SF Encyclopedia Home Page
Friday 13 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
Sponsor of the day: Conversation 2023
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 ...
Hill, Roger [2]
(1948-2023) US author, fan, and collector and historian of Comics – especially of EC Comics – who began to publish relevant nonfiction and artwork in the Fanzine Squa Tront edited and published by his friend Jerry Weist and launched in 1967. The Squa Tront association continued for more than 40 years. Hill also published his own EC Fan-Addict Fanzine from 2003. / Hill ...
Terror Is a Man
Philippine/US film (1959; vt Blood Creature). Lynn-Romero Productions/Premiere Productions. Produced by Kane W Lynn and Eddie Romero (credited as Edgar F Romero). Directed by Gerardo de Leon (credited as Gerry de Leon). Written by Paul Harber, based without credit on H G Wells's The Island of Dr Moreau (1896; vt [with textual omissions] The Island of Dr Moreau: A Possibility 1896). Cast includes Flory Carlos, Richard Derr, ...
4000 AD
Board Game (1972). Waddington's House of Games. / 4000 A.D. is an early sf Board Game which shares much with later Wargames such as Starforce: Alpha Centauri (1974), notable both for its strategic depth and its use of a detailed science-fictional rationale. The game is set during a war in the eponymous year, between human colonies ...
Richards, Joel
Pseudonym of US author Joel Richard Fruchtman (1937- ), who began publishing sf with "Speedplay" for Amazing in 1980 and has published subsequent stories in original anthologies. In his sf novel, Pindharee (1986), an officer in a human-dominated Galactic Empire must decide whether or not to disobey orders and fail to exterminate a peaceful Alien civilization. [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 ...