"I must not fear. Fear is the mind-killer."

"I must not fear. Fear is the mind-killer. Fear is the little-death that brings total obliteration. I will face my fear. I will permit it to pass over me and through me. And when it has gone past, I will turn the inner eye to see its path. Where the fear has gone there will be nothing. Only I will remain."

Bene Gesserit Litany Against Fear.

I heard the first line quoted on TV the other day, taken from one of favourite sci-fi books of all time, Dune by Frank Herbert. The show in question was (get this...) Room Raiders on MTV...!

Dune is such an awesome space opera. It has politics, great characterization, a riveting storyline, factions (i love books with warring factions!) and a Messiah.

To this day, I am still puzzled why Herbert didn't stop at Book 2. The last 4 were unbelieveably disappointing for me.

Top 100 Science Fiction Books

Found this website via Digg.com. It ranks the 100 top science fiction books which they say ' you just have to read'. I have only just gotten into the whole SF genre in the last few years, and can't really count that many that i have read in the list. But being a huge fan of Frank Herbert, I'm glad to see Dune rank quite high. Some of the other authors I have read are also on the list (although lower) like CJ Cherryh, Jules Vernes, Ursula LeGuinn and John Wyndham.

Obviously, favourites like Arthur C. Clarke and Asimov would top the list.

I've listed the top 10 here, for the full list you can check out the site.

1. Childhood's End by Arthur C. Clarke
   
   
   
   
2. Foundation by Isaac Asimov
   
   
   
   
3. Dune by Frank Herbert
   
   
   
   
4. Man in the High Castle by Philip K. Dick
   
   
   
   
5. Starship Troopers by Robert A. Heinlein
   
   
   
   
6. Valis by Philip K. Dick
   
   
   
   
7. Frankenstein by Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley
   
   
   
   
8. Gateway by Frederick Pohl
   
   
   
   
9. Space Merchants by C.M. Kornbluth & Frederick Pohl
   
   
   
   
10. Earth Abides by George R. Stewart
    
    

Memories of A School Library

Malaysian secondary school libraries are well-known for many things, most of them not book-related (Haw, haw). But having a decent English section is usually not one of them.

Although, I wouldn’t say it’s particularly anybody’s fault, funding for these things are not comparable to developed countries.

In my secondary school, the English section was decidedly small, most of it made up of books that hadn’t been checked out in years. Even by me.

But as I recalled back the other day, there were quite a few books that I have found in that steaming hot library that sticks in my mind. One of them was The Chrysalids by John Wyndham. At the time when I read it, I simply thought it was a good yarn, without any prior knowledge of who the author was or if the story was anything more than it was.

A few years later, when I was in uni during my study break just before the finals, there was this one year I decided not to go home during the one week like most of my classmates. I was on a freaking tight budget then (heck, some things don’t change) so I thought I’d stay on campus and save on the express bus fare. Just so happen the huge campus library just received a new batch of reprinted novels from selected authors, and to my surprise, The Chrysalids was one of them.

So that afternoon in the freezing 4th floor of the library (see the contrast to the earlier library…?) instead of cramming for my finals, I sat down and finished the book, and experiencing a wider understanding to Wyndham’s beautiful allegory and social observations of society.

The next day, instead of studying again, I read Lost Horizon by James Hilton - another book I read earlier from my school library...

Slow Going with Le Carre

I'm ploughing through Absolute Friends by John Le Carre for almost two months now. It's really slow going. I dunno, maybe its just me, i find his style of writing very tedious and digressive.

Back in the 80's John Le Carre was supposed to be the cool espionage thriller writer, and while is my first Le Carre book, i'm feeling his grip on fiction is as outdated as the cold war. No doubt a lot of his fans still love him, it's just not for me.

150 more pages... can't wait to finish it so i can start another book.