rekindled my love of sf after 60 years of being away from it. Full marks.

This video shows the potential that this channel has. It could very well become the biggest SF channel on youtube. The content is fantastic as always, but it also shows that lists like this are something people are looking for. I’m not suggesting that you change the overall direction of your videos, after all, this is YOUR channel. However, as someone who would like this content to be known by more people, it could be a good trade off to drop a video like this every now and then. Amazing stuff and a good bunch of books that are going on my TBR. On another note, if you could indulge me: do you know a good alternative for bookdepository? International readers are mourning.

Your videos make me realize how little I know about science fiction and how much I have to discover. That's a good thing! Fascinating list; I've read several of the books or a different book by some of your chosen writers (High Rise by Ballard and Inverted World by Priest, for instance). Thanks for all the thought and care you obviously put into your videos. Your love of science fiction comes through loud and clear.

I could listen to you talk all night. What a deeply underrated channel

I love your channel mate. I just found you but I’ve bought 4 books and wishlisted another 10 or so. You do a very good job at this and are obviously very well read. Nice work!

Loving the In Search Of Space T-Shirt,.... Great video. Thankyou 😀

Thank you for the suggestions and the education!

Great video, was looking for months for a video like this. I feel really transported back to my teenage years, when every sci-fi book just blew my mind.

Enjoyed this hugely, Steve. Was thrilled to see you show your 1976 Pan edition of The Time Machine. That's the one I have (most likely bought at WH Smith in '76). I re-read my original copy just a few months ago. A perfect book from start to finish.

Stephen, excellent video, and I really enjoy your in-depth take on these many classic SF works. Your efforts here continue to expand the scope and appreciation I have for the foundational works of SF. Many times I get a good reminder that I need to be a more disciplined reader. So many enthralling books. BTW, I recently grabbed a copy of “The Glamour,” 2d Ed. It’s on the TBR.

When I was 9 in 1970 we went on holiday to Majorca. I wasn't remotely interested in getting sunburn so I did lots of reading in the shade. I bought a very cheap compliation of Hugo award-winning short fiction, which included 2 HE pieces: "The beast...." and "I have no mouth...." I didn't get "The beast", but I was only 9, but I was terrified by "I have no mouth"

Outstanding presentation, Stephen, and there are many books on your list that are on mine. Some common author's, but with different books, but overall we coincide quite a bit. I've read most of the works you mentioned, Ballard, Priest, Dick, Bester, Ellison, Wells, are central for me. Wells initiated me into SF with The Time Machine, Dick and Lem opened my eyes to a different dimension in SF, Priest removed and rewired my brain, M. John Harrison put it back in

Great selection, thank you. I started reading Eric Frank Russell and EE Doc Smith when I was 5 years old back in 1960. To this day I probably read 2 or 3 books a week when I am not gaming. I really appreciate this list and there are some new to me authors for me to explore, so thank you again ^_^ I love Harlan Ellison too.

Great insights. Great books. Great video! Yet more books added to my TBR. Making a trip to Hay on Wye soon. Maybe I'll find some there. I'm a reader who often explores multiple short story anthologies as a way to understand how science fiction and the ideas it explores developed over time. I find this enhances my enjoyment of my reading immensely. Hence why I love the context that you bring to the books you talk about, whether that is about the author's oeuvre, other literature, the times or your own. Keep up the great work.

came across your channel as bart gave you a shoutout in his video. i recently discovered sci fi as a genre for reading so this video is perfect!

Extraordinary video and a very nice choice or books. I ve read most of them, but some are really a discovery for me

Hello there Mr Outlaw Bookseller, I really enjoyed your two videos on your 25 "best" SF books. Quite a different list compared with most of the others out there, of course you have plenty of classics in there at the end of the day a great book is a great book such as FRANKENSTEIN by Mary Shelley, 1984, Do androids dream ..., THE TIME MACHINE, etc but you also have many lesser acclaimed works such as PAVANE, THE GLAMOUR, THE FINAL PROGRAMME, etc all very British! I am your age and also live in the UK and started my SF journey by reading YA SF from the library when I was 8 years old like Danny Dunn time traveler, Space adventures by Hugh Walters and Trillions by Nicholas Fisk. I have subscribed so catch you later.

