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Wednesday 18 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 16 February 2026
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Postman, The
Film (1997). Warner Bros presents a Tig production. Directed by Kevin Costner. Written by Brian Helgeland and Eric Roth, based on the novel The Postman (fixup 1985) by David Brin. Cast includes Scott Bairstow, Daniel von Bergen, Kevin Costner, Roberta Maxwell, Ron McLarty, Will Patton, Tom Petty, Giovanni Ribisi, James Russo, Joe Santos, Larenz Tate, Olivia Williams and Brian Anthony Wilson. Colour. 170 minutes. / The ...
Half-Life
Videogame (1998). Valve. Platforms: Win (1998); rev PS2 (2001). / Half-Life is a First Person Shooter, notable for its depth of narrative immersion (see Game Design). It was the first FPS in which a storyline was presented without the use of non-interactive scenes interposed between levels set in different locations. ...
Davis, Hank
(1944- ) US author and editor who began to publish work of genre interest with "Squatter's Rights" in If for March 1968. Ten more short stories followed at intervals until 2022, with another long announced for the never-published full version of Harlan Ellison's «The Last Dangerous Visions»; of the published tales, perhaps the most notable was "To Plant a Seed" in Orbit 11 (anth 1972) ...
Terrin, Peter
(1968- ) Belgian author whose second novel, Blanco ["Blank"] (2003), depicts a disintegrative relationship between a father and son after the former has lost his wife, couched in terms that have evoked comparison to Franz Kafka. Of sf interest is his fourth novel, De Bewaker (2009; trans David Colmer as The Guard 2012), set in an Underground parking lot occupied by ...
Morris, James
(? - ) UK author of The Escapist (2005), a Near Future thriller set in a Cyberpunk-tinted venue, which the street-wise hero has little real difficulty in negotiating as he tracks down a roge AI. [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 ...