Links to the works by Isaac Asimov covered in this section:
Books Short Stories
Commentary:
Isaac Asimov was one of the most prolific, creative and versatile authors who ever lived. He wrote or edited over 500 books covering a wide variety of genres, including science fiction, mystery, fantasy and non-fiction. He even wrote two different series of children’s novels: Lucky Starr and Norby (the latter jointly with his wife Janet). However, it is for his science-fiction works that he is best known.
Asimov had an easy-to-read writing style and his stories had interesting characters and plots, while having grand philosophical themes and backgrounds which fill you with wonder. For many of his short stories, he added his personal commentaries when the stories were later included in collected editions. Asimov’s commentaries provide a fascinating glimpse into how his amazing mind worked, and they are also delightful to read because of his chatty conversational tone and his self-deprecating humor.
Among Asimov’s Sci-Fi novels, his most famous are those in the Foundation series and the Robot series. They represent the pinnacle of quality in science fiction. Asimov somehow managed to weave these two plot lines together in one of his later novels (which I will not name here because I don’t want to be a spoiler – read them for yourself and find out!). Asimov also wrote novels in the Galactic Empire series as well as several standalone novels, but in my opinion the Foundation and Robot novels stand head-and-shoulders above the rest.
Asimov also wrote over 650 short stories in various genres (you can find a complete list here), of which I have selected about 180 which specifically fall in the field of science fiction. Among his most famous short stories are Nightfall and The Last Question. It is truly incredible how Asimov could turn out these stories like clockwork in such large quantities, while maintaining consistent quality in nearly all of them.
If you haven’t yet read Asimov’s science fiction, you have a treat in store. Enjoy!