A really nice selection of books, and won't argue with any of your choices. I don't normally enjoy these countdown videos but these two were good as you took the time and I'm not yet ready to put such a beast together. Moorcock was my route into both Fantasy and SF when I was 12 or 13, I first hit the Cornelius novels when I was eighteen. My choice would have been something slightly later, Blood: A Southern Fantasy with A Condition of Muzak as a close second. Also love Byzantium Endures but while it touches on the fantastical with Pyat's crazy schemes, very much not an SF novel. Naturally I stumbled onto M. John Harrison from there, really enjoyed his literary novels like Course of the Heart and Signs of Life. I still need to read a few of the more recent ones. I've read Pavane by Keith Roberts, and the old Pan edition of The Furies has to be one of my all time favourite SF covers, but need to read more of his. I have a few of his sitting in my piles of books. Crash would also be my choice for Ballard too, it's just an excellent book and one of the ones where I also enjoy the adaptations, both Cronenberg's film and the song(!) Warm Leatherette by The Normal. I still feel as though Ballard is completely unique, he very much has his own voice. I love Concrete Island and High Rise as well, amongst many others. I rate his short story Billenium really highly as well, just that sense of inevitability. I read it again recently in the Damon Knight edited anthology Cities of Wonder and it hits just as well every time. It's one I frequently talk to people about, in Teams calls at work, any opportunity! I read Wyndham when I was on a post-apocalyptic reading/watching theme for a few years, also hitting John Christopher at the same time, specifically The Death of Grass. It wasn't the first time I'd read him though as we did Empty World in school and I read The Tripods while everyone at school was talking about the TV series (I never saw it at the time). I think I've read most of Wyndham's novel now, even enjoyed The Trouble with Lichen. For Aldiss I'd pick Hothouse but you can't really go far wrong with him, so many good books. I first got that one from the library when I was in my teens, with no expectation of what I was getting into. I've read Ellison, Dick and Delany but they're all authors I need to read more of. I have yet to read Gibson. The internet did predate the book slightly, but his ideas definitely drove where it went beyond the sheer act of linking the machines together in a topology with TCP/IP. Have read a lot of Priest but haven't read The Glamour so need to remedy that. Sounds in the wheelhouse of Iain Bank's The Bridge but I know they're very different writers. Finally read Clockwork Orange a few years ago and loved it, especially getting my head into the language. Read 1984 much longer ago, but still pretty fresh, and still annoying how it's misused so much in discussions around politics and culture. Will always like the book with its multitude of ideas packed in a short novel. My wife was showing off that same Pan copy of The Time Machine at the weekend that she'd found. And I've got a similar edition for War of the Worlds. Such a nice little uniform set. As for female SF authors, I know you touched on some in the previous video. I enjoy Le Guin and Sheri S. Tepper, pretty much anything Angela Carter has put out, but authors like CJ Cherryh, Pat Cadigan and Octavia Butler are still on my to-read list.

Excellent selection. Vey pleased that Wells and Wyndham are so high up on this list. Thanks for compiling this for us. I'm happy to say that I've read most of the books mentioned in this Phase Two list. Not all though. Small city. Limited selection in the local book shops: one major chain, and one independent once long ago. Thus, some of these authors highlighted in this "series" are unknown to me. That's also the legacy of spheres of publication: Canada is dominated by the United States, and by default, unless a British or Australian author got very popular, most authors who are not American (and popular and contemporary) weren't/aren't sold here. Even Canadian authors are largely unknown.

Great list, with some new ones to check out. My seeds into literary SF began with discovering David Pringle's Science Fiction: The 100 Best Novels list on an old online site somewhere. It became my shopping list for a few years as I went to different used book stores and formed a core understanding of sci-fi for me, many of which have showed up on here. Nineteen Eighty Four is such a unique work and was the first entry on Pringle's list. Interesting because it is one of the few SF novels that was required reading in America high school, marking is as part of a literary canon that transcends genre. It might be the only SF book many people end up reading because of that and it still haunts me to this day.

So many new book ideas to add to my list. Love these videos.

In case of Sonic Attack on your district - follow these rules...

What an incredible list. It’s going to cost me a lot of money! You have such a wealth of knowledge of this genre. Subscribed.

Wonderful video. Very informative, with many fascinating insights. Thank you .

