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Thursday 16 July 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 July 2026
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Bierce, Ambrose
(1842-circa 1914) US journalist, poet and author of short stories and Satires, deeply affected by his four years in the American Civil War (he enlisted as a private in 1861, was breveted major for bravery, and was wounded twice). Like Bret Harte and Mark Twain (who were both resident in London in the 1870s, as for shorter periods was Joaquin Miller), he soon went ...
Elson, Robert
(? - ) UK author whose only work of sf interest is "Quack!": The Portrait of an Experimentalist (1924), in which a doctor discovers that a substance in vitamin B hugely increases muscular strength and resistance to disease (see Immortality; Superman). [JC]
After the Holocaust
Board and counter Wargame (1977). Simulations Publications Inc (SPI). Designed by Irad Hardy, Redmond Simonsen. / After the Holocaust is an unusual Wargame in which victory depends as much on cooperation as competition. The setting is the US twenty years after a devastating nuclear war; players adopt the roles of various factions expanding across the continent, with the aim of ...
Kost, Bruce
(1950- ) US merchant sailor and author whose first novel, the Military SF tale Reclusive Authority (1998), carries a tough female into space with her elite male buddies to fight off Aliens; in The Youngblood Project (2002), which is a tale of Near Future justified Paranoia, a man is kidnapped by the CIA, forced to ingest a ...
Langley, Kenlis
Working name of Indian-born soldier and author Kenlis Langley Stevenson (1875-1946), in UK from an early age, in Canada from some point after World War One; his juvenile novel (see Children's SF), The Mountain of Mystery: A Tale of the Arabian Desert (1929), is set in a Lost World discovered by boy adventurers in North Africa. [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 ...