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Sunday 15 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 ...
Smith, Garret
(1878-1954) US journalist, newspaper editor and author who was active with sf stories in magazines like The Argosy, where several novels appeared. Only Between Worlds (11 October-8 November 1919 Argosy Weekly; 1929), one of his weakest, reached book form; it is a semi-juvenile tale that begins on a Dystopian Venus as male explorers from its light ...
Maniac Mansion [tv]
Canadian/US tv series (1990-1993). Atlantis Films for YTV (Canada), The Family Channel (US). Created by Paul Flaherty, John Hemphill, Eugene Levy and Martin Short. Based on the Videogame Maniac Mansion (1987). Produced by David Flaherty and Jamie Paul Rock. Directors included Paul Flaherty, Hemphill and Perry Rosemond. Writers included Bob Carrau, Paul Flaherty, Elena Lesser, Cliff Ruby and Alan Templeton. Cast ...
Bayley, Barrington J
(1937-2008) UK author, active as a freelance under various names in the first decades of his career, author of juvenile stories, picture-strips and features as well as sf, which he began to publish with "Combat's End" for Vargo Statten Science Fiction Magazine #4 in 1954, where his name was given as J Barrington Bayley. His sf pseudonyms included P F Woods (at least ten stories), Alan Aumbry (one story), John Diamond (one story), and ...
Palmer, Philip
(1960- ) UK author and scriptwriter, mostly for Radio beginning with "Gin and Rum" (30 June 2000 BBC Radio 4 Afternoon Play). He began to publish his exuberant, slightly overloaded, gonzo Space Operas with Debatable Space (2008), whose double story focuses alternatively on the lengthy memoir of an Immortal woman behind the throne of her son, who had once ruled ...
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 (1966-1967), and later in ...