What’s been in the ol’ game console lately?

Here are some of the games of a sci-fi nature I’ve played lately, along with my thoughts.
Bioshock is, overall, THE best game I’ve played since I first bought my Xbox 360 back in December. It has received very positive reviews, and deservedly so; its strengths are apparent in every aspect of the game. [...]

What is Science Fiction anyway?

Tom Dillon over at Pawnstorm has a post on the purpose of science fiction in which he makes this worthwhile point:

[...] only one of Science Fiction’s jobs is to deal with the future. Another is to take situations that we see today and look at them in a different light, from different perspectives, stripped of [...]

A partial eclipse of Brunner’s talent

I just finished up with Total Eclipse (1974), the fourth of Brunner’s novels I’ve read so far, the others being Children of the Thunder (1988 ), The Crucible of Time (1983), and Stand on Zanzibar (1968 ). So far I’ve been fairly impressed with Brunner’s work (enough to keep reading his books, obviously), but [...]

Sci-fi in music: Star One

I’ll be posting from time to time about some noteworthy appearances of science fiction in music. For my first entry, I can think of no more worthy example than Star One’s Space Metal.

Star One is a side project of Arjen Anthony Lucassen, who is better known for his band Ayreon, a Dutch progressive rock [...]

Telling it like it is, Le Guin style

The Telling (2005) is yet another installment in Ursula K. Le Guin’s Hainish cycle, and another example of her brand of soft, social, anthropological science fiction. It’s not her best work, and not her worst, but rather in the middle; comfortably average Le Guin, certainly a decent read.

Sutty, an Ekumen Observer, is sent to [...]

Encyclopedias: gotta love ‘em!

Science Fiction: the Illustrated Encyclopedia by John Clute. I recently found this at a used book shop and had to have it (along with a stack of other books, of course!). I’ve been browsing through it for the last few days, in between my other readings, and I love it. There’s so [...]