SciFi and Fantasy Book Club discussion

What are some of your other favorite time travel books, tv shows or movies? Why?

Dr. Who and Quantum Leap are the first to come to mind. Quantum Leap was not an all-time favorite but it was entertaining.

Doomdays Book ( C. Willis ) is my favorite. Very well done.

I really enjoyed The Time Machine and (to a lesser degree) the "sequel" The Time Ships. I was also quite surprised at how much I enjoyed The Time Traveler's Wife.

And of course, there's my all time favorite book, Slaughterhouse-Five.

Ditto for Doomsday Book. Just for nostalgia reasons, I like the movies Final Countdown and Star Trek IV.

Sorry if you've seen this before (Jon), but I loved The Time Traveler's Wife as an audio book. It has a man and a woman reading the respective parts and it really added to the story. I'm curious to see how the movie turns out; I think it will be released this summer. Other time travel favorites:
Heinlein's Lazarus Long books will always be favorites;
Spider Robinson's Callahan's Cross-Time Saloon series has several time travel stories, and is great overall, funny and smart;
Douglas Adams classic Hitchhiker series has some good time-travel story lines. If for some reason you haven't read them, or even if you have, try the audio books read by the author, they are amazingly funny, smart and wackily wise;
Not exactly time travel, but it does involve messing with the timeline, A Swiftly Tilting Planet by Madeleine L'Engle. An all-time favorite, 5 star book;
There are a lot of time travel romances. Diana Gabaldon's Outlander series is pretty popular. I only read the first one, but it has a lot of very vocal fans. I also remember enjoying A Knight In Shining Armor, a classic romance;
And on the topic of romances, the most classic romantic time travel movie is Somewhere In Time, starring Christoper Reeve and Jane Seymour. Sigh.

I found Joe Haldeman's The Accidental Time Machine to be a great read. For that matter The Forever War also by Joe Haldeman a great time travel story in a non-obvious way.

A great collection of time travel stories have been gathered in The Best Time Travel Stories of the 20th Century Stories by Arthur C. Clarke, Jack Finney, Joe Haldeman, Ursula K. Le Guin,.

The First Migration by Daniel Logan. Why? Because I wrote it!

Clarke's The Light of Other Days, had kind of an interesting tweak on time travel. I especially liked the idea of retracing the mitochondrial DNA.

Catherine wrote: "Diana Gabaldon's Outlander series is pretty popular. I only read the first one, but it has a lot of very vocal fans"

I really enjoyed Outlander. It's the first and only book I've ever bought in the Romance section. It was a total guilty pleasure. I haven't read any more in the series but I loved this first one.

Libby,

Don't fear the romance section of the store. There are some great books over there.

Lara Amber

Lara Amber wrote: "Libby,

Don't fear the romance section of the store. There are some great books over there.

Lara Amber"

I've always thought it's funny that I proudly visit SciFi / Fantasy but avoid romance like the plague - guess it's because I'm a single woman. I don't mind if people think I'm an odd duck Trekkie but Heaven forbid they think I'm a lonely female ;-)

Libby,

This should make you feel better. Romance is the biggest selling category in paperbacks (55% of paperback books sold, over a $1.2B in annual sales) and several major publishing houses depend on romance sales to subsidize all their other departments. (Oh, and 22% of readers are male.) So when you buy romance novels you're helping pay for publishing copies of I, Robot.

Lara Amber

My all-time favourite time travel story is TOS: City on the Edge of Forever. Harlan Ellison wrote the original, much cut script, which Roddenberry cut into a manageable teleplay, but damn I love that story. There are some other wonderful stories mentioned by others on here too. Slaughterhouse-Five and The Time Machine are a couple of faves of mine too.

Libby: when I was 18-19 I worked at a bookstore in our town's big shopping mall, and the manager put all of her employees in charge of a section. We were in charge of maintenance and ordering suggestions, and we were the go to employee for questions. I wanted Sci-Fi/Fantasy. I got Romance. But the big thing was that she demanded that we read at least one book from our section every two weeks. I read much crap, but I also found some pretty cool stories that I'd never have read any other way [e.g. book:A Woman of Substance]. I also developed a taste for erotica at the crucial age for developing such taste. If I ever bump into Tina again, I'm going to have to thank her, I think.

Brad wrote: "My all-time favourite time travel story is TOS: City on the Edge of Forever. Harlan Ellison wrote the original, much cut script, which Roddenberry cut into a manageable teleplay, but damn I love th..."

Oh, I love that episode/story! In fact, I just added to my Instant Play Queue yesterday the entire first season of TOS just so I could watch that episode in particular! :)

Quantum Leap and Dr. Who I love. Journeyman was okay. Back to the Futures were cute. The Butterfly Effect was interesting. The story - "A Distant Sound of Thunder" by Ray BRadbury and Yes I love the City on the edge of Forever. Star Trek 4 was silly but fun.

