by the way, IMHO, the really biggest, most far fetched fantasy and science fiction about trees and forests is the forestry profession! Joe
PS: this is an interesting thread- which has me thinking that it might be fun to start a thread on trees and forests in art, we see a lot of great photos in this list serve, many of which are truly artistic but the way painters show the subject can go to a different dimension ----- Original Message ----- From: Edward Frank To: [email protected] Sent: Thursday, August 27, 2009 2:23 AM Subject: [ENTS] Re: Need Tree Fiction Recommendations Jennifer, I have an extensive fantasy and science fiction book collection. I could likely write a forty page essay on the place of trees and forests in the fantasy and science fiction genres. I will restrain myself here to a handful of recommendations. Certainly among fantasy novels, J. R. R. Tolkien's trilogy The Lord of the Rings is the epitome of a story featuring forests and trees. Prior to this time the forests were simply a vague, ill defined background into which the other elements of the story were set, or would pass through. With LOTR the forests and trees are fleshed out and developed until they become a character in their own right. The introduction of the animated trees - the Ents -mealy adds to this element of the novels. Beyond the LOTR three are fragments and continuations of stories featuring these elements in the Simalrillion and in the Unfinished Tales. These are another source I would recommend. Another fantasy novel worth reading is the second book of Terry Brooks' Shannara seriesentitled "The Elfstones of Shannara." A blirb about the book reads as follows: "Ancient, ultimate evil threatened the Elves and the Races of Man. For the Ellcrys, the tree of long-lost Elven magic, was dying, loosing the spell of Forbidding that locked the hordes of Demons away from Earth. Already the fearsome Reaper was free. Only one source had the power to stop it: the Elfstones of Shannara. And the valiant companions must ride again in an impossible quest to find them." On the science fiction front two books come to mind to recommend. the first is "The Word For World is Forest" by Ursula K. LeGuin. A reader review states he following: The basic scenario is isolated earth colonists destroying a native planet whose inhabitants learn to fight back. It is very well executed and is quite deep and philosophical if you really engage with it, yet it also has a great story and great drama. The other I would recommend in "The Integral Trees" by Larry Haven. A review of the book reads: Surrounding a decaying neutron star is a torus of breathable air, the Smoke Ring, wherein - in near-weightless conditions - float some unusual flora and fauna: gigantic trees shaped like mathematical integration signs; cubic-mile globules of water ("ponds"); globular jungles; creatures large and small; and. . . some tree-dwelling people, attenuated descendants of a space survey team who fled into the Smoke Ring half a millennium ago to escape ill-defined but apparently totalitarian Earth government. Both the LeGuin book (actually a novella, but available as a short book) and the Niven novel won the Hugo Award and Nebula Award for best science fiction novella and novel when they were published. LeGuin is perhaps best known for her Earthsea Trilogy which was somewhat mutilated as a mini-series on the SciFi channel a couple years ago. Niven is a multiple award winner known for his hard science fiction stories.His best known work is the novel "Ringworld." There are several more I would recommend, but these are a good start. Ed Frank "The most beautiful thing we can experience is the mysterious. It is the source of all true art and all science." - Albert Einstein --~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~ Eastern Native Tree Society http://www.nativetreesociety.org Send email to [email protected] Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/entstrees?hl=en To unsubscribe send email to [email protected] -~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---
