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Friday 2 June 2023
Welcome to the Encyclopedia of Science Fiction, Fourth Edition. Some sample entries appear below. Click here for the Introduction; here for the masthead; here for 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 29 May 2023
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Caprica
US TV series (2009-2011). David Eick Productions for Syfy. Created by Ronald D Moore and Remi Aubuchon for Syfy. Producers include Moore, David Eick, and Jane Espenson. Writers include Moore, Aubuchon, Espenson, Michael Taylor and Michael Angeli. Directors include Moore, Michael Nankin, Wayne Rose, and Roxann Dawson. Cast includes Eric Stoltz as Daniel Graystone, Alessandra Torresani as Zoe Graystone, Esai Morales as Joseph Adama, Polly Walker as ...
McKinney, Joe
(1968-2021) US police sergeant (with the police department of San Antonio, Texas) and author who began to publish work of genre interest with Dead City (2006), in which the Disaster scenario of multiple hurricanes afflicting Houston, Texas, is followed by a Zombie apocalypse caused by the Ebola-like "necrosis filovirus". This opens the Dead World sequence of standalone novels, plus some short stories, that share the ...
Monster Movies
A term colloquially used for a very specific genre of film, usually borderline sf. A monster movie – sometimes called a Creature Feature – must contain the unexpected appearance, normally in a serene setting, of a creature (or many creatures) hostile to humanity. The nature of the creature is usually revealed gradually, and its attacks normally increase in severity. It may be a mutated animal or human (see Mutants), an Alien, a ...
Baum, L Frank
(1856-1919) US author who also published as Floyd Akers, Laura Bancroft, John Estes Cooke, Hugh Fitzgerald, Suzanne Metcalf, Schuyler Staunton and Edith Van Dyne (see below). He remains most famous for his long series of tales set in the land of Oz, beginning with The Wonderful Wizard of Oz (1900; vt The New Wizard of Oz 1903), which served as the main source for the most famous film version, The Wizard of Oz (1939). The series continues with ...
Osborn, Laughton
(1809-1878) US poet and author whose Lost Race novel, Travels by Sea and Land of Alethitheras (1868), anonymous, is constructed as a Fantastic Voyage during which the protagonist visits a large number of contrasting cities and regions, all subject to Satire, including the lost world at the heart of the continent. [JC]
Langford, David
(1953- ) UK author, critic, editor, publisher and sf fan, in the latter capacity recipient of 21 Hugo awards for fan writing – some of the best of his several hundred pieces are assembled as Let's Hear It for the Deaf Man (coll 1992 chap US; much exp vt The Silence of the Langford 1996; exp 2015 ebook) as Dave Langford, edited by Ben Yalow – plus five Best Fanzine Hugos ...