The Pi Man - my favourite Bester short. I would probably choose Golem 100 as my favourite novel, although The Demolished Man and the eponymous Tiger Tiger are awesome. Like your list, although I'd put Bester higher ;)

Your reviews of the books are better than the books themselves :)

Loved your list! Just for the heck of it, here's my top ten: 10) More Than Human by Theodore Sturgeon; 9} Gateway by Frederik Pohl; 8) Ender's Game by Orson Scott Card; 7} Hyperion by Dan Simmons; 6} Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury; 5) A Canticle for Leibowitz by Walter Miller; 4) The Left Hand of Darkness by Ursula Le Guin; 3) Brave New World by Aldous Huxley; 2) 1984 by George Orwell; and 1) Dune by Frank Herbert. Some of these don't meet the criteria you established, especially that of being the originator of a key science fiction concept, but I love all of them more than any others I've read, and I guess that's the most important criterion of all.

Ellison's Shatterday has always been a favorite. Thanks for the great content.

Loving the early release 🎉. Cheers.

I know this comment is late but I had to say that if it was not for this channel, I would not have discovered so many amazing SF writers. Thank you Stephen!

Fantastic video. I really must re-read 1984, my favourite book for so long.

Great selection, your passion for the adventure of imagination that is SciFi really shines through, and of course as a younger man in a faraway country I envy you have the luck to meet several of these great and unique minds. Quite a few authors I've never even heard about, so that in itself is a gift. Speaking of the selection itself, of course I understand it's entirely subjective but my heart plunged when I saw Solaris on the bottom... it's easily my current n° 1, I believe that the only other writer that may have been so far reaching is Wells (who is in a cathegory of his own in terms of genius); I truly believe that Solaris is one of the greatest achievements of the human imagination, ever. If I had to pick ten books to save from the XXth century, and just ten, Solaris would be one of them. And I read it from a translation of a translation! BTW, your Bester pick made me question your whole selection LOL I've just finished that very book in that very EXACT Pan edition with the kickass cover, and... I found it fairly underwhelming. While some stories are good satire and made me chuckle (specially The Man Who Murdr'd M...), and others are great pieces, specially They Don’t Make Life Like They Used To, with its absurdity and crackling ending, I found it quite dated in many ways. The casual mysogyny of some of these is truly unsufferable (I'm a lefty but not easily triggered); others, like Time Is the Traitor or The Flowered Thundermug are just old and stale. Did love Out of This World (the one with the crossed telephone lines), probably because it's short, unpretentious and warmer than the others. It's a problem when authors believe they are wittier than they truly are, just a happy few can get away with that (I think of Gibson or Ballard: they can). On the other hand, it's always a good sign when a SF reviewer puts The Forever War above Starship Troopers. I read it from a mouldy (literally) copy of the 1st Spanish ed. when I was 18 and I was absolutely gripped, and disgusted, and amazed. I love that book to bits. Have you checked the 1988 comic book 3-vols adaptation by Marvano? While Marvano made a very competent job (one can only dream of what coud have happened if adapted by the monsters of that era, Moebius, Bilal, Liberatore), it's also a great exaple of a very faithful and respectful adaptation, truly deserves a read. Anyways, we could all go forever, great selection and thanks for your work, would love to visit your store one day. Loved your accent, it's quite elegant and pleasing to the ear, without the sometimes obnoxious pomp of Standard English that the Amerikaner are so fond of. Cheers from a fellow bookseller, from the melancholic and fabled lands of Buenos Aires.

I enjoyed that so much, thanks for making the 2 videos - sublime stuff. One question I have though - since you are such a fan of British SF, I have not heard you mention Olaf Stapledon, you probably do somewhere but I just haven't seen the video yet. I read 'First and Last Men' when I was about 13 and it absolutely blew my mind - when I think about 'punching through into a new reality', that book and Star Maker jump immediately into my head. I love 'Sirius' too, which strikes me as very similar to 'Flowers for Algernon'. I am curious to know what you make of him - possibly not a great prose stylist, but in terms of ideas, I can think of few who have stimulated my brain more.

Nice to see R. Silverberg represented here. One of my fave SF stories of all time is his Nebula-winning novella "Sailing to Byzantium". (Actually I always thought it would make a neat movie if done right.)

Great selection. I love The Book of Skulls. Also love the Hawkwind shirt!

I realized, when you pronounced the word “heard”, that I am probably living on a different earth in a different dimension, but I’m still loving your channel. Thanks.

