Marcus Gipps, Editor at Gollancz.
I only took up my job as Editor for Gollancz a few weeks ago, so the planning for our celebration of fifty years of brilliant SFF publishing had mostly been done, and I came into things cold. Despite the research I’d done for my job interview, and the respect I had for Gollancz after ten years as a bookseller, I was (pleasantly!) surprised to see just how many great books they had published over the years. There are always books missing from any list, especially one that has to cover so much ground, but the fifty books selected here are truly astonishing. If you have any interest in SF or Fantasy, you’ll probably find that you’ve read a good selection of them – but there’ll be something on the list which you’ve heard of but never read, or which appeals to you for no obvious reason. Go out there and buy a copy! If a book is on this list then it won’t be much of a risk.
When I was 21, the masterworks series began. I remember seeing the first two or three in Waterstone’s Kingston, and picking up the first. The Forever War, by Joe Haldeman. Dear god, that’s a good book. Actually (don’t tell my authors on the list), I’ve voted for it in this poll. Ringworld was a close second. But I digress. When I realised that this was to be an ongoing series of the best in SF, it became a ritual of mine to head over to the book shop on my lunch break and see if the new titles had come in. That first tranche of twenty-four books is an utterly astounding collection, and I still have them all. I have a hazy recollection that the original plan was to end with the twenty-fourth, but the success was clearly such that the series continued, and some of my favourites come in the later part of the range. To be working at the publisher that provided me with such joy, and gave me such a great selection of books to discover, is still a pinch-myself-daily thing. As the range continues, we add new titles to the list, and I’m looking forward to being part of that conversation. Bribes are welcome. I copy-edited Arslan by M. J. Engh last year, my first piece of work for Gollancz, and it was a real discovery. Well worth picking up, although it isn’t on this voting list.
Of course, Gollancz don’t just republish classics – we publish future classics as well. These lists contain some of the best books of the last few years. Working in my bookshop, just been handed the SFF section to manage and order for, I got myself onto the Gollancz advance copy list. There have been some brilliant discoveries over the last few years, and I remember the excitement I felt when I read Abercrombie, Lynch and Lloyd-Williams. Three great fantasy books, different in style but all debuts, all highly readable, all from the same publisher, in the same quarter. That was an astounding bit of publishing, and I look forward to contributing to a similar buzz in the future! But no, you can’t have my collection of signed Gollancz proofs, they’re mine.
I haven’t read every book on the Gollancz at 50 list, and I probably never will – too many books to read, too little time. But I’m immensely proud to be part of an imprint that has published so widely, so well and for so long. I’ve voted – get out there and choose your favourites, so we can republish them as, truly, the best of Gollancz.
You can cast your vote here!
