TIME's 100 Best Fantasy Books of All Time

[Mercurius]

The panel and Time staff nominated a total of 250 books, none there own, and then rated them. The time Editors just used those ratings as one factor along with their opinion to make the final 100.

It would be interesting to see what the top 100 as rated by just the panel were.

Yeah, I skimmed the process. Still, I'd feel at least a little sheepish if I was one of them.

 

[Cadence]

Yeah, I skimmed the process. Still, I'd feel at least a little sheepish if I was one of them.

Sure. But if you were building the panel of authors to pick them, would you want it to have people you thought were great writers of fantasy... which means they might have at least one on the list (assuming anyone alive did)?

 

[Gradine]

The list is definitely a product of its own time (that time being now); obviously a list compiled in the 80's, for instance, would almost certainly not have excluded, say, Howard. So there's a recency bias, as well as all of the accompanying second-taking of works that don't hold up as well as they used to for one reason or another. Lord knows what another couple of decades will tell in the fashioning of a list like this. I imagine you'll see several fall of with the passage of time; Harry Potter and The Name of the Wind would be my first guesses, maybe Night Circus. And who knows what legacy of A Song of Fire and Ice will end up being.

One curious omission for me, upon further reflection, is Terry Brooks. I cut my teeth on Brooks (and David Eddings, whose omission I am not surprised by, as much as I enjoyed his books) as a kid. I guess there's the issue of "which book to choose" (Sword of Shannara being a not particularly good LotR ripoff) and probably the tanking of the recent Shannara tv show weighing it down; for my money Druid of Shannara is one his best early works.

Maybe The Black Cauldron would be on here too if not for the association with the barely related Disney movie.

 

[Mercurius]

Sure. But if you were building the panel of authors to pick them, would you want it to have people you thought were great writers of fantasy... which means they might have at least one on the list (assuming anyone alive did)?

I don't have a problem with the authors being on the list. Jemisin and Martin are great and deserving, Gaiman obviously too. Can't speak to the others as I haven't read them (although have been eyeing the James book, and possibly Adeyemi).

A charitable view on the list is that it just wasn't thought out all that well, not unlike asking a bunch of folks, "What are your favorite films?" and then changing that to a list of the greatest films of all time. The films will inherently be skewed to generational demographics, and thus also fall into recency bias, as Gradine pointed out.

Furthermore, there's the problem of expertise and knowledge. I'm guessing that the staff of TIME is probably not only on the younger side, but generally without a huge amount of knowledge or reading of older fantasy works.

If we really wanted a "best fantasy of all time" list with any credence to influence and originality, those involved should probably have a solid grasp of the tradition. I'd love to see such a list compiled by a panel that is more balanced, with experts like John Clute and Farrah Mendelsohn, as well as well-established and knowledgeable writers.

 

[Zaukrie]

Needs more Guy Gavriel Kay!

 

[Mercurius]

Needs more Guy Gavriel Kay!

Kay is one of my favorite authors, so he'd have a bunch of books on my top 100. But I do like the idea of only one book (or series) per author on such a list. For me it would be Lions of Al-Rassan, even though it had almost no fantastical elements.

 

[Zaukrie]

Kay is one of my favorite authors, so he'd have a bunch of books on my top 100. But I do like the idea of only one book (or series) per author on such a list. For me it would be Lions of Al-Rassan, even though it had almost no fantastical elements.

Most of his stuff has almost no fantasy.....what genre is it, really?

Also, if it was about influence more, you'd have to have Cook or Moorcock, wouldn't you?

 

[Mercurius]

Most of his stuff has almost no fantasy.....what genre is it, really?

Also, if it was about influence more, you'd have to have Cook or Moorcock, wouldn't you?

I mentioned Moorcock but forgot about Cook - definitely. Robin Hobb, too.

Kay is interesting because he isn't easy to categorize. He seems to exist somewhere between fantasy and historical fiction.

 

[MarkB]

Harry Potter 3? I get 6 being on the list, but I think 1 should be been here instead of 3.

It's pretty much my favourite of the novels. It's outgrown the worst of the initial wish-fulfilment aspects of the series, and hasn't succumbed to the bloat of later entries.

I was glad to see Good Omens in the list. It's my favourite in the 'urban divinity' genre.

 

[Zardnaar]

No Eddings, Feist, Katherine Kerr, Terry Brooks either.