From a group of titles nominated and then voted on by over 60,000 people, here are the top 10 titles in NPR’s Top 100 Science Fiction and Fantasy books.  You can click here to see the entire Top 100 list. 

My biggest gripe with the top titles are that there is not a single female author in the bunch.  The first female author appears at #20 and is Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein.  That is followed closely by Margaret Atwood’s The Handmaid’s Tale.  But then there is another large gap until Anne McCaffrey appears at #33 with Dragonflight.

I know it was a democratic voting process, but I still think it shows how dominant male writers are in sci fi and fantasy despite such amazing female authors.  Sigh.  We have a long way to go!

Note:  the list does not include horror or teen books, but teen readers enjoy fantasy and science fiction for adults, so I thought the list still had a place here on my blog.

Top 10

1. Lord of the Rings by J. R. R. Tolkien

2. The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams

3. Ender’s Game by Orson Scott Card

4. The Dune Chronicles by Frank Herbert

5. A Song of Ice and Fire Series by George R. R. Martin

6. 1984 by George Orwell

7. Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury

8. The Foundation Trilogy by Isaac Asimov

9. Brave New World by Aldous Huxley

10. American Gods by Neil Gaiman