Now, this is talking largely about "literary" fiction, which is a genre to itself, even though it's assumed to be the default choice of reading material. Looking at the bestseller lists (which are an entirely different animal altogether) gives a slightly different view, although I have to say there's nothing there that really grabs me either. This week (3/15/98) sees Grisham at the top of the list, of course, and features some more of the Usual Suspects: Lillian Jackson Braun, with her "Cat" mysteries, and Jackie Collins, pitching her usual stew of sex, money, and fame. None of these particularly appeal to me to read, though I don't get snobbish about it; Grisham and Collins, for whatever their ultimate value, at least know how to keep the pages turning — a talent that is woefully underappreciated (besides, Toni Morrison and Charles Frazier, Nobel and National Book award winners, respectively, are also on the list this week — so who can complain?).

Fourth, no other genre has the same immediate appeal to me that science fiction does — I suspect, because my own personality does not incline me towards those genres on a day-to-day basis as it does with science fiction. Most horror I read is laughably bad, though I except Stephen King (the original page-turner) and a couple others from this general tarbrushing. Romance fiction is a world alien to me; most of what I read makes me giggle. Westerns bore me. Erotic writing is especially tricky; too graphic and I get turned off (in the literary sense), not graphic enough and I wonder why I'm reading it in the first place. Techno-thrillers don't seem to have much place for character and dialogue; they mostly seem to be varying degrees of high-tech warfare porn. Poetry is generally silly. Historical novels seem to overlap romance novels rather too much for my taste. Medical thrillers are generally boring science fiction. So on and so on and so on.

Keep in mind that I'm speaking about genres as a whole; in each genre there are writers who I will read because I find their writing interesting, regardless (or in spite) of the genre they are working with. With science fiction, either I find a lot more writers whose work appeals to me in spite of the genre, or I mentally have kept the bar for being entertained somewhat lower than in other genres. It's hard for me to say objectively. The only genre that I seem to have either the same tolerance, or have found the same number of interesting authors, is the mystery genre, in which I enjoy Carl Hiaasen and Gregory McDonald on a regular basis.

But ultimately, it comes back again and again to the simple fact that I enjoy science fiction, both for what people write about in the genre, and how they write it. The fiction writers I'd prefer to emulate come from the genre.

Well, enough of that. Whose writing do I enjoy in the science fiction genre, and why? I've collected this list of my favorite writers in the genre, with suggested novels for each. Bear in mind that for the sake of convenience, I'm lumping fantasy in with science fiction; I understand quite vividly that they are two separate genres, although I think the distinction for most folks is the same as the distinction between country music and western music: There's a difference, though damned if most of us could say what it is.

And now, without further ado, my List of Favorite Science Fiction Writers. This list is in no particular order, excepting the first one, who is, reasonably enough, my all-time favorite.

Robert Heinlein: The most ironic thing about Heinlein's writing, I think, is how much of his science he (in hindsight) got backwards. In Starman Jones, he has starship officers writing out by hand the sort of logarithmic equations that a hand calculator can crunch in a fraction of a second; in The Moon is a Harsh Mistress, it's (almost) nothing for a computer to talk and think, but rather impressive for it to be able to create a convincing virtual office on a monitor. Heinlein's future is almost purely mechanistic in that stereotypical "rocketship to the moon" sort of way; technology qua technology either bored him or he simply didn't fret the details too much beyond the math.

Which is fine with me. I read Heinlein not for the hardware ("hard" SF generally bores me), but for the software: namely, the characters and the dialogue — Heinlein, of all the Golden Age writers, had the best grip on both — and for Heinlein's philosophical musings. Heinlein, as any SF reader worth his or her salt knows, was very much a proto-Libertarian; his general political philosophy appeared to be "most people are idiots, so why should we trust a government of the people?" Like Ayn Rand (who he share a large chunk of his audience with), Heinlein could get away with it because he populated his novel with characters who were independent and free-thinking, and thus could handle Heinlein's political set-up with a minimum of fuss. The real world, dare I say, is somewhat more complicated.

For all that, Heinlein's characters' streaks of independence, intelligence, and honor made a big impression on me as kid growing up; they were the sort of people I would have liked to have been. Jubal Harshaw and Lazarus Long would be two people I would love to have over for dinner, just to chat and expound (although one would probably do; the characters, philosophically, are pretty much the same). Heinlein had style, and he had influence on several generations of writers — as you go down the list here, you'll notice some of his stylistic children popping up now and again.

Heinlein's work has aged reasonably well, particularly his juveniles, which I admire greatly because they talk across, rather than down, to the audience (I'm trying to write a juvenile myself, in the same vein as Heinlein's work). Ironically, it's his later work which I think fares worst of all: The Number of the Beast, The Cat Who Walks Through Walls and To Sail Beyond The Sunset all are the work of a man trying to tie his fiction together in one big bow, rather than trying to create discrete works of fiction (for my money, Heinlein's last totally readable book was Friday). Also, Heinlein got a little sex-crazy near the end, which for me distracted rather too much from the stories at hand.

Still, for all that, Heinlein was the author who got me started reading science fiction, and the author I still turn to as the primary signpost of what I think of as "good" science fiction. A singular fellow, to be sure — he could have been a character in one of his books. That qualifies as high praise.

Suggested Reading: Among his adult works, Stranger in a Strange Land is of course the place to start to get the gist of Heinlein when he was in full force: the story still reads like a rocket, despite some jarringly outdated moments — the crack about women looking for trouble nine out of the ten times they get raped is one that wouldn't survive the editing process today. Speaking of which, I recommend the traditional version of the book rather than the "uncut" version which is also available; the book benefited from the pruning, from what I can see. Once you're done with Stranger, check out The Moon is a Harsh Mistress, a rousing tale of rebellion and computers, and Time Enough for Love, the first and best capstone of Heinlein's universe, featuring Lazarus Long. He's the guy to whom Heinlein attributes all his pithy quotes. For late-era Heinlein, Friday gets the vote.

But don't neglect Heinlein's juveniles! Some of his best work is here — and because these books were generally shorter, they're a quicker, more compact read. Starship Troopers qualifies as a juvy in my book (though aimed squarely at later teens), and serves as a good tract for Heinlein's political musings (it's nothing like the movie, by the way). Starman Jones, Citizen of the Galaxy, The Star Beast and Red Planet are also worthy reads.