Best Sci-fi short story?

Best Sci-fi short story?

Posted by Aditya on Thu, 2008-03-20 21:52 in

Legendary author Isaac Asimov rated his most favorite stories in this order: "The Last Question", "The Bicentennial Man", and "The Ugly Little Boy".

Going by a few hacker discussions, "The Last Question" did seem to be one of the real favorites, and even got tagged as the best ever. Luckily this story is available online here.

I am a bit literary-challenged, and may be it's me, but is this really the best? No doubt it's quite good, but i am sure there would be others that might be better. This link has the other contenders in the form of a top 100 list. Here are the top 10 from it:


Ender's Game
-- Orson Scott Card
Nightfall
-- Isaac Asimov
The Bicentennial Man
-- Isaac Asimov
Flowers For Algernon
-- Daniel Keyes
The Last Question
-- Isaac Asimov
The Nine Billion Names Of God
-- Arthur C Clarke
The Man Who Sold the Moon
-- Robert A Heinlein
I Have No Mouth and I Must Scream
-- Harlan Ellison
The Green Hills Of Earth
-- Robert A Heinlein
A Sound Of Thunder
-- Ray Bradbury

Time to read! :-)

Which one?

There is a short and funny story which might have served as a inspiration for "The Last Question" (1956). It was written 2 years before Asimov wrote his masterpiece.

The story is "Answer," from Angels and Spaceships, by Fredric Brown (Dutton, 1954). Here is the original text:

http://www.alteich.com/oldsite/answer.htm

Posted by nag.rajan on Thu, 2008-03-20 23:18
Something wrong with australians

I noticed that the top 10 server is australian which clams me a bit, since 'enders game' is decidedly not a great piece of anything let alone science fiction.

Still I must read many of the others on the list to determine this (= crazy australians) once and for all.

Posted by sunny (not verified) on Sun, 2008-03-30 23:11
So what are your favorites?

:-). So which are the few you really like?

Posted by Aditya on Mon, 2008-03-31 21:09
and now?

So, which ones you liked a year after? can you make some recommendations?

Posted by Anonymous (not verified) on Mon, 2009-04-06 06:22
One sorely missing

I think the Foundation Series definitely belongs in here. Not too much science, but SF nevertheless and one of the best I have read (have read half the books in this list).

Posted by nag.rajan on Wed, 2009-04-08 13:29