...so I like to read anthologies--and mostly the old-line authors, Bradbury, Simak, Kornbluth, Ellison, etc.

Yeah, I know--but I'm no spring chicken either.

gene wolfe's 'solar cycle' ('the book of the new sun', 'the book of the long sun', 'the book of the short sun')

it's a commitment (eleven books, really) but he's far and away the best s/f author out there. unlike most, he's foremost a writer who just happened to end up in the genre, rather than a guy who had a clever idea and wrote a story around it (cf. niven's 'ringworld'). they also improve immensely on rereading - i'm working through for the fourth time and still getting blown away.

if you're interested (though they're not *really* in order) i'd start with 'book of the new sun'.

Only the original Dune. None of the sequels. None of the vile imitations.

http://www.dougfort.com

Ender's Game

I've read all the Classics, Asimiov, Heinlein, Clarke (very good) especially Fountain of Paradise, I like David Drake & John Ringo, am a subscriber to the Baen website, but the one book I go back to, again and again, is Lord of The Rings.

I read it the first time in 1968. It's still as good as the first time.

I read 30+ years ago.
The last name started with "D". Dickinson, Dick or something like that.
It was about the US collapse. The government traced the collapse to one person and gave him the money to make the purchase that he wanted to make in the first place which brought the economy back.
At that time it taught me a lot about economy.
I wish that I could remember the author and/or the author.
Can someone help me?
Could it be Dickerson?

_{repressive governments mix administrative clumsiness & inefficiency with authoritarian tendencies.}

reading some of Jorge Luis Borges' short stories always struck me as being very sci-fi-ish (like The Circular Ruins or The Babylon Lottery from Ficciones). A couple other non-genre books that reimagine the world (which I think is what good sci-fi does) that I love going back to are Einstein's Dreams by Alan Lightman and Invisible Cities by Italo Calvino.

And then, there's always the delightful mess that is the Hitchhiker's Guide... :)

... "Use of Weapons" and "Player of Games" are my favorites. Consider them extremely relevant novels. Pretty much exclusively read SciFi. Too me it is the most important fictional literature there is. I think the bias against it will eventually die off with the people holding it.

Hyperion rules.

A close second is Dune.

Then, Stranger in a Strange Land by Heinlein, Neuromancer by Gibson, Diaspora by Egan, and Valis by Dick.

then it is #1 for me, followed by Heinleins' Stranger in a Strange Land, the original Dune books, and then some of Greg Bears' books, sorry cannot remember the titles.

Asimov and Arthur C Clarke are also writers I'll never tire of re-reading.

If you're looking for more quality SF writing, track down M. John Harrison's Light. It's mind-blowingly well written.

Also, since no one else has mentioned them, anything by Vernor Vinge or Charles Stross. Both write novels absolutely packed with high-quality ideas.

In no particular order . . .

Arthur C. Clarke, Childhood's End.

Greg Egan, Distress.

George Alec Effinger, the Budayeen novels

Vernor Vinge, A Fire Upon The Deep/Deepness In The Sky.

Robert Heinlein, Time Enough For Love/Stranger in a Strange Land.

Lois McMaster Bujold, The Vorkosigan Series.

David Brin, Startide Rising, The Uplift War.

Charles Stross, Accelerando

Neal Stephenson, Snow Crash (and less SF-ish, Cryptonomicon)

William Gibson, Neuromancer

Got to fit in 1984 and Martian Chronicles as well. Somewhere.

greatest SF novels of all time:
Dune by Frank Herbert

best pure SF:
Rendezvous with Rama by Arthur Clarke

if you like Iain M. Banks Culture novels, check out:
Evolution's Darling by Scott Westerfeld

favorite new SF authors:
Karl Schroeder (novels, favorite: Lady of Mazes)
Ted Chiang (short stories, favorite: Understand)

Understand by Ted Chiang:
http://www.infinityplus.co.uk/stories/under.htm

best SF novel that really pissed me off:
Fiasco by Stanislaw Lem

Here's where I can't make my mind up. When I was in grade school, probably about age 7 or 8, my dad brought home a large box full of science fiction and fantasy books he had gotten from a coworker. There must have been close to 50 books. There were the classics, Bradbury, Asimov, etc., etc.

One of my favorite was a book called "The Aluminum Man." Written in the late 60s or early 70s, it was full of counter culture language that was funnier than hell. Roger Zelazny's "Lord Of Light" is another great book, and quite possibly speaks of our current political and social establishment at the moment.

I don't know if my dad is aware of this fact, but reading all those old science fiction books probably had a lot to do with my becoming a liberal. The irony being my father was at the time a staunch conservative republican. Now he's a moderate democrat, with liberal leanings towards social issues.

