Do you prefer fantasy, or science fiction, or neither?--Al

-- Al Schroeder (al.schroeder@nashville.com), May 31, 2001

Answers

Fantasy. In some points of my life, I've spent more times in magical worlds such as Avolon, Pern, and Mt Olympus, than in reality. I don't think this is a negative thing, just that I've seen the ugly side of realty and compensate in this way. In some books I can re-read over and over just because the words on the page are put together in a way that they have their own beauty.

-- AJ (joijoijoi@hotmail.com), June 01, 2001.

I enjoy science fiction more than fantasy. I never really analyzed the "why" of it before, until tonight. And I believe that it has a lot to do with who I am, and how I think. I feel that science fiction is a look into the future - that one day, everything I read about will be real and true. It's as if I am reading the primer, the holy tablets of my life 50 years in the future. In many ways the words of science fiction are visionary and thrilling, even energizing - it's goal oriented for me.....or perhaps I'm simply weird.

-- Planet Earth (imagine@industrial-ideas.com), June 02, 2001.

I don't keep them strictly separate. The genres blend a lot. I am cynical enough to know that most science fiction is completely unrealistic and breaks fundamental laws of physics and logic. That's OK: If I wanted realism, I'd worked overtime instead.

-- Magnus Itland (itlandm@netcom.no), June 07, 2001.

I have my phases. Right now, I am into a heavy sci-fi phase and I'm reading a LOT of it. But in general, I prefer fantasy. But, really, I just enjoy novels with a setting different enough from my normal workaday world, and with that setting well enough established, that the differences pull the analytic part of my brain in and keep it busy while the rest of me enjoys the escape. Doesn't really matter what genre they are.

-- Marianne (marseillaise@hotmail.com), June 09, 2001.

This from a guy who will read A Child's Garden Of Verses by Stevenson with the enjoyment and wonder of the 7 year old boy I once was and still am to a certain extent. Books and stories are like people to me, there is some good in each one, a measure of enjoyment and fun in all their facets. Blends are nice too, in books as in spirits.

-- Denver doug (ionoi@webtv.net), June 12, 2001.

There's a thin line between science fiction and fantasy, even a little overlap. There's some stuff that's really far from it, like heavy science fiction or really fairy-tale fantasy, but I've always preferred the material that floats right around the line: fantasy with science fiction overtones, or science fiction that resembles fantasy.

-- Kristen Walker (raisha15@hotmail.com), June 15, 2001.