Ranking Every Book I Read in 2023

17 time Infinity is a short story Anthology edited by grath Conlin that I thought was very mixed

2001 Space Odyssey might be my favorite Clark ... this was my favorite of them

Babel 17 by Delaney is his most famous book ... great philosophical weird Space Opera about Linguistics ... it's hard to follow in spots because it's Delaney ... but it's it's good

the best book that I read this year was Bad Brains by Kathy COA ... it's by far the best horror book that I've ever read ... it's a perfect t for me

Beyond Apollo by Barry mberg is his most famous book ... it's a satire of like the space program and American values of the 70s I think it's Sublime another one that's definitely not for everybody

burning Chrome is a short story collection by William Gibson it might be my favorite short Story collection in science fiction ... Bernie Chrome it's great

it was competent but forgettable and I thought not as clever as it wanted to be

Capricorn games is a short story compilation from Robert silverberg it's not his best material ... there are a couple nelas including one dystopian one ... that was superb

Dawn by Octavia Butler is a skin crawling weird and creepy science fiction horror ... it's not super easy to get me to put a book down and walk around because of disturbing content but Butler managed to make that happen

Do Android's Dream of Electric Sheep ... is the best Philip K dick book ... it totally lives up to the hype ... 100% I co-sign its status as a mega classic

the delore ad by Missouri Williams is a really Bleak post-apocalyptic novel ... but was inventive and kind of cool and interesting if Bleak

dream snake by Vonda McIntyre was an effective science fantasy about a medicine woman ... I did find it just a little bit boring in spots though

Dune Messiah did not live up to Dune I thought that it felt like it was rushed ... character work was not nearly as interesting as in the first dune

the Electric Forest by tanith Lee was the first tanith Lee book that I've read if you like Philip K dick you should read this ... she deserves to be much more widely read

farewell Earth's Bliss by DG Compton probably the darkest bleakest most hopeless science fiction book that I've ever read ... Compton was just an amazing writer

Frankenstein Unbound by Brian Aldis was a retelling rehashing of Frankenstein by Mary Shelly ... I think that it kind of retreads the same thematic ground as Frankenstein and it felt just a little bit like fanfiction to me

God's demon is by Wayne Barlo my favorite genre artist it's his first work of fiction I think it is Clumsy a little bit in Parts but if you like high fantasy ... I do recommend it

heliconia spring is the first of a Trilogy from ald this big sprawling World building some great ecology great aliens ... it's pretty good if long

IR robot by Isaac azimov is a fix up of short stories ... for the most part the short stories are rather narrow in their conception and not again all that interesting mixed bag

Ice by anak cavan ... I think in terms of just raw literary merit might be the best science fiction book that I've read ... it's like a five-dimensional object ... most amazing

the instrumentality of mankind is a lesser known cord wayer Smith short story compilation ... unbelievably powerful writing ... just one of the strange and best writers in science fiction

Kindred by Octavia Butler great very brutal surprisingly tough read ... utterly gut-wrenching ... I think people should give Butler a chance

negative space by BR joerger is a horror book that reminded me way too strongly of things that happened around me in high school ... I wasn't really comfortable weighing in on if I liked the book or not

The nightland by William hope Hodson ... absolutely blew me away with how ahead of its time it was ... it gets really truly boring like undeniably boring and redundant for a long part of it but there are set pieces ... unbelievable

kns Master by tanith Lee one of the best fantasy books that I've ever read ... written just absolutely beautifully ... cannot recommend highly enough

nightflyers by George RR Martin is a noela that is quite literally completely forgettable

on the beach by Neville shoot I found okay ... interesting premise po premise I thought the execution was a little bit dull

one on me by Tim Huntley is a utopian distopian novel that is actually funny did make me laugh but kind of steps on a bunch of rakee heads ... I thought that it was a little clumsy

other days other eyes beautiful fix up hard SF novel Bob Shaw wrote more beautiful hard SF than any other hard science fiction writer ... it's all good

overlay by Barry mberg ... just beautiful a beautiful weird crunchy book truly not for everybody ... I was just in love with it when I read it

Rond with r by Arthur Clark it's good it's Clark so the writing is decent it's very stayed down the middle and a little dull a little bit slow

I don't think River of gods by Ian McDonald had a good first half it's cyberpunk that gets bogged down again in its own plot

RoR by aam Davidson ... it's pretty good there's some cool aliens in it but it is mixed it is uneven

star maker by stapled in very boring philosophical novel with quite literally no plot but some amazing kaleidoscopic ... meditations on like speculative alien life ... amazing book beautiful in Parts but also very dense impenetrable and boring in Parts

star of The Unborn by France farful ... it was a fortuitous pick it's a totally forgotten science F science fiction fantasy stapled donian big Epic ... amazing book

the book of skulls by silverberg ... it is kind of its period pretty risque and a little uncomfortable but excellent book

the chrysalids is my least F no that's not true ... it read a little bit like ya to me ... it's perfectly fine ... not bad it just felt a little bit tread over

myth City in the stars by Arthur C Clark is a dying Earth novel that is pretty soft around the edges ... is beautiful and lyrical in parts

the decay of the Angel by Yuki Mishima it's the last in a tetrology called The Sea of fertility ... I do recommend it but I don't recommend doing what I did

the doomed City by borison arcad statsky is a huge long truly strange meditation on 20th century ideology ... truly amazing ... absolutely recommended

the drowned World by JG Ballard beautifully written evocative important book ... Ballard has never produced that feeling in me as much as I love and respect his work

the Einstein intersection by Delaney ... is a rather difficult rather out there New Wave novel ... I remember a sense of being befuddled and also impressed by Delaney ... it is good

