The Best Science Fiction and Fantasy Novels of All Time

I've been meaning to set this straight for some time now. On Facebook Stephen Carlson posted Alex Carnevale's rating of The 100 Greatest Science Fiction or Fantasy Novels of All Time. On whole it's not a shabby list, though the omission of Stephen R. Donaldson is absurdly criminal (I'm sure Jim Davila would agree). Too much space is given to certain authors, most notably Gene Wolfe, and Tolkien and Herbert come in way too low. So here's my own top-12 list, which serves as a corrective to some of Carnevale's ratings.

1. The Lord of the Rings, J.R.R. Tolkien. 1954-1955. (#13 on Carnevale's list.) I could go on about Tolkien's meticulous crafting of Middle Earth, his mythic approach which left little room for allegory, his linguistic brilliance, and his ability to filter simple themes (courage, friendship, and passing on) through all of this to result in the greatest story ever told. Contrary to popular opinion, he didn't supply a happy ending. As a Catholic he saw the history of Middle-Earth as a "long defeat" (containing glimpses of final victory but never more), which is why Frodo had to be a failure, unable to resist the Ring when it mattered most. The quest to Mount Doom was hopeless from the start, and the cause, rather than the hero, was triumphant only because of the euchatastrophe -- the unexpected intervention of fate made possible by the mercy shown Gollum. The tragic ending to The Lord of the Rings has been tragically lost on too many of Tolkien's imitators.

2. Dune, Frank Herbert. 1965. (#11 on Carnevale's list.) The first book only. The five sequels are good but don't live up to the original. Themes of messiahship and charismatic movements are addressed in a remarkably well-developed story set in the far future on a desert planet, where water is precious as gold, and sandworms the size of skyscrapers. Herbert intended his story to make a statement about the "messianic convulsions that overtake us" and inevitably fail, the depths of their failure being directly related to how successful they are initially. "Heroes are painful, he declared, "superheroes [messiahs] a catastrophe. The mistakes of superheroes involve too many of us in disaster." On top of that is the narrative power. The book is simply impossible to put down.

3. The Chronicles of Thomas Covenant, Stephen R. Donaldson. 1977-1979; 1980-1983; 2004-2013. (Nowhere, shamefully, on Carnevale's list.) All ten books. The last one is yet to be published, but I'm supremely confident it will live up to the standards of the other nine. That this series didn't come in anywhere on Carnevale's top-100 list (let alone the top 10!) is incredible, and pretty much disqualifies the list. One is hard pressed to name a fantasy series with the same level of originality and philosophical depth. The underlying interplay throughout the chronicles is between that of innocence and guilt. The former, while good, is completely useless; guilt is power. Only the damned can be saved and thus effective for the salvation of others. Thomas Covenant is the best anti-hero of all time -- leper, outcast, unclean, unbeliever, rapist -- I mean, really, how often is someone like that the source of redemption in a work of fantasy?

4. The Gap Cycle, Stephen R. Donaldson. 1991-1996. (Nowhere on Carnevale's list.) This five-volume epic, structured on Wagner's Ring, will blow your mind. Set in a future where the administrators of intergalactic mining companies are effectively gods of the universe, a woman who is raped and abused horribly attempts to bring them all down. You won't like this series if you can't tolerate thoroughly despicable characters (the worldview is downright suffocating in its misanthropy); Donaldson delights in putting his protagonists through physical and emotional hell. I've never read a work of fiction with a plot and counterplots so convoluted that you need to keep notes trying to figure out who is doing what to whom and for what reason, but it makes for exciting reading -- the most exciting work of fiction I've read after Shogun and the third volume of A Song of Ice and Fire. The narrative crescendo escalates until your nerves are shrieking, it's that good.

5. A Song of Ice and Fire, George R.R. Martin. 1996-? (#19 on Carnevale's list.) A projected seven-volume series, with two yet to come, but showing every sign of being able to deliver the goods. More like historical fantasy (think James Clavell crossed with Tolkien), gritty, completely unpredictable, with the good guys losing (and dying) more often than the bad -- though of course the good guys aren't terribly "good" to begin with. You find yourself cheering for characters you never expected to, and hating those you thought you liked. There's little sorcery in this epic, and because magic is so rare, it's all the more interesting, powerful, and precious. Martin understands people like few authors I've read (he writes brilliantly from the perspective of women and children as much as men), and it's rare to see such gritty realism portrayed in works of fantasy. Reviewed here.

6. The Lions of Al-Rassan. Guy Gavriel Kay. 1995. (Nowhere on Carnevale's list.) Kay makes us live and breathe 11th-century Spain as the Islamic dynasty was starting to collapse. But it's an alternate fantasy version of Spain, with Asharites (who worship the stars) standing for Muslims, Jaddites (worshiping the sun) for Christians, and Kindath (worshiping the two moons, white and blue) for Jews. They co-exist by the tensions of real Spanish history, and the social dynamics are handled brilliantly, though with certain license. At heart, The Lions of Al-Rassan is a tragedy about the pain of cross-cultural friendship in time of war. I found myself torn and hurt like the lead characters -- Jehane, Ammar, Rodrigo, and Alvar -- this unlikely group who know their friendship is doomed. This book is impossible to put down, a roller-coaster ride through court politics, character introspection, battle action, and bloody devastation.