A fine set of 25 books. Interestingly, I’d say one of my own seminal influences in gravitating towards the more literary end of the spectrum was - along with Aldiss’s Billion Year Spree -that very edition of the Encyclopaedia of SF you showcased in the first video. John Clute’s writing style, particularly in his magazine criticism, could be…um thesaurusal… but his taste was impeccable. And friends with the late great Tom Disch too - the only notable absence in your list, despite a few mentions in your commentary. When I first found a battered donated copy of 334 in the school library back in the ‘70’s, I was astonished by its wit, its style and how effectively it put you in a living, breathing decayed New York with hardly an infodump in sight: his prose is sheer class. Nevertheless, it was delightful to find so many of my perennial favourites here - particularly M. John Harrison, Keith Roberts and Christopher Priest: The Course of the Heart, Molly Zero and The Affirmation are my choices, though Harrison’s latest novel, The Sunken Land Begins to Rise Again, must be the best alien invasion story (if that is what it is) since The Midwich Cuckoos. I could go on - Ballard, Dick, Wells, Le Guin - but suffice it to say you’ve sent me back to my bookshelves to re-engage with some truly wonderful works of cognitive estrangement!

Great list, thank you! im really courious on your opininon about "The Man Who Melted": being published the same year as neuromancer, i feel that Jack Dann book is strangely more pertinent today than Gibson. Thanks!

Incredible list of books. Gave me plenty of authors to add to my TBR. So much to read. So little time. Must..read..faster!!!!!

Great list many thanks, always learning something when watching your videos. Interesting re: Christopher Priest, I will have to check him out. Thanks again

Thank you, Stephen, for your unselfish sharing of what is really a treasure trove of insight, perspective and honesty from a true champion of SF. We are fortunate to have you there doing that voodoo that you do so well! Was struck by your comment when reviewing Silverberg's "A Time Of Changes", that you aren't put out by the contemporary rage surrounding pronoun usage (or something to that effect, forgive me). That, sir, is a very healthy attitude. Live and let live. Just another reason to love this channel, your honest candor and good nature. Cheers.

Another outstanding presentation 👍🏻

Mike Harrison is great, I need to read more of him! I trawled through your videos since this one 9 months ago...did you interview Mike yet? Will take another look again shortly.

Solid list. Hopefully I’ll complete the gaps in my sci fi canon soon. Have you ever discussed Ubik on this channel? Curious to hear your thoughts.

You've managed to create a top SF list without Asimov, Heinlein, Clarke, or Herbert - Well done! (although I'm a bit shocked there is no Dune) Couldn't squeeze in a little Theodore Sturgeon in there somewhere? Roger Zelazny?

I would love to see a list of "most entertaining but not necessarily important" SF books.

Fascinating list of Science fiction novels Stephen. I have read MJohn Harrison an excellent Author. Neuromancer is on my TBR list heard so much about the book. Philip k Dick I also must check out.

When I was in graduate school students gave a seminar to the faculty examination committee as part of their qualifying exam. I insisted that mine be in room 101 as a homage to George Orwell. Sadly, nobody got the reference.

I read Burgess' "A Clockwork Orange" last year for the first time eventhough I did see the film twice in my student years. Both the novel and the film are masterpieces in my opinion... also I like "The Man in The High Castle", so I'll add "Pavane" to my TBR-list.

Great stuff as usual, Stephen. Did you attend the Nigel Kneale weekend held at the Chapter in Cardiff in 1999? I was lucky enough to go and got my paperback copy of the Quatermass (Conclusion) signed, which I treasure. The audience gave him a standing ovation after a screening of it too, which he seemed to be genuinely moved by. His influence is enormous over a number of genres as you point out.

To my mind, Ballard, like Bester was at his best in the short format.

Thank you- Iove your content!!

Thank you for sharing such an eclectic and personal list! I just ordered a few. Can you recommend any other facsimile editions? I admit I am more of a fantasy fan than SF, but most of all it's the craft, the decisions writers make, that I'm fascinated by.

Chris Priest gave me a copy of that early A format paperback of The Glamour and intimated, without saying so directly, that it was the true first edition. It was fairly common practice to circulate an early "overseas" edition for copyright protection purposes. It happened also with Ballard's Empire of the Sun.

Great video, again!

I could listen to you talk about CRASH all day

Did you maybe read „Nest of Worlds” by Marek S. Huberath? I would place it on my version of this list. For me it was one of those life changing experiences. Something more than just another great new wave novel, evolution of my childhood fascination. I read it in polish - I am not sure about translation quality but it was done by Michael Kandel so it might be accurate.

