Slan
"Fans are Slans," became the catchphrase of early science fiction fandom in the wake of this novel. Like the Slans - telepathic mutants hiding out in a hostile population - science fiction fans considered themselves a haunted special minority, imbued with transcendent and visionary insight, sure to prevail in the fullness of time. Communes were called "Slan shacks" and fans occupied them. In the wake of the atomic bomb and theories of atomic mutation, the premise of SLAN seemed ever more credible.There are two kinds of Slans - those whose tendrils publicize their power to read the minds of ordinary humans and so-called tendrilless Slans whose strange power is concealed (allowing these Slans to hide). The tendrilled Slans were exterminated in a pogrom a while ago; now human society is ruled by the dictator Kier Gray who promises to locate and eliminate the tendrilless Slans. Johnny Cross, a young adolescent, is a secret Slan who in the novel's opening scene is fleeing with his mother, pursued by a human mob. The mob assaults and kills his mother, who dies charging Johnny with the responsibility to confront Kier Gray in his palace and destroy him so that the Slans may live.The novel is the narrative of Johnny's odyssey through the Slan sub-societies and toward his final confrontation with Kier Gray. In Gray's palace lives the young, beautiful Slan, Kathleen Layton,who Gray spared from a mob so that a Slan and her powers could be investigated at close quarters.
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- Lest Darkness Fall by L. Sprague de Camp which appears to recently have received a reprinting, my copy is from the 40s.
Deathworld by Harry Harrison. I've been waiting for some screenplay writer to stumble across this one, and if I had to guess James Cameron probably did, but just didn't tell anyone.
SLAN by A. E. van Vogt.
The Witches of Karres by James H. Schmitz.
Lord Kalvan of Otherwhen, and Paratime by H. Beam Piper.
However the best of all, is maybe only slightly less know, since the author is certainly extremely well known: Tuf Voyaging by George R. R. Martin. An absolutely fantastic collection of stories about an ecological engineer.
- Try A. E. van Vogt, Slan, 1946 for even more precient.
- Null-A is probably the Van Vogt's most famous book, but others are great as well, I loved "Slan" from the same author : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slan
- depends on the subgenre :)
Superhuman: Slan by A.E. Van Vogt More Than Human by Theodore STurgeon Odd John by Olaf Stapledon
Post Apocalyptic: The Day of The Triffids by John Whyndham Earth Abides by George R. Stewart A Canticle for Lebowitz by...don't remember
Space Opera/Adventure: any of The Culture novels by Iain M. Banks The Reality Dysfunction series by ...don't remember Hyperion series by Dan Simmons To Your Scattered Bodies Go by Philip Jose Farmer
Dystopian: We by Yevgeny Zamyatin <---highly overlooked, predates 1984 and Brave New World
But the Absolute Best would be anything by: Stanislaw Lem (Cyberiad, Futurological Congress, Solaris) Alfred Bester (The STars my Destination, The Demolished Man) or Samuel R. Delany (Babel-17, Dhalgren, Trtion, Nova) oh and Roger Zelazny's Lord of Light and This Immortal are both great.
Some of Philip K. Dick's stuff is great, but everyone recommends him. :)
almost forgot John Brunner, check out Steel Beach, The Sheep Look Up, and Stand on Zanzibar.
- Nope. Remember that Project Gutenberg hosts books which have lapsed into the public domain. That's not true for a lot of the stuff mentioned. (A decent collection of Van Vogt is available through Baen Book's Webscriptions program, though it lacks classics like Slan.)
You will find the occasional oddity: a couple of Samuel R. Delany's early Ace Double publications just popped up, and Chip is still very much alive. Chip has been in the business a long time - if they've lapsed into the public domain, it's because he allowed them to.
(It is weird when you see stuff appearing on PG by people you know/knew - Delany among the living, and Terry Carr and Laurence M. Janifer among the deceased.)
