A Reader's Guide To Science Fiction

by Baird Searles, Martin Last, Beth Meacham

From A to Z (Akers and Asimov to Zebrowski and Zelazny), from the first astounding magazine to DUNE, A READER"S GUIDE TO SCIENCE FICTION is an invaluable reference work, chronicling where science fiction has been, and where you-the reader-can travel next in the most exciting literature of the cosmos.

Genres: Reference, Nonfiction, Speculative Fiction, Literature

Paperback

First published September 1, 1979

Reviews

[Craig · Rating 2 out of 5]

This tried to be a fairly comprehensive guide in its day (it appeared in 1979, so it would have to be viewed now as a look at the first half-century of the genre as a formal entity), but even then I disagreed with much of it. Baird Searles was a long-time critic and scholar in the field, so his opinions were certainly more valid than are mine, but I disagreed with many of his assertions and recommendations. The first two-hundred pages is an encyclopedic listing of authors with suggestions as to what other writers you might like if you enjoyed works by that person, and many of the listings seemed to me to be incomplete and the suggestions questionable. For example, if you like Zach Hughes then try John Norman. What!? For Gregory Benford fans he suggests Michael Bishop, Samuel R. Delany and Thomas Disch... huh? From Dean Koontz he directs to David Gerrold or Eric Frank Russell, which also seems curious. Some of the biographical information is interesting, but... thank goodness we now have the internet!

[Randy · Rating 3 out of 5]

Pretty comprehensive for it's time but even though it's now out of date I still refer to it and it's sister book on Fantasy if I'm in too busy to go check out the online version of the Encyclopedia of Science Fiction or the Wikipedia.

[Erich Franz Linner-Guzmann]

This reference book to science-fiction authors and their novels looks really interesting. It's too bad it was written in the 70's however instead of something more current.

[Muzzlehatch · Rating 4 out of 5]

The late 1970s and early 1980s were boom years for science fiction; the twin mega-successes of STAR WARS and CLOSE ENCOUNTERS OF THE THIRD KIND (in 1977) in the cinema helped spur on a huge growth in the field - in film, TV, games, comics, and of course in literature, the foundation of the genre. Along with this came a surge in interest for popular reference works, guidebooks and the like; as a kid just getting into the field at the time, I accumulated quite a few of them, and some of those early books - even the outdated ones - remain very useful. Probably the two best that I've used are The Visual Encyclopedia of Science Fiction, from 1977 and The New Encyclopedia of Science Fiction, first published in 1979 and updated in the early 1990s. These books are of course out of date but still contain a wealth of great information on the genre's authors, themes, and works - some of it not that easy to find now, even in the internet age.

The same can be said of this work from 1979 by longtime SF book critic and bookseller Baird Searles and coauthors Martin Last, Beth Meacham and Michael Franklin - but unlike the other books I mentioned, this is short, very accessible, and more readily and cheaply available. It's a good starting point if you're interested in some of the great names - and obscure and forgotten names - from the genre's rich past. Like its companion volume A Reader's Guide to Fantasy published a couple of years later, it's divided into several short sections - a rundown of SF book series, a list of the authors' personal favorites, a brief history of the field from "Frankenstein" to the then-present, a listing of awards - and one large section which is the bulk of the book, an alphabetical guide to major authors, with short descriptions of their careers and work. The authors receive anywhere from a short paragraph to 2 1/2 pages - I believe H.G. Wells and Olaf Stapledon have the largest entries. In the interest of thoroughness and to give the reader of this review a good idea of what's included, here are the writers covered:

