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Wednesday 16 September 2026
Welcome to the Encyclopedia of Science Fiction, Fourth Edition. Some sample entries appear below. Click here for the Introduction; here for what we mean by Science Fiction; here for the masthead; here for some Statistics; here for the Acknowledgments; here for the FAQ; here for advice on citations. Find entries via the search box above (more details here) or browse the menu categories in the grey bar at the top of this page.
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Groom, Pelham
Working name of UK-born author Arthur John Pelham-Groom (1906-1978), in Singapore from 1954. He published some stories as A J Pelham-Groom in the 1930s, beginning with "Duel of Death" for Air Stories in 1935 and continuing with several other "Death" stories that verge on sf; a similar later title, David Farlow Takes the Air (1949), oddly describes a 1940 Invention that will soon keep the Luftwaffe at bay (no prior magazine publication, which ...
Clements, David
(? - ) Author of whom it is known only that his sole sf novel, for Robert Hale Limited, is The Backwater Man (1979). [DRL]
Chester, Michael
(1928- ) US author of two Young Adult novels of sf interest, The Mystery of the Lost Moon (1961) and a Time Travel tale, The Shores of the Near Past (1986). Several of his titles, like his first book, Moon Trip: True Adventure in Space (1958) with William Nephew, are nonfiction you-are-there texts. [JC]
Singer, Nicky
(1956-2023) UK publisher, television worker, author and playwright who co-founded the Performing Arts Lab charity. Her first novel Feather Boy (2002) is a compelling Young Adult tale tinged with Magic Realism and deceptive hints of the ability to fly (see Psi Powers) but is ultimately nonfantastic. Young adult novels of direct genre interest are The Innocent's Story ...
Spicer, Arwen
(1975- ) US academic and author, whose nonfiction work has focused on authors like William Morris and H G Wells, with an emphasis on their approach to what eventually would be known as Ecology. Her sf novel Perdita (2001) explores similar issues in a tale set on the artificially isolated eponymous planet, where pro- and anti-Technology ...
Clute, John
(1940- ) Canadian critic, editor and author, in the UK from 1969; married to Judith Clute from 1964, partner of Elizabeth Hand since 1996. He began to publish work of genre interest with an sf-tinged poem "Carcajou Lament" in Triquarterly for Winter 1960 [ie Autumn 1959]; he began consistently publishing sf reviews in his "New Fiction" column for the Toronto Star ...