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Monday 13 April 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 13 April 2026
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Alien Factor, The
US film (1978). Cinemagic Visual Effects. Directed and written by Don Dohler. Cast includes Richard Dyszel, Anne Frith, Tom Griffith and Don Leifert. 79 minutes. Colour. / In rural Maryland the killing of a young man is blamed on a wild animal; three men decide to hunt it down, but die. Elsewhere, a corpse is found: the coroner (Frith) tells the sheriff (Griffith) it suffered accelerated ageing, adding that the first victim's body was filled with Poison. ...
Landor, Robert Eyres
(1781-1869) UK minister and author, brother of the more famous Walter Savage Landor (1775-1864), whose novel, The Fountain of Arethusa (1848 2vols), combines the supernatural and Proto SF as two explorers enter an Underground world (see Hollow Earth), where they engage in discussions with the worthy dead, who either enjoy an Afterlife [see The ...
Hells
Japanese animated film (2008; original title Heruzu Enjueruzu; vt Hell's Angels). Madhouse. Based on the Manga Hells Angels by Sin'Ichi Hiromoto. Directed by Yoshiki Yamakawa. Written by Kazuyuki Fudeyasu and Yoshiki Yamakawa. Voice cast includes Chō, Keiji Fujiwara, Misato Fukuen, Daisuke Kishio, Miyuki Sawashiro and Fumihiko Tachiki. 118 minutes. Colour. / Rushing to her first ...
Curtis, Monica Mary
(1892-1956) UK author of Landslide (1934), an Alternate History tale set in a Europe subtly transformed by a second Great War in the twentieth century. [JC]
Baker, Will
Working name of US teacher, environmentalist and author William Edwin Baker (1935-2005), who began his publishing career with Syntax in English Poetry (1967) as William E Baker, his career as a writer of fiction with Chip (1979), one of several novels deeply involved in the world of the American West, and his short career as an sf writer with Shadow Hunter (1993), a post-Disaster tale in which, after a kind of last war has ...
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 ...