SF Encyclopedia Home Page
Monday 13 April 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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Harris, Anne
(1964-2022) US author who also wrote under the pseudonyms Jessica Freely [used for gay erotic romance, not listed below] and Pearl North, and who began publishing work of genre interest with "Change Is A Dog" in Nova Express for Winter 1991. Her first novel, The Nature of Smoke (1996), is a Near Future tale that fairly effectively weaves together Drugs and apprehensions of chaos as the ...
Batwoman, The
Mexican film (1968; original title La Mujer Murciélago). Cinematográfica Calderón S.A. Directed by René Cardona. Written by Alfredo Salazar. Cast includes Roberto Cañedo, Héctor Godoy and Maura Monti. 80 minutes. Colour. / The murders of five Acapulco wrestlers whose "pineal gland juice has been removed surgically" resemble crimes committed some time ago in Macao and Hong Kong. Local police are baffled, ...
Steam Engine Time
Australian Fanzine, edited and published by Bruce Gillespie (Melbourne, Australia); co-edited with Maureen Kincaid Speller and Paul Kincaid (Folkestone, England) for issues #1-#3; thereafter with Janine G Stinson (Michigan, USA). A4 photo-offset. Average length 50pp. Thirteen issues 2000-2012. / Steam Engine Time ...
Kaveney, Roz
(1949- ) UK critic, editor, author and poet. Her sf criticism, beginning in the late 1970s (before 1980 as by Andrew Kaveney), has appeared in such specialist journals as Foundation and in non-genre outlets including the Washington Post and Books and Bookmen; it is marked by a seemingly off-hand general erudition and a knowing sharpness about the field; she created the term ...
Smith, Keith
(1917-2011) Australian radio and television broadcast and author, most famous as for his "Pied Piper" interviews with children; his sf novel, OGF: Being the Private Papers of George Cockburn, Bus Conductor, a Resident of Hurstfield, a Suburb of Sydney, Australia (1965), is a mild-mannered rather spoofish Satire set in the very Near Future of an erratically urbanizing Australia. [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 ...