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
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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 ...
Schwarz, Liesel
(1974- ) South African author whose first novel, A Conspiracy of Alchemists (2013), initiates the projected Chronicles of Light and Shadow, a sequence set in a Steampunk version of Europe and London, an Alternate History in which electricity remains the dominant Power Source, and magic enemies ...
O'Reilly, John
(1906-1981) US journalist and war correspondent who wrote The Glob (18 February 1952 Life Magazine; exp 1952 chap), an explanation of the theory of Evolution and the Origin of Man, couched in fictional form for younger readers as the life-story of the eponymous creature who crawls out of the swamp and becomes, by stages, Homo sapiens. The earlier pages have some distant relationship to ...
Cher, Marie
Working name of author Marie Scherr (1865-? ), whose nationality has not been securely identified; she may have been French. Her maiden name is recorded as being Schvarzberg, and she published at least one book in France in the late nineteenth century. Her later works all seem to have been written in English. The Immortal Gymnasts (1915) is a Fantasy of Manners setting figures from the Commedia dell'Arte into the contemporary world [for Commedia dell'Arte and ...
Fantasy Magazine Index
US letter-size Fanzine. Publisher and editor: Delbert Winans (1949-2009). One issue only, March 1977. / Long-time fan Winans here did an effective job of indexing most of the English-language Monster Movie magazines published up to March 1977. Despite being a fanzine, Fantasy Magazine Index seems to have sold relatively well: it is not as scarce as one might expect. Collectors should note that this publication indexes ...
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 ...