I had a mixed reaction to fellowship at the ring it took me for literally a lifetime to finally finish ... finally nailed it

the final circle of Paradise by Boris and arcadey is a dystopian book ... very experimental and weird ... a difficult read and a confusing read at points but certainly memorable certainly different

the gamesman by Barry mbberg is a pretty difficult little bit of a rocky road ... it's a fable about I think capitalism ... if you like The Hunger Games if you like kofka the two of them together make the gamesman

the goat without horns by Thomas Bernett Swan ... is a very barely competently written although occasionally beautiful and narratively Reckless book

the gods themselves by Isaac Asimov is really topheavy in a good way the first two of the three sections of it are great ... and then the third one is homage to moon is a Harsh Mistress that manages to be even more boring ... mixed bag

I think it might be the most right-wing book I've ever read ... makes a point a political point that is idiotic and regressive to the point of being fascistic

The Haunting of Hill House ... it ended up totally knocking my little socks off ... it's a big twister of a novel very sophisticated and I was just I was really impressed

house on the Borderlands by William hope Hodson ... some amazing imagery ... I really loved it

the Invincible by Stan's law of LM ... is a very serviceable if slightly pulpy book ... it's LM so it's beautifully written ... very good

man in the High Castle by Philip K dick which I think has the highest high points of any Philip K dick book that I've read ... I think it's him as a writer at his best

the midwich cuckoo by Windam is my favorite Windom ... is slow and a little boring in spots ... but the ending is amazing ... I really value that

the [ __ ] by Dennis Cooper is the most extreme novel I've ever read in my life definitely not for everybody ... it is a book about the internet and how Truth has a difficult time surviving ... amazing novel

the sparrow by Mary Doria Russell was almost as irritating to me in its attempts at kind of quippy smarmy humor I don't think that stuff ages that well

the two towers by a guy named Jr toen ... two towers is way better it's it's much less dull and the there's like a an intelligence and kind of a koi cynicism in it that I think is great

Voyage of the space beagle is a classic Space Opera among classic space operas by EV van voked ... it is slightly dated ... it is better than Galactic Patrol

word for world is Forest by leguin is very good it's leguin in a different mode clipper angrier ... if you want an entree into Lewin maybe start with this one

the best of Robert block he was a horror writer for the most part it's all pretty pulpy except for one story called The Funnel of God that is amazing

the disaster area is a short story collection from Ballard I rated it higher than drowned world ... I think he's sharper

the doomsters by Ross McDonald is crime fiction great protagonist Great Character work believable World lyrical great Pros ... I thought was remarkably good

The Last Castle by Jack Vance seemingly is the ideological antithesis of Gray Prince ... it's quick Punchy you can read it in one sitting and it will give you a taste for the parts of ANS that are truly great

worst book that I read this year was the Moon is a Harsh Mistress by Robert heinlin

the overlords of war is a French hard ass SEF time travel novel ... it does a lot of things right it does some things not right it is pretty racist in one part overall if you like that kind of stuff it is above average

pastel City by m John Harrison is also a way of above average ... it was not as experimental or weird as I had hoped for ... great battle scenes certainly good

three-body problem I've talked unto death on this channel ... I thought it is think it is very overrated and not especially of great literary value

it kind of reads like the X-Men if it was bogged down in a lot of hard science Exposition and not a whole lot happened it was okay

ubic by Philip K dick ... I don't like it quite as much as the other dicks that are on this list ... it's very good ubic is very good but not as good by one integer as man in the High Castle

Universe 5 by Terry Carr is a short story Anthology that has some really interesting Innovative stuff in it ... it is like most anthologies kind of a mixed bag

virtual unrealities is a short story collection from Alfred bester it doesn't work quite as well as the longer form fiction ... but it's bester so it's very good

Vore by James blish feels like it takes place in the same universe as his after such knowledge books it's not as good as them it is slower drier but has a lot to say about Cold War politics ... I do recommend it

we who are about to by Joanna Russ is I think the best feminist book that I've ever read ... I really loved every bit of the book it is not a crowd-pleaser

I found rather prosaic again kind of forgettable kind of mediocre

who goes there is the Noel that the thing was based on ... if you like the John Carpenter version of The Thing read this because the movie is pretty true to the source material

Will of the Wisp is by the same guy that did the goat without horns I thought that this was a lot prettier ... also very horny but I think is a better book