Mark Adlard - Alan Burt Akers - Brian Aldiss - Poul Anderson - Piers Anthony - Christopher Anvil - Isaac Asimov - J.G. Ballard - T.J. Bass - Barrington J. Bailey - Greg Benford - Alfred Bester - Lloyd Biggle Jr - Eando Binder - Michael Bishop - James Blish - Ben Bova - John Boyd - Leigh Brackett - Ray Bradbury - Marion Zimmer Bradley - Fredric Brown - John Brunner - Edward Bryan - Algis Budrys - Kenneth Bulmer - Edgar Rice Burroughs - F.M. Busby - John W. Campbell - Terry Carr - Angela Carter - Lin Carter - Jack Chalker - A. Bertram Chandler - C.J. Cherryh - Robert Chilson - John Christopher - Arthur C. Clarke - Hal Clement - Stanton A. Coblentz - D.G. Compton - Michael G. Coney - Edmund Cooper - Arthur Byron Cover - Richard Cowper - John Crowley - Ray Cummings - Avram Davidson - L. Sprague DeCamp - Samuel R. Delany - Lester Del Rey - Philip K. Dick - Gordon R. Dickson - Thomas M. Disch - Arthur Conan Doyle - George Alec Effinger - Gordon Eklund - Harlan Ellison - George Allan England - Ralph Milne Farley - Philip Jose Farmer - Mick Farren - Jonathan Fast - Homer Eon Flint - Alan Dean Foster - Raymond Z. Gallun - Randall Garrett - Jane Gaskell - Jean Mark Gawron - Hugo Gernsback - David Gerrold - Mark S. Geston - H.L. Gold - Felix Gotschalk - Ron Goulart - Charles L. Grant - Joseph Green - James Gunn - H. Rider Haggard - Joe Haldeman - Austin Hall - Edmond Hamilton - Charles Harness - Harry Harrison - M. John Harrison - Robert A. Heinlein - Zenna Henderson - Frank Herbert - William Hope Hodgson - Fred Hoyle - L. Ron Hubbard - Zach Hughes - John Jakes - Laurence Janifer - D. F. Jones - Neil R. Jones - Raymond F. Jones - Colin Kapp - Daniel Keyes - Otis Adelbert Kline - Damon Knight - Dean Koontz - C.M. Kornbluth - Michael Kurland - Henry Kuttner - R.A. Lafferty - David J. Lake - Simon Lang - Sterling Lanier - Keith Laumer - Tanith Lee - Ursula K. LeGuin - Fritz Leiber - Murray Leinster - Stanislaw Lem - C.S. Lewis - Frank Belknap Long - H.P. Lovecraft - Sam J. Lundwall - Richard A. Lupoff - Barry N. Malzberg - George R.R. Martin - Richard Matheson - Anne McCaffrey - J.T. McIntosh - Vonda N. McIntyre - Richard C. Meredith - Judith Merrill - A. Merritt - Sam Merwin Jr - Walter Miller - Naomi Mitchison - Michael Moorcock - C.L. Moore - John Morressey - Larry Niven - John Norman - Andre Norton - Alan E. Nourse, Philip Nowlan, Andrew J. Offutt - Chad Oliver - Edgar Pangborn - Alexei Panshin - H. Beam Piper - Doris Piserchia - Frederik Pohl - Jerry Pournelle - Fletcher Pratt - Christopher Priest - Marta Randall - John Rankine - Mack Reynolds - Keith Roberts - Spider Robinson - William Rotsler - Joanna Russ - Eric Frank Russell - Fred Saberhagen - Margaret St. Clair - Pamela Sargeant - James H. Schmitz - Thomas Scortia - Richard Shaver - Bob Shaw - Robert Sheckley - Mary Shelley - Robert Silverberg - Clifford D. Simak - John Sladek - Cordwainer Smith - Clark Ashton Smith - E.E. "Doc" Smith - George O. Smith - Norman Spinrad - Brian Stableford - Olaf Stapledon - Bill Starr - Christopher Stasheff - Arkadi & Boris Strugatsky - Theodore Sturgeon - John Taine - Stephen Tall - William Tenn - James Tiptree Jr - E.C. Tubb - Wilson Tucker - Jack Vance - Sydney Van Scyoc - A.E. Van Vogt - John Varley - Jules Verne - Vernor Vinge - Ian Wallace - Stanley G. Weinbaum - Manly Wade Wellman - H.G. Wells - James White - Kate Wilhelm - Jack Williamson - Gene Wolfe - S. Fowler Wright - Philip Wylie - John Windham - George Zebrowski - Roger Zelazny

A big list, eh? One thing to note is that the earliest writer mentioned is Mary Shelley - this history then only reaches back to her publication of "Frankenstein" in 1818. Of course there is little dating from before this date that is remembered, or considered "science fiction", but it's instructive to notice that much of the earlier work would fall into the utopian vein (starting with Thomas More's 1516 "Utopia"), and if there's a huge gap in this book's coverage, it is in fact a lack of attention paid to the many mainstream writers who tackled utopian and dystopian themes, particularly from the mid-19th through the mid-20th centuries. A large percentage of these excluded writers are known primarily for such works:

Edward Bellamy, Pierre Boulle, Samuel Butler, Karel Capek, George Griffith, Aldous Huxley, S.P. Meek, William Morris, George Orwell, Ayn Rand, M.P. Shiel, Kurt Vonnegut, Evgeny Zamiatin

Still one can't be too fussy - it's a short book, meant to be inexpensive and useful for the novice in the field, and it accomplished it's goal in that regard as far as I was concerned. Plenty of the obscure writers on the big list above I discovered through this book; some I still haven't discovered. Even in this era of seemingly unlimited information about everything, there are writers that you'll find little about beyond what's in this modest volume - and it's nice to have some professional, learned guides to sort it all out. Maybe it's even more useful now. Certainly I wouldn't mind seeing this volume and it's companion updated or redone, with the richness in the field over the last 30 years noted - but with the older writers given their due, and brought to new light.

[Brown Robin · Rating 3 out of 5]

I've been indulging my nostalgia feels recently and this is the last item up for reconsideration. My favorite book as a kid, this is limited in appeal to the contemporary reader by its age. However, it is the superior guide to its subject, namely sci-fi published before the release of Star Wars, a movie which had a profound effect on sci-fi publishing. (Before SW, there were only a few sci-fi books published every year, though by 1975 there were more annually than in all of the 1950s. Sci-fi was growing popular slowly, until Lucas, Spielberg and Scott made it cool, and after about 1980, annual sci-fi book production exceeded all previous sci-fi book production ever.)