If I had wanted cream and sugar, then why order the damn coffee?

I enjoyed Niven's writing (I have pretty much the whole 'Known Space' series)..but I feel his writing's been sorta spotty lately. Some of the stories are pretty good, and others (Destiny's Road, Rainbow Mars, Integral Trees) don't live up to the standards of his '70's work.

Jerry Pournelle and David Drake are good picks for 'military sci-fi', expecially Drake's 'Hammer's Slammers' stories. Now if only Tor could stop re-packaging them with minor changes, in different titles.

One to look into as it gets translated into English is Hiroyuki Morioka's series Crest/Banner of the Stars. Interesting story about a star-faring race descended from Man, living side-by-side with their 'parents'.

Other modern writers (I count Heinlein, Sturgeon, Piper, Clarke, Asimov, Herbert, and their colleagues as Golden Age) that are good to pick up:
Greg Bear: (Eon/Eternity, Forge of God/Anvil of Stars, Blood Music (good cautionary tale of the dangers of nanotech development), and his tales of the Sidhe.
Orson Scott Card: His politics are hard-right (he's very Mormon, with all the political implications associated with the faith), but his stories of gifted children are quite beautiful and will definitely pull you in--Ender's Game/Ender's Shadow,SongMaster,the Alvin Maker stories.
Anne McCaffrey: another like Niven who's earlier work I feel exceeds her later. The 'Dragonriders of Pern' series is her best work.
Fred Saberhagen: Can't ignore the 'Berserker' series, or the Books of Swords
Keith Laumer: Retief and the Stainless Steel Rat are classics. His Bolo stories are must-reads also.
John Steakley's 'Armor' is about the only decent work from him, but it's pretty good.

Fantasy has almost always been linked at the hip to Sci-Fi, in part because of the imagination required for the storytelling, but also for the fact that the writers make the stories their own morality plays/political statements/whatever, much more than 'standard' novelists like Dickens, Marquez, and their sort.
Tolkien and CS Lewis were close friends and colleagues in life, and their stories carry a similar flavour. Lewis's shows his Christian faith in them fairly clearly, while Tolkien's show his love for language and history. 'The Hobbit/The Lord of the Rings' and the Narnia stories should be on any serious fan's shelves.
Ursula LeGuin: her EarthSea trilogy made great reading in my early teens.
Raymond Feist: Don't miss his Midkemia series (starting with 'Magician:Apprentice'). He writes a tight, entertaining story, that keeps you turning the pages.

My favourites? Hmmmm...lessee--I constantly re-read through 'Known Space' and the Midkemia books, but these days have my attention drawn in more to the illustrated stories of Manga. The drawing, if well-done, adds to the story being told and can be as important as an art as the writing itself (and the Japanese seen to have quite an imagination when it comes to technology and its applications).
The Lord of the Rings (Tolkien)
The Sands of Mars (Clarke)
Foundation (Asimov)
Ringworld (Niven)
Lord Kalvan of Otherwhen (Piper)
the 'Magician' Series (Feist)
the Riverworld series (Farmer)
the Titan trilogy (Varley)

-5.75,-4.05
"We're all fucked. It helps to remember that." --George Carlin

I admit to not being much of an S-F fan, and feeling I must be missing a lot. First S-F author that I really liked was Ursula LeGuin, especially Left Hand of Darkness and my favorite, The Dispossessed. Then I liked Octavia Butler. My favorite recent writer is Connie Willis, esp. The Doomsday Book, followed by Lincoln's Dreams. I guess it says something that my favorite S-F books are heavy on time travel into the past rather than settings in the future.

Shikasta series by Doris Lessing
Gravity's Rainbow by Thomas Pynchon
Neuromancer, Count Zero, Mona Lisa Overdrive by William Gibson
Stranger in a Strange Land by Henlein
and I'm currently lost in the vastness and emptiness of Stephen Baxter's good writing and time frames

and I must re-read stanilaus lem, again.

Un-acceptable.

Here's a list of the good stuff.
The person who said Octavia Butler? YES. Dawn, Adulthood Rights, and Imago forms a truly subtle science fiction (without much actual science) masterpiece.
Peter Watts Blindsight is a rock-hard and excellent science fiction novel
Ken MacCleod's Cassini Division is one of the most underrated science fiction novels of the last twenty years.
C.S. Friedman's In Conquest Born is only outdone by This Alien Shore
C.J. Cherryh has her acknowledged masterpiece in Cyteen, but her current atevi series reaches profundity at points.
Chris Moriarty's two novels, Spin State and Spin Control. are truly innovative and not completely direct hard science fiction.

