As I was (in the previous post) tossing many of my sci-fi and fantasy books, I came across several that I wasn’t throwing out, and probably won’t ever throw out. In the interest of a little ying in my yang, here’s some of what’s not in the heap:

• Susan Cooper’s The Dark is Rising series, which gave me weird psychedelic nightmares when I was a kid, and which I have always intended to read again as an adult.
• Elizabeth Moon’s The Deed of Paksenarrion. It is, far and away, the best story of how a Paladin becomes one. The end is a little bittersweet, the prequel is just disappointing, but this is fine fantasy.
• Tad Williams’ Memory, Sorrow, and Thorn series. Still one of the best out there. Writes circles around Robert Jordan.
• Brian Daley’s Star Wars: The Han Solo Adventures is still good, rollicking, swashbuckling, Star Wars fun.
• Anne McCaffrey’s Dinosaur Planet books. Small, tight, well-written and fun. There are just two of them, and they are often overlooked in favor of her dragon books. But not to be missed.
• Lawrence Watt-Evans’ Esthshar books, of which there are many, each standalone. These are humorous fantasy novels, I consider them to be Xanth books for grown-ups.
• The E.T. novelization, which is an awesome, funny, enlightening read.
• Everything I own by Connie Willis, especially To Say Nothing of the Dog.
• Most everything by Guy Gavriel Kay. The first books I read by him were the Fionavar Tapestry books, which in the end are a little self-involved, but his stand-alone books are very good, especially The Lions of Al-Rassan, and A Song for Arbonne.
• Ursula LeGuin’s _Earthsea_ books, so recently maligned by the SciFi Channel.
• John Christopher’s _Tripods Trilogy_ which I read when I was twelve, and a Boy Scout, and loved, and now think might be subtly religious in tone, but I don’t know because I haven’t read them in twenty-two years and I should, so I’m keeping them.