SF Encyclopedia Home Page
Monday 16 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 16 February 2026
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Bernau, George
(1945-2005) US lawyer and author of three Alternate-History thrillers: in Promises to Keep (1988) a figure based on John F Kennedy recovers from the attempt to assassinate him; in Candle in the Wind (1990) Marilyn Monroe survives her semi-accidental overdose; and in Black Phoenix (1994), Germany acquires, at the end of World War Two, a super weapon that threatens to create a ...
Pratchett, Terry
(1948-2015) UK author who began publishing with "The Hades Business" in Science Fantasy in 1963, collected with other (mostly early) stories as A Blink of the Screen: Collected Shorter Fiction (coll 2012). For many years he was in full-time employment, as a journalist until 1980 – contributing many short stories to the Bucks Free Press "Children's Circle" section under the pseudonym "Uncle Jim" – and as a publicity ...
Harris, Richard R
(? - ) US author of The Martian Solution (1997 chap), a short sf novel set on Mars featuring a woman detective. [JC]
Galouye, Daniel F
(1920-1976) US author who was born and died in New Orleans, Louisiana; a naval test pilot during World War Two, he subsequently worked as a journalist, though the delayed effect of war injuries forced him to retire in 1967. He had begun to publish sf with "Rebirth" in Imagination for March 1952, and appeared frequently in the magazines for about a decade with such tales as "Tonight the Sky Will Fall!" (May 1952 Imagination) and ...
Wang Jinkang
(1948- ) Chinese author, engineer and multiple Yinhe Award winner, arguably the most overlooked figure in the genre in China, inexplicably overshadowed in translation by both his seniors and juniors, despite massive appeal among his home readership. Graduating from high school at the time of the commencement of the Cultural Revolution (1966), he spent several years in a countryside commune, before being sent to ...
Clute, John
(1940- ) Canadian critic, editor and author, in the UK from 1969; married to Judith Clute from 1964, partner of Elizabeth Hand since 1996. He began to publish work of genre interest with an sf-tinged poem "Carcajou Lament" in Triquarterly for Winter 1960 [ie Autumn 1959]; he began consistently publishing sf reviews in his "New Fiction" column for the Toronto Star (1966-1967), and later in ...