7. The Hyperion Cantos, Dan Simmmons. 1989-1997. (#33 on Carnevale's list.) Influenced by the narrative structure of Chaucer's Canterbury Tales, the poetry of John Keats, and the theology of Teilhard de Chardin, this four-volume space opera centers on a time-traveling creature known as the Shrike. The first two books deal with a space-invasion Armageddon and collapse of the Hegemony of Man. By the time of the second two books, the Roman Catholic Church has assumed control of the galaxy's government, declaring crusades on aliens, reaching out to its subjects with the hideous arm of the Inquisition. Simmons is one of the most versatile writers in existence and comes up with jolting ideas. The Merlin sickness is one of the most horrifying I've ever had to ponder: an anti-entropic aging disease causing a woman in her twenties to age backwards one day at the start of each day. Her emotionally pulverized father is forced to watch her regress into a baby as she keeps losing the memory of her lost days and needs everything explained to her every morning. Yikes. I'll never touch a Shrike.

8. Ender's Game, Orson Scott Card. 1985. (#47 on Carnevale's list.) Everyone loves Ender's Game. It's Lord of the Flies in space, but with adults actively pitting children against each other for their own ends, which makes things even more disturbing. Ender is a manipulated underdog in a world of virtual reality games and simulated battles, recruited to become the greatest military commander of all time -- the plot sounds ridiculously overambitious, except that Card knew exactly what he was doing. My only hope is that the upcoming film does it justice... and that Card's public homophobia won't be an obstacle to evaluating it, or the fantastic classic he wrote, on its own terms.

9. Red Nails, Robert Howard. 1936. (Nowhere on Carnevale's list.) Conan is a legacy of pulp fantasy, like Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser (below), Cthulhu, Elric -- morally ambiguous heroes who show down localized threats out of self-interest, and kill for their own code. The opposite of cheese fantasy (like Dragonlance), in other words, which offers cliche worldy-savior like heroes in high fantasy settings. In the case of Conan, it's one story in particular that makes my cut, "Red Nails", which I can't say enough good about, especially for its influence on old-school Dungeons & Dragons. Conan and Valeria find a hidden lost city where degenerate factions are at each other's throats, and all sorts of craziness ensues. It's a story about inevitable decay and being resigned to destruction, one-upping even Tolkien's long-defeat theme.

10. Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser, Fritz Leiber. 1940-1970. (Nowhere on Carnevale's list.) This five-volume collection of stories (the fifth is actually a complete novel) tends to be a forgotten gem from the canons of pulp fantasy. Leiber's heroes are two rogues, a barbarian and thief, who live in a world so decadent that corruption is the norm and you easily get drawn into the amorality. The notorious city of Lankhmar is the world's microcosm, and it's like going on vacation to an ancient city dominated by thieves and cutthroats, with sorcery cropping up in unexpected places. Fafhrd and Gray Mouser are an awesome pair -- corrupt as everyone else, but at least humane at heart -- and I relish these books when I want a ride of roguish adventure. The sixth and seventh volumes are okay, but not on par with the first five.

11. Mordant's Need, Stephen R. Donaldson. 1986-1987. (Nowhere on Carnevale's list.) Donaldson again. This duology contains some of the most brilliant philosophy on the nature of ontology in any work of fantasy. The protagonist Terisa is from our world, a loner with such a pitiful sense of self-worth that she doubts her own existence. This becomes the essence of her struggle in the world of Mordant, where mirrors don't cast reflections, but are gateways to other realities, and are used by Imagers (wizards) to summon aid when Mordant needs it. Terisa is one such summons, which does nothing for her ego: according to one school of thought in this world, entities who appear in mirrors don't exist; translation into Mordant is what calls them into being. Around this is weaved a political intrigue so twisted and obscure, the key character being King Joyce, whose apathy is a brilliant mask for making Mordant appear vulnerable so as to incite the hidden enemy to attack.

12. The Earthsea Trilogy, Ursula K. Le Guin. 1968-1972. (#51 on Carnevale's list.) For kids or teen literature, I go with Earthsea over The Hobbit. I read this trilogy many times as a kid; it manages to say so much in so few pages. The first two books are coming of age stories, the first taking place in an all-male school for wizards, the second in an all-female temple complex. The third is about the necessity of death as the outworking of life. Taoist influences are evident: the power of naming, the ability to overcome pride, and plenty of yin-and-yang trade-offs. As a kid I adored the world of Earthsea and would pretend to sail between the archipelago of islands on various quests.