SF Encyclopedia Home Page
Thursday 12 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 9 February 2026
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Carver, Jeffrey A
(1949-2026) US author who began publishing sf with "... Of No Return" in Fiction Magazine for 1974. His first novel, Seas of Ernathe (1976), which serves as an introduction to the loose Star Rigger sequence of Space Operas, showed early signs of a love of plot and thematic complexity which would take him some time, and several novels, to control. The continuation, Star Rigger's Way (1978), for instance, combines quest ...
Perutz, Leo
(1882-1957) Austrian playwright and author, active from around 1905, in active service during most of World War One, being wounded more than once but continuing to write; he emigrated to Palestine [now Israel] in 1938 after the Anschluss. Most of his novels are baroque phantasmagorias, irradiated by parodic transformations of popular genres, including sf. His work, much of which has now been translated into English, has been ...
Cameron, Ian [2]
(? - ) Scots author, illustrator and graphic designer who in collaboration with George Erskine wrote the Counter Force sf tales for Young Adult readers, Beware the Tektrons (1988) and Find the Tektrons (1988). Here, in the early twenty-first century, six youngsters work together against the Alien Tektrons who have secretly ...
SF in the Classroom
In September 1953 Sam Moskowitz began to teach what was almost certainly the first sf course in the USA to be given through a college. The course was on Science Fiction Writing, was delivered on a non-credit basis through the City College of New York, and was presented with the collaboration of a popular-science writer, Robert Frazier (not to be confused with the sf poet Robert Frazier). For the Autumn 1953 sessions, ...
Perry, Sarah
(1979- ) UK author whose novels fit comfortably within the armature of Fantastika, while making some room for more straightforward sf readings (see Gothic SF). The protagonist of her first novel, After Me Comes the Flood (2014), who has become bewildered by a heat wave, exits London to find his brother in Norfolk, but goes astray into a mysterious woodland [for Into the ...
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 ...