Having previously only read Slaughterhouse 5 and Breakfast of Champions, I couldn’t help but wonder where the science-fiction label sometimes thrown at Vonnegut had come from. Granted there were nods to sci-fi in both books, but that was it, and I figured it was the usual case of a lazy industry trying to pigeon-hole someone who was too damn good to be slotted into any easy category. In retrospect, I was probably right. Vonnegut’s work, even as early as his second published novel, was unique. But now that I have read The Sirens of Titan, the classification makes a little more sense. It is science-fiction enough, at least, for Gollancz to justifiably stick it under their SF Masterworks banner–though if by Vonnegut’s standards it is straight genre fiction, it is still primarily and unquestionably Vonnegut.

When I tell people Star Control II (released in 1992 by Accolade) is the Best Video Game Ever, I’m only slightly exaggerating for effect. I’m not an avid gamer these days–the gags in Penny Arcade and VG Cats have a tendency to whiz over my head–but I’ve played my share, and Star Control II did some truly amazing things.

Triangulation: End of Time is the latest entry in a series of annual anthologies put out by PARSEC, “Pittsburgh’s premier science fiction organization.” Each of the stories somehow touches on the theme “End of Time,” but wide-ranging and far-reaching is the name of the game here. In typical speculative fiction fashion, the anthology’s twenty stories cover territory ranging from the wild west to the far future to even more exotic locales, some of which exist outside of time itself.

You have to feel a little sorry for Goro Miyazaki. Entering the family business must be an intimidating prospect when your dad is master-animator Hayao Miyazaki, co-founder of the famous Studio Ghibli and Oscar winning director of films like Princess Mononoke and, most famously, Spirited Away. Not only that, but Goro’s first project is an adaptation of one of his father’s favourite works, Ursula K. Le Guin’s classic Earthsea series – Miyazaki has said that he keeps the books by his bed, and had once hoped to direct the project himself. Goro’s choice of first directorial project seems almost calculatedly masochistic.

Have you ever been a Muslim activist in Uzbekistan? How about a waiter in Bangladesh? Arrested for seditious activities by a corrupt government? Starved to death? I’m guessing the answer to most, if not all, of those questions is “no.” Now’s your chance!

If you haven’t read Flowers for Algernon, you probably have a rough idea of what it’s about, or at least have heard of it. I remember it being on my recommended reading list at school, and there was little else on there that could be classified as science fiction. Not only did Keyes win both the Hugo and Nebula in the same year for the novel, but, like Vonnegut and a very few others, he had the double-edged good fortune of transcending the genre in which he wrote, and plunging into the murky depths of “serious literature.”

What can you possibly say about The Simpsons Movie? The only ones who don’t know what to expect from it are the seven or so people left in the world who don’t have TV. We’re talking about what’s probably the most consistently great television program ever, and considering that the film is made by exactly the same people as the series, but with more money and less technical restrictions, it would have taken an astonishing amount of effort for it not to be great.