Since no one has mentioned it yet in this thread, I'll put a good word in for the amazing Company series by Kage Baker. The first book is In the Garden of Iden and focuses on Mendoza, a young girl rescued from the Spanish Inquisition in the 16th century, turned into an immortal cyborg by a 24th century company called Dr. Zeus Incorporated, trained as a botanist, and sent on missions throughout the ages to rescue rare plants from extinction. The series goes on to focus on various historical missions by Mendoza and other Company operatives, and features a large plot arc about the origin and eventual fate of the Company. It's an excellent series and highly recommended.

Stefan - I agree. I recently read In the Garden of Iden and thought it was excellent. Looking forward to reading more of the series.

I also loved Tim Powers'
The Anubis Gates.

Sarah Pi wrote: "I also loved Tim Powers'
The Anubis Gates."

This is on my list - just have to find time to squeeze it in. Looks great!

Hello,

Books...

The Time Machine and Stephen Baxter's sequel The Time Ships, Gregory Benford's Timescape, Ken Grimwood's Replay. Also Asimov's End of Eternity, and various famous short stories by Heinlein such as All You Zombies. And a couple of Niven short stories: Singularities Make Me Nervous, Rotating Cylinders and the Possibly of Global Causality Violation (marvelous title), as well as Niven's fantasy series that includes Flight of the Horse

TV... The City on the Edge of Forever. There are lots of others, but for me that one stands out.

Film...

Primer is an extraordinary film. Tiny budget, incredibly well thought out. And the first Terminator movie is a nicely consistent time travel story. A lot of films seem to violate their own premise by the end, but both of those are self consistent. Also, The Final Countdown.

The Hemingway Hoax by Joe Haldeman was fun, too.

A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court is one of my favorites.

"By His Bootstraps" by Heinlein is a great short story.

Jim: A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court (by Mark Twain) of often overlooked and it has been a favorite of mine for years.

For Tv, I am a confirmed Dr. Who fan!

And, City on the Edge of Forever was a classic Star Trek episode!

Also for kids shows - land of the Lost & Voyagers

And for romance - A Knight in Shining Armor by Jude Deveraux

I have to jump in to second the Outlander series by Diana Gabaldon (btw, I don't consider this solely romance...it spans many genres).

Also, Kage Baker's "The Company" series is superb!

I also really enjoy Suzanne Frank's time travel series. The first one is "Reflections on the Nile". For those who feel uncomfortable about romance, there is a lot in these. But the various settings and eras in the ancient world are fascinating. (Egypt, Phoenicia, Atlantis, Crete, Minoa, Babylon, Ur, ancient Jerusalem etc.)

I love the frankowiz novels. I cant recall the titles but there is a whole series.

A soviet citizen Engineer, is accedentally sent back in time to Poland 10 years before the mongals invade. And introduces modern tech Ideas

Very interesting series

Leo Frankowski's Conrad Stargard books.

I like Replay by Ken Grimwood. It has some issues and drags a little towards the end, but the first part of the book was delightful.

I discovered that after I'd sen and loved Groundhog Day. It seemed like a glut of time travel shows for a while.

Thanks Mark, Frankowski is correct. Apparently my memory for names is as bad as my spelling.

;p

Time and Again is popular. I didn't love it but it did stick with me. The Man Who Folded Himself is excellent. Connie Willis's time travel series is definitely my fave, though.

Episodes of Red Dwarf involved time travel and I find them hilarious. Of course, every SF show seems to have its time traveling episodes.

On TV, Dr. Who is the best time travel show. In movies, I liked the "Back to the Future" trilogy, it was funny and Science Fiction at the same time.

In literature .... I agree with Stefan (hi!), Kage Baker's "The Company" Series (beginning with In the Garden of Iden) is the best one out there. Connie Willis's Doomsday Book is excellent also.

Doomsday Book by Connie Willis, The Time Traveler's Wife by Audrey Niffenegger and Diana Gabaldon's Outlander Outlander series are all excellent. I wasn't too impressed by neither The Time Machine nor To Say Nothing of the Dog though.

Somewhere in Time always makes me cry.

Lara Amber

Thanks for the recommendation Kevinalbee and Marc for Leo Frankowski's Conrad Stargard books! I just got the first one and am enjoying very much so far.

You're welcome. They're fun.

Marc
http://marcvunkannon.blogspot.com/

Glad yoiu liked them they are a great romp

Kevin

Did anyone think The Time Machine was Awesome?
I personally fell in love with that book. It was awesome! I read it when I was 10. The orange-colored cover was interesting and the book wasn't very thick.

Ben wrote: "I really enjoyed The Time Machine and (to a lesser degree) the "sequel" The Time Ships. I was also quite surprised at how much I enjoyed [book:The Time Traveler's Wife|140..."
I wanted to read the sequel to the Time Machine. I should go read that. Right now I am reading The Time Traveler's Wife for summer english homework. That's good to see that someone who enjoyed The Time Machine liked this book I am about to read.

I am currently boycotting any book whose title is about a woman as defined by her relationship to a man (the blah blahs' wife, the blah blahs' daughter). Do you ever hear the blah blah's husband? Sorry. It's just my latest pet peeve.

