Favorite or Surprising Early Sci-Fi Authors

Last week I read several shor stories in Planets of Adventure by Basil Wells. My copy of the book is at http://www.librarything.com/work/4455756/book/23978629. I found him to be a wonderful read. At a time when many authors were writing stories about 'heroes in space', with blasters and spaceships, he took a more cultural approach in some of his stories. His writing flows nicely, and he took his own approach, not just a formulaic approach, to science fiction.

I read the Null-A stories when I was about 11, followed by Voyage of the Space Beagle and have had a soft spot for Van Vogt ever since. His stuff could be formulaic, but it was still "out there".
Love this group...1930s to 50s is the golden age.

I read also when young "Voyage of the space Beagle" by Van Vogt and liked it very much. I am enthusiastic of the Foundation series by Asimov and Fahrenheit 451 by Bradbury made me a great impression...nice group, I hope it will develop further

A series of stories put into a series of books that I read a while back were:

the sunless world
space war
twin worlds
doomsday on ajiat

These books feature a collection of Jones' short stories featuring a Professor Jameson who is given immortality and gets to see the future history of Earth and the universe. I found them lots of fun and still very readable.

There is even a world (future Earth) in one of the stories that looks a lot like the world of the Matrix ( the movie) in some respects. People think these concepts are new...B-)

Let's Revive this Thread!!
I'm about to start reading The End of Eternity by Isaac Asimov and just so you know, This book is from 1957 and is currently in the Pre-Production stages to become a feature film.
Long live Sci-Fi!! All Ideas are from this era!!

See Crawford, Donahue, & Grant's "333: A Bibliography of the Science-Fantasy Novel." Originally issued as a limited edition pamphlet, this became a famously rare reference work, then Arno's hardcover edition added another thousand copies to the pool making the book more generally accessible. It contains synopses of 333 weird, lost race, fantasy, & s-f novels from the gothic period to about 1950 --

This is much of a "best of" vintage adventure fantasies & SF - everything listed can be relied on as a fine read (in the same way that the Queen's Quorum list can be counted on for best detective tales.)

I am half way through Foundation and Empire. Really enjoying these books.

It is obvious where Lucas got a lot of his ideas for star wars. Some of the passages read like a scene straight of the movies.

Just finished Rocket Ship Galileo and Have Spacesuit Will Travel. Am looking for any other golden age recommendations.

Didn't I just post something here? Guess not!

If you're on a Heinlein kick, I always enjoy Double Star. It's not as Heinlein-ey as some of the others!

I think I've read all of Heinlein's novels. Of his juvenile fiction, Citizen of the Galaxy and Between Planets are both good. Of his later fiction, which I generally like less, the best is The Moon Is A Harsh Mistress. Of course, tastes vary.

I also see an AE Van Vogt comment. The Weapon Shops of Isher was the first of his I read and still one of my favorites.

Quest For the Future was perhaps my favorite of Van Vogt, as the most complex time travel story I have ever read.

http://www.sci-fi-o-rama.com/wp-content/uploads/2008/11/gary_-viskupic_quest_for...

I just read (for the first time!) both of the Weapons shop stories last month. Since posting that comment 3 years ago, I've also gotten more into early Heinlein.

I think my favourite early SF author per se would be Verne. Ive read quite a few of his stories, quite amazing!

#14,

I'm glad to see Verne mentioned. I have a fairly extensive collection of his works.

I like the old Victorian copies for their appearance and illustrations. However, I know that most of the 19th Century translations are very bad. They don't follow Verne's original texts. In the case of Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Seas, the 1872 translation by Mercier Lewis omits many parts, including a chapter describing the interior of the Nautilus, and mangles many others, especially units of measurement.

If I want a quick, breezy read, I can turn to the Fitzroy editions of the 1960s. These are abridged, what you might call the "good parts editions" (to borrow from The Princess Bride). The set contains many obscure titles, including some first English translations. However, the illustrations are not much to look at. Evans did much to popularize Verne in the 1960s and I'm glad of that.

To get as close as possible to Verne without reading French, one must generally look to the modern translations. For 20,000 Leagues, look to Walter James Miller or F.P. Walter. Many well-known and obscure titles have received new translations in the past 10-15 years. One of the latest is Walter's translation of the Sphinx of the Ice Realm. The checklist by Arthur B. Evans is several years old (2005) but is a good way to evaluate the older translations and know the good translations available then. The companion article is also useful in explaining the nature of the problems with Verne translations.

Of course only some of Verne's texts fall into what many would consider to be science fiction. Others may be travelogues. However, even among the obscure titles are some interesting surprises.

I have been a member of the North American Jules Verne Society (NAJVS) since the early 1990s and encourage others who are interested to join this for a small fee or the online Jules Verne Forum for free.

James

I enjoyed reading Invaders from the Infinite by John Campbell again, 40 years after I read it in the 60s. Quite dated sociologically, yet with one of the more astoundingly powerful space warships ever imagined.