I’m getting really into reading second hand science fiction from the 1950s onward. I read a few (but nowhere near all) of the Foundation series as a child, and I remember liking them a lot. Stolen from Wikipedia as well as other online sources, here is a list of the books in The Foundation series in Asimov’s suggested reading order…
The Robot Short Stories
| Short story | Publication year of primary anothology | Contained in The Complete Robot? | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
I, Robot |
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| Robbie | 1950 | Yes. | Readings: one; two. The first collection, all present in The Complete Robot. |
| Runaround | Yes. | ||
| Reason | Yes. | ||
| Catch That Rabbit | Yes. | ||
| Liar! | Yes. | ||
| Little Lost Robot | Yes. | ||
| Escape! | Yes. | ||
| Evidence | Yes. | ||
| The Evitable Conflict | Yes. | ||
The Rest of the Robots |
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| Robot Al-76 Goes Astray | 1964 | Yes. | Readings: one. The second collection, all present in The Complete Robot. |
| Victory Unintentional | Yes. | ||
| First Law | Yes. | ||
| Let's Get Together | Yes. | ||
| Satisfaction Gauranteed | Yes. | ||
| Risk | Yes. | ||
| Lenny | Yes. | ||
| Galley Slave | Yes. | ||
Robot Dreams (only the stories not in the previous two books) |
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| Robot Dreams | 1986 | No. | Readings: one. |
| Breeds There a Man...? | No. | ||
| Hostess | No. | ||
| Sally | Yes | ||
| Strikebreaker | No. | ||
| The Machine That Won The War | No. | ||
| Eyes Do More Than See | No. | ||
| The Martian Way | No. | ||
| Franchise | No. | ||
| Jokester | No. | ||
| The Last Question | No. | ||
| Does a Bee Care? | No. | ||
| Light Verse | Yes. | ||
| The Feeling of Power | No. | ||
| Spell My Name with an "S" | No. | ||
| The Ugly Little Boy | No. | ||
| The Billiard Ball | No. | ||
| True Love | Yes. | ||
| The Last Answer | No. | ||
| Lest We Remember | No. | ||
The Complete Robot (only the stories not in the previous three books) |
|||
| A Boy's Best Friend | 1982 | Readings: one. | |
| Point of View | |||
| Stranger in Paradise | |||
| ...That Thou Art Mindful of Him | |||
Robot Visions (only the stories not in the previous four books) |
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| Robot Visions | 1990 | No. | Readings: one. |
| Too Bad! | No. | ||
| Feminine Intuition | Yes | ||
| The Bicentennial Man | Yes | ||
| Someday | Yes | ||
| Think! | Yes | ||
| Segregationist | Yes | ||
| Mirror Image | Yes | ||
| Christmas Without Rodney | No. | ||
Recommendations: read The Complete Robot end to end, and then read the new stories only found in Robot Dreams and Robot Visions.
| Year | Title | Notes |
| 1992 | The Positronic Man | Robot novel based on Asimov’s short story The Bicentennial Man, co-written by Robert Silverberg. |
| 1954 | The Caves of Steel | Robot novel. |
| 1957 | The Naked Sun | Robot novel. |
| 1983 | The Robots of Dawn | Robot novel. |
| 1985 | Robots and Empire | Robot novel. |
| 1993 | Isaac Asimov’s Caliban | Caliban trilogy by Roger MacBride Allen. These three books were quite hard to get, as they’re no longer for sale. |
| 1994 | Isaac Asimov’s Inferno | Caliban trilogy by Roger MacBride Allen. These three books were quite hard to get, as they’re no longer for sale. |
| 1996 | Isaac Asimov’s Utopia | Caliban trilogy by Roger MacBride Allen. These three books were quite hard to get, as they’re no longer for sale. |
| 1951 | The Stars, Like Dust | Galactic Empire series. |
| 1952 | The Currents of Space | Galactic Empire series. |
| 1950 | Pebble in the Sky | Galactic Empire series. |
| 1988 | Prelude to Foundation | Foundation novel. |
| 1993 | Forward the Foundation | Foundation novel. Finished by Asimov’s wife after his death from unfinished work. Combines a series of short stories: “Forward the Foundation”, became Part I, “Eto Demerzel”. “Cleon the Emperor” became Part II, “Cleon I”, and “The Consort” became Part III, “Dors Venabili”. Also includes “Wanda Seldon” and “Epilogue”. |
| 1951 | Foundation | Foundation trilogy. |
| 1952 | Foundation and Empire | Foundation trilogy. |
| 1953 | Second Foundation | Foundation trilogy. |
| 1997 | Foundation’s Fear | Second Foundation trilogy by Gregory Benford. The general consensus seems to be that this book isn’t very good, but the other two are worth reading. Perhaps skip this one (although the other two will make less sense unless you read a plot synopsis of this book). |
| 1998 | Foundation and Chaos | Second Foundation trilogy by Greg Bear. |
| 1999 | Foundation’s Triumph | Second Foundation trilogy by David Brin. |
| 1982 | Foundation’s Edge | Final chronological Foundation books. |
| 1986 | Foundation and Earth | Final chronological Foundation books. |
Next step, read them.
Updates: This Foundation Series timeline is useful too. This page contains a useful list mapping short stories to later Foundation books. I have also reworked this post to be more helpful in a re-read of the best of these books in 2025 onwards.