This book remains what I consider the only reference guide anyone could ever need to sf books published before the deluge. There really isn't anything comparable for today's sf. There are many websites and a few large references, but not a single one-stop, portable guide to the sf of the 21st century. I think you could do worse than use this fine book as a guide to producing a new guide to new sf for new readers. Maybe someone will. It's also possible that the internet and social media make this sort of book unnecessary. It was a different time. (Sometimes I feel like it was a different planet. I sure felt like an alien back in the 1980s.)

The beauty of this beauty is its succinct coverage and focus. The authors were booksellers; they were utilizing their experience to produce an essential guide to the basics. They provide a thumbnail history of the genre, a list of series and a canon, and a brief annotated bibliography to the most important work of hundreds of writers. This is a place to start. They allow for readers to develop beyond the basics on their own recognizance. The result is a short, useful, personal guide.

In retrospect, I understand why this was my favorite book. I always wanted to produce something in its spirit for others. That's as good a sign that a book is good as I know: you want to make one of your own.

[Francis Fabian · Rating 3 out of 5]

Excellent thumbnail descriptions of thousands of SF books up to about 1980. Also with ratings. I was disappointed the reviews were so short but then the book might have been to heavy to loft. Recommended to those interested in the origins of SF. We probably need a new volume since it's been over 40 years since the publication. I do know there are lots of similar books by Dave Pringle Science Fiction: The 100 Best Novels (from 1949 - 1984) A good selection as I have read most of the books. Followed by Science Fiction: The 101 Best Novels 1985-2010 by Damien Broderick & Paul Di Fillipo. I have read all of these books yet. Still working my way up to modern times. There is Classic Science Fiction & Fantasy Literature edited by Fiona Kelleghan which I'm enjoying (I don't really read much Fantasy but the reviews & analysis are interesting). Science Fiction Writers - Critical Studies of the Major Authors from the Nineteenth Century to the Present Day edited by Richard Bleiler is very in depth. And there are many more books such as these. Probably I should spend my time reading "the" books rather than reading about them but I enjoy such things.

[Lisa (Harmonybites) · Rating 4 out of 5]

The one problem with this guide--and admittedly it's a big one--is that it was published in 1979 (and given how long it takes to put out a book, probably the cut off is somewhat earlier). You won't find Orson Scott Card here. Or William Gibson. Or Douglas Adams, Dan Simmons, Lois McMaster Bujold, John Scalzi. You will though on the "Seven Parsec Bookshelf" find many seminal writers in the genre that many a list neglect. Not just H.G. Wells and Jules Verne and Edgar Rice Burroughs but such writers as Olaf Stapeldon and E. E. Smith. I certainly found many a writer to love through this book. So although I might be reluctant to recommend it to someone looking for a guide to science fiction, it's keeping it's place on my shelves.

[Little Timmy · Rating 3 out of 5]

Great reference book for SiFi writers. Recommended

[Paul Chandler · Rating 4 out of 5]

Published in 1979, this guide for its size packs quite a fair bit of variety into the contents.

It has an introduction followed by a list of 200 authors, predominantly (American) and male, though, with linked authors a reader might find interesting.

It also contains a first and last series by authors and a space academy awards section, with the Hugo's and Nebula's.

There is a 5parsec shelf entry offering readers a different introduction on an author's suggested styles and concluding with an overview of science fiction writing in general.

I liked the layout of the book and the grammar used throughout. I have read more recent guides in the vein from different publishers and found myself coming back to this one time and again for advice.

[Steve LaForest · Rating 4 out of 5]

Science Fiction - brief descriptions of authors and their books; lists of recommended books.

[Pachyderm Bookworm · Rating 3 out of 5]

Because this appeared as a mass-market paperback for the first time in 1979, it was fairly comprehensive in both scope and objective in giving the reader on the street an idea of the themes and authors who wrote about them without a fair amount of literary criticism for the subject matter
at hand, which in 1979 was fairly surprising in and of itself, given that this was a paperback and that before this particular volume existed, the general consensus among science fiction fans and critics was that sci-fi/fantasy and weird or speculative fiction magazine editors and publishers accomplished the same task in a far more efficient manner with documentation and suggestions to the general reading public about what to read, and of course, where to locate said items to read. That said, there are far more comprehensive or exclusive or perhaps even niche-specific guides which do a far better job of categorizing the literary universe which comprises science fiction as it is read and written today.

[elissa · Rating 4 out of 5]

Probably fairly dated at this point, but still interesting. I stole it from my mom when it first came out (well, it was still in her house for awhile, but she bought it and I now own it...). I spent TONS of time poring through this book (the things we had to do before goodreads :), but didn't actually get THAT many recommendations out of it. The authors ran The Science Fiction Shop in NYC for many years.

[Kelly (Maybedog) · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is an old book but I loved it when I used it when I was a kid and thought Heinlein was the man. It introduced me to a number of authors I had never heard of seeing as no one else I knew read SF. Thankfully we have the Internet now.

[Brett]

Science Fiction,Anthology

[Scott Golden · Rating 4 out of 5]

An entertaining and useful (especially for its time) guide to the work of the best/most popular authors in science fiction.

[Rick · Rating 4 out of 5]

Superior pocket guide to science fiction that is sorely in need of an updating.