SF Encyclopedia Home Page
Tuesday 9 June 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 8 June 2026
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Duffy, Maureen
(1933-2026) UK author, active from around 1950, several of whose books focused on London, including Capital (1975), a complex set of era-switching meditations – including a Neanderthal man's thoughts about the future – on the deep mythos of the city. The novel influenced Michael Moorcock's Mother London (1988) (as the author acknowledged clearly), and similar later works by Iain ...
Martian, The [film]
Film (2015). Twentieth Century Fox Film Corporation/TSG Entertainment/Genre Films. Directed by Ridley Scott. Written by Drew Goddard from The Martian (2014) by Andy Weir. Cast includes Sean Bean, Jessica Chastain, Matt Damon, Jeff Daniels, Mackenzie Davis, Chiwetel Ejiofor, Azel Henne, Kate Mara, Michael Peña, Sebastian Stan, Kristen Whig. 144 minutes. Colour, 3-D. / The Martian begins in the ...
Nathan, L M
(? - ) UK author whose first novel, Young Adult The Virtue Season (2024), is set in a Dystopian Near Future world, which has become severely depopulated due to Climate Change and Pollution; a governing Council exercises strict Eugenic control over women, ...
Cocoon
Film (1985). Fox-Zanuck-Brown. Directed by Ron Howard. Written by Tom Benedek from a story by David Saperstein. Cast includes Don Ameche, Wilford Brimley, Hume Cronyn, Jack Gilford, Steve Guttenberg, Maureen Stapleton, Jessica Tandy, Gwen Verdon and Tahnee Welch. 117 minutes. Colour. / Aliens disguised as humans come to Earth to revive their kinfolk who were abandoned millennia ago in cocoons on the ocean floor; the ...
Earth: Final Conflict
American-Canadian tv series (1997-2002). Alliance Atlantis Communications and Tribune Entertainment. Created by Gene Roddenberry. Producers include Majel Barett Roddenberry, Paul Gertz, David Kirschner, and Seaton McLean. Writers include Gertz, John Whelpley, George Geiger, and D C Fontana. Directors include Brenton Spencer, Andrew Potter, Ross Clyde, and Vincenzo Natali. Cast ...
Robinson, Roger
(1943- ) UK computer programmer, bibliographer and publisher, active in UK Fandom for many years. The Writings of Henry Kenneth Bulmer (1983 chap; rev 1984 chap) is an exhaustive Bibliography of one of the most prolific sf writers, Kenneth Bulmer, and Who's Hugh?: An SF Reader's Guide to Pseudonyms (1987) is similarly exhaustive in its ...