That facsimile edition of Nineteen Eighty-Four looks triple plus good. I'll have to seek out a copy.

I didn't realize that the movie "Crash" (1996) was based on a novel by J. G. Ballard. Thanks for the insight.

Have you read “Riddley Walker” by Russell Hoban? Seems like the kind of book you would like. Also liked your reference to “The Inheritors” - I’m still not sure what to make of it, but it’s certainly not quite like any other Conrad.

I don't think "A Time of Changes" was as powerful as other novels by Silverberg as "Nightwings", "The Masks Of Time", "Downwards to the Earth", "Dying Inside" and "The Book of Skulls". I think it was the internal monologue I didn't like, but it was very well written and easy to read. I only read "Non-Stop" two years ago, I came to it too late, but it's an early novel. I much preferred his more mature novel "Greybeard". Harlan Ellison was an awesome, fiery spirit, and I think I've read more than a fair amount of his pieces, including that collection. "Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?" is great, and I've always thought it's one of Dick's and the SF genre's very best novels. Of those by Ballard you mentioned or showed, I really liked "Concrete Island", it makes our ordinary places so mysterious and fascinating. Like Dick weird places, there's a sort of merging of mind and world, but unlike the devastating changes that create Dick's nightmarish realities, it's accepted with an aesthetic approach. I'm not sure what George Orwell thought in regards to SF or what his interest in it was he wrote "Nineteen Eight-Four" or what he was really writing about. It's a modern fable about what was then Soviet Russia and totalitarianism, but I'm not sure how conscious he was about writing SF. I suppose he must have been aware of the British and literary tradition, and he was probably similar to authors like Mary Shelley when she wrote "Frankenstein", and Olaf Stapledon, with whom he was contemporaneous. Like him, he was concerned with social issues and the future of the world. He could have had the chance, he'd probably have emerged as quite a good author of SF. My own choices would have included Ray Bradbury's "The Martian Chronicles", Olaf Stapledon's "Star Maker", John Crowley's "Beasts", Gene Wolfe's "The Book of the New Sun" or "The Fifth Head of Cerberus", Robert Holdstock's "Mythago Wood" and Anna Kavan's "Ice". I haven't read that Christopher Priest's novel, of those I've read by him, I'd have chosen "The Affirmation", an excellent novel about the strangeness of memory and an unreliable narrator.

Very good selection and I wouldn't argue with any of them. The only quibbles would be which books by Ballard, Priest and Aldiss to choose. I would have put The Drought or Atrocity Exhibition above Crash, simply because Crash is a book which I admire enormously but don't like very much. I just can't face rereading it. Priest is so difficult to choose from his incredible array of books. I think I would have chosen The Affirmation or The Separation, but The Glamour is brilliant too. Aldiss is a real problem. So many good books but few of them great. I would have chosen Moreau's Other Island or Frankenstein Unbound, but some of his short story collections were excellent too. Of titles I would have included, I would like to have seen a Tiptree collection, Out of the Everywhere or Star Songs of an Old Primate possibly, and something by Joanna Russ or Gwyneth Jones just to increase the female presence. All of these had a huge impact on me when I first read them and I reread them all the time. ,

I am amazed at how much I didn't know. I also have been looking for a sci fi book, that is pretty rare. A Sweet Sweet Summer by Jane Gaskill. So I guess my question is have you read it?

Oh hell yeah mate, this hour plus is already a treat! I'm mightily interested in Keith Roberts now and never read his work, you've already sold me on Molly Zero but that Panther SF artwork on "Pavane" looks so damn intriguing! That alone had me thinking of Harrison's Viriconium stories circling about "In Viriconium" the novel especially, especially I'm interested if there's a focus on landscape and a particular kind of British writing, through the lens of 60s British SF ... (I guess the artwork on that copy of Pavane is very evocative to me already, of strange folky pre-industrial business, haha!)

Thanks!

You should check A Canticle For Leibowits. Its in my top 3 alongside 1984 and Dying Inside.

Something you didn't mention about Pavane: it's not just that that alternate reality is technologically backward compared to ours, but "Faerie" exists.

That is the best top-XX list of SF in the whole booktube for me.