As for more mortal writers, Charles Stross, Richard Morgan, Greg Egan, Karl Schroeder, Justina Robson, and Iain Banks are all pretty much on auto-read when they come out.

"The moon is a harsh mistress" by Heinlein but new favorite would have to be the Bellisarious series co-authored by Drake.

_{"I beseech you in the bowels of christ think it possible you may be mistaken."}

Many good choices, which might make my best, so I will point out one of my favorite authors, who is currently stuck in movie-based series limbo:

Mick Farren, with such classics as "The Last Stand of the DNA Cowboys", "The Armageddon Crazy", "Necrom", "Their Masters' War" and "Mars:The Red Planet".

One of the few authors who doesn't keep writing the same story over and over again, or return to the same milieu over and again.

Which is probably why he didn't sell well enough to keep producing.

E.E. "Doc" Smith's "Lensman" series, Andre Norton, Heinlein, Clarke, Asimov, Niven, Pornelle, Zelazny, Farmer, and of course the greatest science fiction (?) writer of all time...John Norman. Who knew that Al Gore had such an interesting secret life? On counter-Earth, I bet he'd be president!

You know what the main point of all these sci-fi writers is?

We don't think big enough. We don't use our imaginations. Who ever decided that we'd be stuck using internal combustion vehicles powered by an ancient, finite, concentrated chemical energy storage molecule? Is it really all that difficult to imagine getting our juice a little fresher off the tree?

Oh, to own stock in an Indian scooter factory...!
.
Good times for Smiley! :-D

that science fiction is about possible worlds, and fantasy is about impossible worlds.

Aside from that, Pullman's His Dark Materials trilogy is wonderful.

Oh, jeez. Tough question.

Neuromancer by William Gibson was my gateway drug to Science Fiction, and genre fiction in general. Dark, lush, and mysterious, it's a pop masterpiece, and it hit me at just the right time in my young life, so it will always be my favorite. You can get a sense for all of his early SF by reading the short story "Burning Chrome," in the collection of that title. Twenty pages or so, but all the promise of "cyberpunk" is realized in that story.

For sheer literary merit, Stanislaw Lem's "Fiasco" is the greatest SF novel I have ever read. It is a suspense story, a philosophical novel, a mystery, and a supreme work of hard science fiction. And it possesses a high literary playfulness that puts it on par with Joyce, Nabokov, and Borges. If anybody brought the legacy of HG Wells into the 21st century, it was Lem. He also deserved the Nobel Prize and it's a shame he never got it.

Other all stars include the:

Best Short Stories of J.G. Ballard, which has dazzling examples of his early writing for the SF pulp magazines.

BIOS, by Robert Charles Wilson, which is both clean, fast commercial fiction and has some big ideas to ponder. All of his novels are reliable, but BIOS is his best.

Schismatrix Plus, by Bruce Sterling, hard SF that resonates like good historical fiction.

City of Saints and Madmen, by Jeff Vandermeer, this is the best example of a new strain in fantasy. It's literate, weird, and fun.

A Game of Thrones by George R. R. Martin is pure, addictive epic fantasy that is actually well written. Imagine if Tolkien had toned down the prose style a lot, and written a magical history of the War of the Roses.

The Deep, or Little Big by John Crowley are fantasy novels to the core, but are wonderfully written pieces of fiction, by any standard. Harold Bloom considers Little Big to be one of the finest novels written in the last thirty years.

Song of Kali by Dan Simmons is really much better than any of his science fiction. It's one of the few books that has ever given me a real sense of horror. Slow, creeping horror, not just spookiness and suspense.

The Road by Cormac McCarthy needs no introduction. The man wrote gothic novels, westerns, and now he has written a science fiction novel. Just because he's the greatest living writer in English doesn't mean he doesn't write in particular genres.

The Stars My Destination by Alfred Bester is a very different kind of golden age SF than Heinlein or Asimov. It's all the furious energy of the United States in the 1950s without the triumphalism.

Childhood's End by Arthur C. Clarke is way better than 2001. As is Rendezvous with Rama. Clarke is the best example of that "sense of wonder" SF readers talk about so much.

Blindness by Saramago. The Handmaid's Tale by Margaret Atwood. The Left Hand of Darkness by Ursula LeGuin. Cloud Atlas by David Mitchell. I could go on ...

Science Fiction is never really about the future, it is about a re-imagining of the time it was written in, a kind of fantasia on scientific and historical themes, and the same is true of Fantasy. It's all about trying to make sense of the present and the past but with the tools of literature rather than history and science. It's never about escaping from the world, but about finding new ways into it.