SF Encyclopedia Home Page
Friday 16 January 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 14 January 2026
Sponsor of the day: Paul Giamatti
von Däniken, Erich
(1935-2026) Swiss author of a series of purportedly nonfiction books, beginning with Erinnerungen an die Zukunft (1968; trans Michael Heron as Chariots of the Gods? 1969), which, based on a mass of often suspect and internally inconsistent data, argues that the Earth was visited by at least one Alien spacefaring race before and at the dawn of historical time; thus, for example, the Great Pyramid of ...
Adams, Scott
(1957-2026) US author and cartoonist best known for the Dilbert strip published from 1989, which when at its best superbly (in terms of concept and accuracy of Satire rather than quality of drawing) satirized contemporary office life and corporate incompetence. As with most ambitious modern comic strips, it segues frequently into sf and fantasy tropes – such as Robot office workers, wish-fulfilling ...
Garnett, David S
(1947- ) UK author, author of a large number of books, many of them novels, in various genres and under various names. To differentiate himself from the elder David Garnett he created a middle initial to add to his own name, and in the US signed his early books Dav Garnett, for the same reason; he has published novels also as David Lee and David Ferring. His sf has always been action-oriented and dominated by ...
Leech Woman, The
US film (1960; vt Leech). Universal-International Pictures. Produced by Joseph Gershenson, Direct by Edward Dein. Written by David Duncan from a story by Ben Pivar and Frances Rosenwald. Cast includes Coleen Gray, Kim Hamilton, Estelle Hemsley, Gloria Talbott, Phillip Terry and Grant Williams. 77 minutes. Black and white. / Unscrupulous endocrinologist Dr Paul Talbott (Terry) is in a failing marriage with older wife June (Gray), and plans to ...
Wild Talents
This is Charles Fort's term – made famous by his book Wild Talents (1932) – for the complex of supposed paranormal abilities which are discussed in this encyclopedia's entries for ESP and Psi Powers. Wilson Tucker borrowed the phrase for the title of his relevant novel Wild Talent (1954; exp 1955; 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 ...