An Ideal Husband
The Perfect Husband
The Good Husband of Zebra Drive
Dona Flor and Her Two Husbands
Her Husband Ted Hughes and Sylvia Plath - A Marriage
Navy Husband

Kelly,

Sometimes a woman is defined by her relationship to a man. Being a "Submarine Officer's Wife" defined a great deal of my mother. Our constant moving, his long deployments, the expectations of an officer's wife (especially a senior officer's wife) had a major impact on who she was.

1. My mother was pregnant her senior year of college and was not allowed to take her lab classes (botany major) required for graduation. Because dad went active duty the next year and they immediately moved, she never graduated.
2. Because dad was frequently at sea, mom took over all the family finances, does the taxes, has power of attorney, etc.
3. Because of the expectation of senior officer wives being there for the junior officer wives and enlisted wives, she was heavily involved in the Navy Officer Wives Club and the Submarine Officer Wives Club. Later she was president of the Submarine Officer Wives Club in San Diego and took it from a club to a non-profit. My mom was always checking on younger/new wives, making sure they were handling the stress okay, didn't need anything, inviting them over so they didn't get lonely or overwhelmed.
4. Since we moved a lot, mom saw a great deal of the country. The moving and responsibilities of being a Navy wife made it difficult for her to go back to school, or consider working, so she stayed "at home" but heavily involved in organizations (she's also a singer, so lots of chorale societies too).

My mom was engaged to someone else when she met my dad (mom & dad were college lab partners and he stole her away). She would have been a completely different person if she had married the first guy and probably would have never moved out of Ohio.

Lara Amber

Is naming the claim of ownership, or just a silly atavism? I can remember when women were formally known by their husband's first name, as well as his last (I saw my mother's name wholey subsumed on more than one formal announcement). The more interesting question concerns the extent to which language influences the social construct of gender.

In formal settings women are still known by his first name and his last name. If you see her first name, his last name, technically it means the recipient is divorced.

The dumb rules you learn when addressing wedding announcements.

Lara Amber

None of which makes it a good reason to reject an otherwise good book.

Marc wrote: "None of which makes it a good reason to reject an otherwise good book."

Good point, I don't think you could seriously accuse Niffeneger of being callus toward the marginalized. The problem with irony is that you need to be careful setting it up. I found it interesting that, most of the time, the Time Traveler's Wife, wasn't.

I don't think anyone should sneer at old formalities. Come up with better ones. I've known women who kept their own last name or hyphenated their names &/or that of their kids. I can understand it, but I think it is often counter productive, like so much of the forced informality that we have today.

There is comfort in formal names & conventions in social functions. Used to be, a quick introduction gave reams of information. Now, when a couple is introduced by their full names & they're different, their status as a couple is in question & many people feel awkward addressing questions to them lest they be less than PC. Formalities lubricate social situations & give strangers a common, safe ground to communicate from. We need some new formalities to fill the void & let everyone know each others status.

It used to be easier with men as the usual head of household & professional in the nuclear family. Now there are homosexual marriages, many women are professionals & 'housewife' is as demanding as most other professions. House husbands aren't uncommon. Working from home, while taking care of part of the household chores, is often as productive as a full day's work at the office or factory. The trouble is, how do you pack that into "This is Mr. Smith & Mrs. Jones" during an introduction?

The imposition of a convention is an act of authority. It may make the actor "comfortable" (otherwise, you could argue, the effort would be spared) but it can just as easily make the acted-upon uncomfortable.

For me, social convention is about the mindless claim to privilege (sometimes atavistic, and often unwarranted). As a white male, I may be loath to abandon my privilege, but I can't rationally defend it.

The reason I don't like it, is why should I give up a name I have used all my life 40+ years and start with another. Names are part of who we are.

As for introductions, how about I'd like you to meet my friends Bob and Jane? Or my boss and his wife - Richard and Jennifer? Why does their role matter in the beginning. That is why we get to know each other. And why should I care about their status as a couple until I get to know them? Or it is relevant like if I were their kids' teacher?

It is like Ms. vs. Miss or Mrs. The reason it was popular in the first place is because who cares what a person's marital status is unless you are planning on dating them.

I dislike those outdated rules who cares if Mr. is first or last except maybe someone insecure? And as for a divorce, nobody's business. I would send an invitation addressed to Robert and Jane Smith or John Davis and Elizabeth Lewis. Or Linda Peters, Jeff Martin and family.

I guess I am saying that I see no need for these formalities.

As for roles, a role should be based on what a person does. Not by what they do as a result of their relationship to another person.

Jim wrote: "The trouble is, how do you pack that into "This is Mr. Smith & Mrs. Jones" during an introduction?"

Why would you want to?

My personal annoyance with some of the old formalities is that it is so cookie cutter. Happily in our modern age we are finally acknowledging the fact that people, professions, families, and relationships are varied and unique and that there is nothing wrong with this.

So, why would you want to squish a life, a relationship, and experience simply to it make things easier for a brief introduction? In fact, why would it even be necessary to convey this information?

In regards to titles such as 'The Time Travelers Wife', there is a difference between the woman being defined by her husband and the fact that a husband's profession may define the types of stresses she deals with that are somewhat unique from others.