Science Fiction, Fantasy & Horror Forums

It happens that now is a great time to add those books.  Pohl is a Grand Master and we're about to launch our Grand Master Reading Challenge.  I'll add them to my list.

Here ya go:

Frederik Pohl

• The Case Against Tomorrow
• Tomorrow Times Seven
• The Man Who Ate the World

L. Sprague de Camp

• The Continent Makers and Other Tales of the Viagens
• The Best of L. Sprague de Camp

That is the most often requested list right now.  We're a little over halfway through it now but it got bumped a bit because of the GMRC.  We'll get back on it shortly.  I'll post updates in the Adding lists and series thread as we go along.

@iftyzaidi:  I'm glad you're finding WWEnd to your liking!  No problem on your post I just wanted to make sure you didn't miss the discussion in the other thread.  You guys have been giving us lots of great list ideas over there.

@justifiedsinner and nate1234:  That's a lot of C. J. Cherryh!  I'll try to get some of these added this weekend but as I mentioned in another thread I'll be giving preference to Grand Master books for now so you guys in the GMRC will have those books to tag.  Don't let that stop you from requesting more books though.  I'll drag Jonathan into the mix again so we can get these up faster.

@iftyzaidi:  I was not aware Vast was part of a series.  I can't abide an incomplete series!  These are on the list for sure.  I might have to give these a go; I'm a huge fan of Reynolds.  Thanks for the info.

Wow.  Somehow I lost track of this thread so let me catch up.

@valashain:  I would have layed money down that we had The Songs of Distant Earth in the DB already.  Shocking.  I'll add that one and The Last Theorem to my wicked long list.

@kya:  Welcome to WWEnd and thanks for the compliments!  I'm a big historical fiction fan too.  Loved Sharpe's Rifles which as justifiedsinner rightly points out would not be a fit here.  I've not read any other Cornwell works but from your description The Warlord Chronicles would certainly fit well enough.

@valashain:  It can often be a fine line deciding what to include and what not to include in our database.  Typically we'll go with whatever the major awards or lists classify as SF, F or H.  That removes the burden of making the tough decisions to some extent and allows us to push the boundaries of what is and what isn't genre fiction in a way that we're comfortable with.

The Guardian list has many great examples of books that push those boundaries.  I never expected to be adding Kafka, Umberto Eco, Herman Hesse or Virginia Woolf to this site!   We saw adding those books as a great way to expand into the more literary side of genre fiction.  It's a really exciting and very different list than what you typically see and if anyone cries foul we can say with a straight face: "Take it up with the Guardian, Pal..."

The historical fantasy, especially where dragons and obvious fantastical elements come into play, are a no brainer for inclusion (even when coming from somebody who sells in the gen fic section like Cornwell) but I'm always leary of shifting the focus too much away from the genre fiction core.  There is just so much still to cover within the comfortable bounds of SF/F/H that I can't really see us making that expansion to include straight up historical novels (sans fantastic elements) for some time to come.  Heck it took us years to get around to embracing Horror as a distinct genre outside of the "Dark Fantasy" label we attached to everything scary that came our way.

The gray area for me comes in most awkwardly when we add an author who writes in multiple genres.  nate1234 points out many great examples of authors that could be problematic.  Once an author makes it into our DB, through an award nomination or inclusion in a best books list typically, we like to expand on their bibliographies.  Eventually we end up posting something like Able One by Ben Bova.  It's got lasers and other high tech military equipment etc. but it seems clearly to be more in the "thriller fiction" camp than in the SF realm.  I'm OK with that one because Ben Bova is a total bad ass (he did an interview with us) but also because it's still pretty gray.  You could get away with tagging it as "near future" SF.

Where do you draw the line, indeed!  Well, I suppose since it's a fuzzy line at best we'll continue to veer this way and that over the line on a case by case basis while we try to stick to our core mission of giving you guys the best SF/F/H books to pick from.  As always, we'll be leaning on our members to help us decide what needs to be added.  I have a feeling you will let us know if we stray too far.