[Tanniker Smith]

I know it's NPR, but Le Guin ahead of the Silmarillion?

It's not a critics' list, it's a readers' list.
Seriously, how many people have even read (or should I say "attempted to read") The Silmarillion?
If you haven't read it, you aren't likely to put it in your top five picks.

And I don't know how how humor and hard sci-fi were on the list, but if you focus the humor votes onto one book, Hitchhikers would be it.

[FredZarguna]

OK, you haven't read (or "attempted to read") the Silmarillion. I can't account for your -- or anyone else's -- taste, and won't try. But among the cult of Tolkien's close followers, which probably outnumber Le Guin's even casual readership by two orders of magnitude, it's a well regarded piece. That her awful dreck makes it into this list multiple times is a clear indication of how oversampled she would be in a liberal audience such as NPR's.

As for me, I have read it, and I have also read all of Le Guin's stuff hoping in vain that someday I'd get a glimpse of what people in college assured me was her brilliance. Nope. It's awful: only an NPR audience would put one of her books in the top 100, let alone several.