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Wednesday 11 February 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.
Site updated on 9 February 2026
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Carver, Jeffrey A
(1949-2026) US author who began publishing sf with "... Of No Return" in Fiction Magazine for 1974. His first novel, Seas of Ernathe (1976), which serves as an introduction to the loose Star Rigger sequence of Space Operas, showed early signs of a love of plot and thematic complexity which would take him some time, and several novels, to control. The continuation, Star Rigger's Way (1978), for instance, combines quest ...
Rinzler, J W
(1962-2021) US author and film executive, with Lucasfilm 2001-2016, where he became an executive editor of Lucasbooks; best known for nonfiction books on Cinema and in particular the Star Wars franchise, beginning with Star Wars: The Making of Episode III: Revenge of the Sith (2005) [for further Star Wars volumes see Checklist below]. Other film franchises are discussed in such titles as ...
Heywood, Victor D
(? - ) US author of an unremarkable Space Opera adventure, Prison Planet (1974; vt Alpha Star 1980), which is a Young Adult tale whose young protagonist earns his spurs in space. [JC]
Rambo, Cat
(1963- ) US editor, journalist and author, co-editor of Fantasy Magazine from 2007 to 2011; she may have began to publish work of genre interest with "Three Sons" in an unidentified 2001 magazine; this story, along with others, was included in The Surgeon's Tale and Other Stories (coll 2007 chap) with Jeff VanderMeer, each author contributing about half the contents of the volume. Further short fiction has been ...
Blaine, John
Pseudonym of US author Harold Leland Goodwin (1914-1990) who specialized in sf-adventure novels for teenage readers. His books tended to emphasize the nuts and bolts of science and Technology, and were more carefully written than most series books for teens. As Blake Savage he also wrote an sf novel for teens, Rip Foster Rides the Gray Planet (1952; vt Assignment in Space with Rip Foster 1958; vt ...
Nicholls, Peter
(1939-2018) Australian editor and author, primarily a critic and historian of sf through his creation and editing of The Encyclopedia of Science Fiction [see below]; resident in the UK 1970-1988, in Australia from 1988; worked as an academic in English literature (1962-1968, 1971-1977), scripted television documentaries, was a Harkness Fellow in Film-making (1968-1970) in the USA, worked as a publisher's editor (1982-1983), often broadcast film and book reviews on BBC Radio from 1974 and ...