SF Encyclopedia Home Page
Tuesday 10 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
Sponsor of the day: Andy Richards of Cold Tonnage Books
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 ...
Binns, Jack
(1884-1959) UK-born ship radio operator, in the US from 1912; famous for staying at his post on 23-24 January 1909 and transmitting the CQD distress call for eighteen hours without stopping as his ship, the Republic, began to sink; in World War One he worked as an instructor in the Canadian Flying Corps, and later (now resident in the US; he was naturalized in April 1923) wrote introductions to the Radio Boys (see Radio Boys) sequence for the ...
Schneider, John G
(1909-1964) US author whose borderline-sf Satire, The Golden Kazoo (1956), which anatomizes the Madison Avenue nature of the (Near-Future) 1960 presidential election, which he saw as foolishly Computer-dominated. [JC]
Reyes, Ruben, Jr
(? - ) US author who began publishing work of genre interest with "SyncALife" in Lightspeed for August 2022, with some of his numerous short stories assembled as There Is a Rio Grande in Heaven (coll 2024). His first novel, Archive of Unknown Universes (2025), features an apparently patented device known as the Defractor, which also functions as a Time Viewer. The ...
Snyder, Cecil III
(1948- ) US author of The Hawks of Arcturus (1974), in which a lone Earthman defies the eponymous Aliens in their attempt to find the secrets of an ancient Galaxy-ruling race (see Forerunners). He should not be confused with his father, Cecil K Snyder Jr (1927- ), also an author. [JC]
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 ...