the best sci-fi stories you've (n)ever read

Science fiction is arcane stuff. I get that. Not too many people are into it, except the science professor with the corduroy trousers and the geek down the block with the inch-thick glasses. More people are into fantasy (you know, that weird crap with unicorns and leprechauns and sparkly vampires and swords and magic and sexy witches) than sci-fi.

But I didn't come here to pontificate.

The odds are you're not a sci-fi fan. Two-thirds of you reading this probably aren't. Either that or you're a mere dilettante, someone who claims to love science fiction when the most you've ever done is go see Thor and Spider-man in the theaters, or glanced at Fahrenheit 451 in high school, or taken a shortcut through the sci-fi/fantasy section in Barnes & Noble because it was the quickest way to get to Dreams of My Father by Barack Obama at the mall entrance.

Oh, right. I'm not supposed to pontificate. [ahem]

So I'll help you out a little, because I happen to be a real sci-fi fan.

My collection includes everybody from James Blish to Poul Anderson, C.M. Kornbluth to John W. Campbell, Jr., Fritz Leiber to Gordon R. Dickson, Robert E. Gilbert to Edgar Rice Burroughs, A.E. van Vogt to L. Sprague de Camp...and it may soon extend to Piers Anthony, Robert Heinlein, Jack L. Chalker, and Orson Scott Card.

I know my stuff.

I know who Isaac Asimov is (and therefore I know just how much the Will Smith version of I, Robot sucked).

I have read pretty much every story that H.G. Wells or Jules Verne ever wrote.

I know what happened in the year 802,701 A.D. I can carry a gun for dinosaur. I know why sea monsters love lighthouses. I can (probably) flush out a shape-shifting alien. I've learned what a "gestalt organism" is. I know what lies at the earth's core. I can recite the Three Laws of Robotics. I remember what happened to Thor V. I discovered where Captain Nemo lives.

I think I'm pretty qualified to judge what constitutes "good" sci-fi and "bad" sci-fi.

If you're not a science fiction fan, but have been curious about the genre, the following would be my pick. I have here, for your consideration, a list of what I believe represents the best science fiction written in the last hundred years. Some authors' names you may recognize, some you may not. The stories themselves are, to you, probably unfamiliar. Even if you haven't read them, though, you've probably seen them on the silver screen. A lot of these were made into classic, memorable, or semi-memorable films.

More importantly, though, these works have influenced me on a profound level. Someday I hope to be half as good as the people who wrote them. If you, dear reader, should choose to peruse them, you'll receive a crash-course in the mind-blowing storytelling and incredible writing the world of science fiction has to offer.

And as an added bonus, you just might mutate into a full-blown sci-fi nut. Here's hoping.

I was originally going to make this a ten-item list, but you can't read three science fiction anthologies (and have a used book store in your town bursting with dog-eared arcana) without, you know, winding up with a few more favorites than you'd like to admit. More to the point, however, there is absolutely no way to distill an entire genre down to ten items. I needed enough leeway to clue you in on both the genre's classics and its lesser-known short works in order to give you the full picture of the organ's merit and the writers' genius. Then again, you lot are uninitiated, uncultured swine, and I can't overload your gnat-like attention spans with as much material as I'd prefer.

So here you go, twenty items. I slaved over the list for months. I picked these works because (a) I liked 'em and (b) they will literally blow your mind. I dare you to read even three of them and see if your universe hasn't widened a smidgen.

1. The Fog Horn . . . . Ray Bradbury (short story, 1951; inspired the 1953 film The Beast from 20,000 Fathoms)
2. Who Goes There? . . . . John W. Campbell, Jr. (novella, 1938; adapted into 1951's The Thing from Another World and 1982's much more faithful The Thing by John Carpenter)**
3. Black Destroyer . . . . A.E. van Vogt (short story, 1939)*****
4. Nerves . . . . Lester del Rey (novella, 1956)**
5. Code Three . . . . Rick Raphael (novella, 1963)*****
6. The Spectre General . . . . Theodore Cogswell (novella, 1952)***
7. Thy Rocks and Rills . . . . Robert Ernest Gilbert (short story, 1953)*****
8. A Pail of Air . . . . Fritz Leiber (short story, 1951)*****
9. The Time Machine . . . . H.G. Wells (novella, 1895; so much better than the two movie adaptations)**
10. E for Effort . . . . T.L. Sherred (novella, 1947)***
11. The Last Question . . . . Isaac Asimov (short story, 1959)*****
12. A Gun for Dinosaur . . . . L. Sprague de Camp (short story, 1956)*****
13. Heavy Planet . . . . Lee Gregor (short story, 1939)***** 
14. Scanners Live in Vain . . . . Cordwainer Smith (short story, 1948)*
15. Arena . . . . Fredric Brown (short story, 1944; provided the basis for a Star Trek episode of the same name)* 
16. The Machine Stops . . . . E.M. Forster (short story, 1909; adapted for TV in 1966 as part of the U.K. sci-fi series Out of the Unknown)***
17. A Rose for Ecclesiastes . . . . Roger Zelazny (short story, 1963)* 
18. The Big Front Yard . . . . Clifford D. Simak (novelette, 1959)***
19. Microcosmic God . . . . Theodore Sturgeon (novella, 1952)*
20. Call Me Joe . . . . Poul Anderson (novella, 1957)**

A in case that wasn't enough, here a few stories I thought deserved a nod. They may not be as "good" as the ones I've listed above ("good" here having the meaning of deep, profound, insightful, provocative, didactic, romantic, or mind-blowingly awesome)...but they're fun. So there.

• The Escape Orbit . . . . James White (novel, 1983)
• The Island of Doctor Moreau . . . . H.G. Wells (novel, 1896)
• Harrison Bergeron . . . . Kurt Vonnegut (short story, 1961)****
•  At the Earth's Core . . . . Edgar Rice Burroughs (novel, 1914) 
• Tale of a Computer that Fought a Dragon . . . . Stanislaw Lem (short story, 1977)****
• The Gods Themselves . . . . Isaac Asimov (novel, 1972)
• A Clockwork Orange . . . . Anthony Burgess (novel, 1962)
• I Have No Mouth, and I Must Scream . . . . Harlan Ellison (short story, 1967; made into a computer game in 1995)
• The Hammer of God . . . . Arthur C. Clarke (novel, 1993)

And that's the list. Pick a few out and give 'em a whirl.  You won't regret it. All I ask is that you read, think, and above all, enjoy.

That's what sci-fi is all about.

* The Science Fiction Hall of Fame: Volume I, ed. Robert Silverberg, 1970.

** The Science Fiction Hall of Fame: Volume IIA, ed. Ben Bova, 1973.

*** The Science Fiction Hall of Fame: Volume IIB, ed. Ben Bova, 1973.

**** The World Treasury of Science Fiction, ed. David G. Hartwell, 1989.

***** The World Turned Upside Down, ed. David Drake, Eric Flint, & Jim Baen, 2005.