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Wednesday 13 May 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.
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Suzuki Kōji
(1957-2026) Japanese author and essayist, largely known in English through the Cinema adaptations of several of his books, the international success of which obscured his wide-ranging domestic output. His horror and Equipoisal fiction proceeded in tandem with a wide array (not listed here) of books on young fatherhood and occasional works on motorcycle travel. He was also the translator of Simon Brett's ...
Capobianco, Michael
(1950- ) US author, married until her death to A C Crispin, whose most significant work has been in collaboration with William Barton (whom see for details). His solo novel, Burster (1990), examines the stresses afflicting those aboard a Generation Starship which has left an Earth that was possibly at the brink of destruction. Capobianco was ...
Minsky, Marvin
(1927-2016) US computer scientist of considerable renown in the field of artificial intelligence, who at the time of his death was Toshiba Professor of Media Arts and Sciences and also professor of electrical engineering and computer science at Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He advised Stanley Kubrick on the plausibility of a talking, sentient Computer by the year 2001, for the film ...
Gammon, David
(1904-1996) UK author of two closely similar Lost Race novels, The Secret of the Sacred Lake (1947), set in a snake-infested jungle wilderness, and Against the Golden Gods (1947), set in the Australian outback. Both are designed for the Young Adult market; other titles by Gammon lack sf explanations. [JC]
Martin, Peter
(? - ) A name long thought to have been the working name of UK author Peter Martin Leckie; but members of Leckie's family have stated that Peter Martin Leckie was not this Peter Martin. The name was used for the sf novel, Summer in Three Thousand: Not a Prophecy – A Parable (1946), in which a progressive Utopian World Island state is contrasted with a war-torn conservative ...
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 ...