The Hinterlands Canon
The Hinterlands Canon is a project I announced in my zine (Available Here) last year. Essentially it's my attempt to wrangle with the long and deep history of speculative fiction (that's science fiction, fantasy, and horror, and also anything else that seems to overlap with the "not real" zone), pick out the stuff that I think is Important, whether that's because it's really good, really influential, really important to me personally, or any other reason I can think of. It's my list, it's particular to me, and reflects what I find important, valuable, or even just interesting in fiction. I might have called this The Hinterlands Appendix N if I'd been familiar with the concept when I wrote my zine. Anyway - see the list below. Entries will note next to them when and how they were added to the canon.
I have a half-baked plan to have some kind of annual post where I announce a new class of entries to the canon, kind of like a hall of fame - we'll see if I ever get that far.
- The Hobbit by J.R.R. Tolkien - Inaugural Class
- The Lord of the Rings by J.R.R. Tolkien - Inaugural Class
- The Dispossessed by Ursula K. Le Guin - Inaugural Class
- The Complete Chronicles of Conan by Robert E. Howard - Inaugural Class
- Perdido Street Station by China Miéville - Inaugural Class
- Discworld by Terry Pratchett - Inaugural Class
- Invisible Cities by Italo Calvino - Inaugural Class
- The Wheel of Time by Robert Jordan and Brandon Sanderson - Inaugural Class
- One Piece by Eiichiro Oda - Inaugural Class
- Dragon Ball by Akira Toriyama - Inaugural Class
- Swamp Thing by Alan Moore - Inaugural Class
- The Book of the New Sun by Gene Wolfe - Inaugural Class
- Frankenstein by Mary Shelley - Inaugural Class
- Salem’s Lot by Stephen King - Inaugural Class
- The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams - Inaugural Class
- Dune by Frank Herber - Inaugural Class
- Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell by Susanna Clarke - Inaugural Class
- Burning Chrome by William Gibson - Inaugural Class
- All-Star Superman by Grant Morrison - Inaugural Class
- The History of the Runestaff by Michael Moorcock - Added in Hinterlands Zine #1
- Peace by Gene Wolfe - Added in a review on the blog Oct 5, 2025