I first read Clockwork Orange in January of 1966. Despite Burgess's later disavowal of Kubrick's movie (original ending only), I have always liked the movie as well as the book.

I suppose the choices are really Patternmaster or Lilith’s Brood for sf, but do you have thoughts on Butler? I think the Parable books are fantastic, but they’re certainly more apocalyptic than sci-fi.

Need to see a photo of you in your youth dressed like Jerry Cornelius. 😊 I’m about to read Light by MJH-why is it considered divisive?

There's a graphic novel adaptation, from Boom Studios in 2011, of "Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep" that uses the full text of the novel. I have all of the monthly installments that came out back then.

The author that grabbed me in SF was Isaac Asimov. I love your videos, and you've given me plenty of novels to read. It just depresses me that you detest Asimov. Maybe detest is too strong a word, or maybe it isn't, though from what I've watched of you it seems to fit. Of course no hard feelings whatsoever, this is all subjective and everyone will have their own preferences.

I’m ashamed I got below 50% on the Outlaw Bookseller test: From part 2 I guessed 7 books inc. your number 1 being in that position. I almost got Molly Zero but I couldn’t quite recall it (I was searching my brain for it but I forgot and moved on). My correct guesses: Neuromancer Nineteen eighty four (this will be number 1). The beast that shouted love… Do androids… The Time Machine The glamour A clockwork orange

Bester: I reckon he got all of the names he used in "Tiger, Tiger" from an atlas of GB: Presteigne of Presteigne.

I would include "A Canticle for Liebowitz" by Walter Miller.

Your list of top 25 SF books is really interesting, but I would love to know what was your reason to omit authors like : Frank Herbert (Diune), Gene Wolfe (Book of New Sun), Atrhur C. Clarke (Childhood's End), Ray Bradbury (Farenheit 451), Aldous Huxley (Brave New World), Dan Simmons (Hyperion). Don't get me wrong, this is your list and I am not saying your choices are wrong. I am just courious why you didn't put those books on list? BTW thank you for placing my compatriot book on list: Solaris by Stanisław Lem is masterpiece and it deserve to be top 25.

Notice how parts 1 and 2 have nearly the same number of views. On videos this long, that's saying something.

More Britts than I'd have gone with...just kidding. Great list. I love when I see a list and can nod my head half the time and shake my head the other half of the time. Glad to see Neuromancer on here. I feel bad for those who read it and do not have the experience of the novel wrapping around them and pulling them into Gibson's amazing and visual virtual world. Another favorite is Frankenstein. Shelley and Asimov were the best at examining humanity using the not-quite-human. Darkside of the Earth is great reading and I completely agree with Time Machine as Wells' best work. Aldiss' Non-stop is just and OK/good read for me, I didn't really care for Ballard's "Crash," and I love that theres a couple of things I haven't read but am adding to my list. excellent video

funny how so many people leave ray bradbury off. : )

the final programme was also a movie

My copy says "1984" on the cover but "Nineteen Eighty-four" on the spine haha

you are a treasure

Before 1984 there was We, and that's really Sci-Fi. I never though of 1984 as Sci-Fi, but I understand why you included it here.

1984 - not a wasted word in that novel.

Is there a Patreon associated with this account? Or does anyone know a different way to contribute to this channel? I live in Japan and it won't accept my card or my paypal for the "thanks" function. @Outlaw Bookseller have you considered making a patreon account so we can contribute while you grow the channel?

I don't get MJH: I read "The Centauri Device" when it came out in paperback but found it tedious. Read a more recent SF novel but that was so dull I can't even remember the title.

The synopsis of Molly Zero sounds very much like Margaret Artwood...

You mentioned a book 'The Rose' - I didn't quite catch the authors name that you mentioned for that book - but it wasn't the same name as one I have - It's 'The Rose' by Charles L. Harness (1968 - in the UK) which is itself a great SF novel IMHO :-) - enjoyed your selection by the way - quite a few of which I've read and still have.

I read my first Sci fi in 1965 AD. The esoteric stories for me DO NOT stick. I prefer Azimov over P.K. Dick---everytime. I prefer Megan O Keefe , Velocity series over PK. I prefer Modesitt Jr. over most of Iain Banks ( with exceptions) Yet ...HAZE, FLASH, the HERO Series never get any mention. Superior storyline that read like a Reacher book by Lee Child. Sophisticated plotting and fascinating extrapolation of trends.