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Friday 20 May 2022
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.
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Bond, Larry
(1951- ) US author whose Technothrillers hover at the far edge of the present, and could be deemed military/political sf, though their interest (as with most technothrillers) lies not in extrapolation for its own sake but – through carefully hedged assertions about the state of the world later the same day – in their speculations about current events. His first novel, Red Storm Rising (1985) with Tom Clancy, fits this description, as does his solo work, ...
Clarke, Joan
(?1921- ) UK author, mostly for children; she is not the Canadian author, Joan Clark. Her books of sf interest include The Happy Planet (1963), set in a Ruined Earth dominated by three contrasting societies, one technophilic, one Utopian on pastoral principles, the last composed of Cyborgs. The second "choice" seems to prevail in the end. Foxon's Hole (1969) involves its young protagonists in an archaeological puzzle with unfolds into Prehistoric SF world; Take Your Time ...
Donnie Darko
Film (2001). Newmarket in association with Pandora presents a Flower Films production. Written and directed by Richard Kelly. Cast includes Drew Barrymore, Daveigh Chase, Jake Gyllenhaal, Maggie Gyllenhaal, Jena Malone, Mary McDonnell, Holmes Osborne, Katharine Ross, Patrick Swayze and Noah Wyle. Original cut 113 minutes; 2004 Director's Cut 129 minutes. Colour. / A gifted teenage psychotic escapes a Fortean death when a jet engine falls out of nowhere into his bedroom, and he comes to ...
Traill, H D
(1842-1900) UK lawyer, journalist and author, of most interest for his Satires, early examples – like The Israelitish Question: And the Comments of the Canaan Journals Thereon (1876 chap) anonymous tending to spoof contemporary politics through elaborate parodies and anachronisms. The New Lucian: Being a Series of Dialogues of the Dead (coll of linked stories 1884) makes its satirical points through a sustained reworking of the work by Lucian. The long Near Future title story of the tales ...
Rocket Stories
US Digest-size magazine; three issues, April, July, September 1953, published by Space Publications, New York, one of the imprints of John Raymond. It was edited by Lester del Rey for the first two issues and Harry Harrison for the final, both under the alias Wade Kaempfert. Rocket Stories was a companion magazine to Fantasy Fiction, Space Science Fiction and the 1952-1954 Science Fiction Adventures. All four magazines were closed down when the publisher lost interest. Rocket Stories, slanted ...
Nicholls, Peter
(1939-2018) Australian editor and author, primarily a critic and historian of sf through his creation and editing of The Encyclopedia of Science Fiction [see below]; resident in the UK 1970-1988, in Australia from 1988; worked as an academic in English literature (1962-1968, 1971-1977), scripted television documentaries, was a Harkness Fellow in Film-making (1968-1970) in the USA, worked as a publisher's editor (1982-1983), often broadcast film and book reviews on BBC Radio from 1974 and ...