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Sunday 20 July 2025
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 16 July 2025
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Williams, Tess
(1954-2025) UK-born teacher, editor and author, in Australia for many years, there receiving a degree in literature from Curtin University and an MA in creative writing from the University of Western Australia. She began publishing work of genre interest with "The Padwan Affair" in She's Fantastical (anth 1995) edited by Judith Raphael Buckrich and Lucy Sussex. Of sf interest are two novels: Map of Power (1996), set mostly in a ...
Harmer, Joyce Efia
(? - ) UK teacher and author whose first novel, the Young Adult How Far We've Come (2023), justly discussed in relation to Octavia E Butler's Kindred (1979), reverses the narrative structure of that foundational tale. A young enslaved girl in 1834 Barbados meets a white lad from the twenty-first century (see Slavery; ...
Dr. M
Film (1989). NEF Filmproduktion/Ellepi Film/Cléa Productions. Directed by Claude Chabrol. Written by Sollace Mitchell from a story by Thomas Bauermeister, inspired by Doktor Mabuse, der Spieler (1920; trans Lilian A Clare as Dr. Mabuse, Master of Mystery 1923) by Norbert Jacques (1880-1954). Cast includes Alan Bates, Jennifer Beals, Jan Niklas and Hanns Zischler. 116 minutes. Colour. / Although in clear homage to Fritz ...
Asterley, H C
(1902-1973) UK author of one 1930s detective novel with no element of the fantastic and of Escape to Berkshire (1961), set in a Post-Holocaust London after a nuclear war and an Invasion have destroyed English decencies; the tales uncertainly conveys echoes of H G Wells and John Wyndham at their grimmest, but ends in hope. ...
Tang Fei
(1983- ) Chinese author and photographer, Beijing-based, whose work seemingly sprang into the Anglophone sphere fully-formed, although her biography hints at earlier stories under other pseudonyms in multiple venues, including fantasy and Wuxia publications. She is also an occasional critic for the Jinji Guancha-bao ("Economic Observer"), a role that has imbued her with a cynical sense of distance towards her ...
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 ...