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Sunday 25 May 2025

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.

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Clowes, Carolyn

(1946- ) US author of a Star Trek Tie, Star Trek #49: The Pandora Principle (1990), featuring a threat from the Romulans. [JC]

(1992- ) US editor, playwright and author, now in Prague, whose first novel The Doloriad (2022) focuses primarily on a family composed both of survivors of and those born with Mutations after a Near-Future series of planetary Disasters. Incest seems necessary, as they may be the only humans left. But the matriarchal head of the clan sends the protagonist, who was ...

Tang Fei

(1983- ) Chinese author and photographer, Beijing-based, whose work seemingly sprang into the Anglophone sphere fully-formed, although her biography hints at earlier stories under other pseudonyms in multiple venues, including fantasy and Wuxia publications. She is also an occasional critic for the Jinji Guancha-bao ("Economic Observer"), a role that has imbued her with a cynical sense of distance towards her ...

Meluch, R M

(1956- ) US author whose first novel, Sovereign (1979), shows a competent grasp of the conventions and venues of sf adventure while at the same time refracting traditional material through an unusually complex protagonist, who is the precarious culmination of a Genetic Engineering programme haunted by the continuing image of his first enemy: his own father. There are, perhaps, too many additional enemies for ...

Rifbjerg, Klaus

(1931-2015) Danish poet and author, who has published at least 100 books since 1956; in his sf novel, De Hellige Aber (1981; trans Steve Murray as Witness to the Future 1987), two adolescents are transported almost half a century forward from 1941 (see Time Travel; World War Two), but find little in the year 1988 to give them joy about Progress. [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 ...