SF Encyclopedia Home Page
Wednesday 15 January 2025
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.
Site updated on 13 January 2025
Sponsor of the day: Joe Haldeman
Haddon, Cole
(? - ) Australian screenwriter, journalist and author, mostly in US, initially of interest for his creator/producer role in the Television series Dracula (2013 10 episodes), showrunner Daniel Knauf. He is of stronger sf interest for his first novel, Psalms for the End of the World (2022), which is set in various venues – from a 1960s California where reality ...
Nicholson, Sam
Pseudonym of US author Shirley Nikolaisen (? - ), who began to publish work of genre interest with "Magma Wave" in Galaxy for July 1975, but who was primarily associated over her relatively short active career with Analog, where the stories assembled as Captain Empirical (coll of linked stories 1979) first appeared. The protagonist, Captain Schuster, shifts from water-bound ships to a ...
Wren, M K
(1938-2016) US author who initially concentrated on mysteries, the Conan Flagg series being nonfantastic. Her Phoenix Legacy trilogy – Sword of the Lamb (1981), Shadow of the Swan (1981) and House of the Wolf (1981) – uses a carefully thought out Future History to justify an intricate plot which compounds together Space Opera, romance and political thriller ...
Walker, Samuel
Pseudonym of the US author (? -? ) of The Reign of Selfishness: A Story of Concentrated Wealth (1891; vt Dry Bread 1899), a Near Future tale in which a country-dominating trust collapses after the economy (see Economics) fails and a Pandemic afflicts the land; an idealistic business man takes over, ruralizes the country, introduces kindly forms ...
Miller, Joaquin
Pseudonym of US poet and author Cincinnatus Hiner Miller (1837-1913). Various birth dates have been suggested, but Miller was notoriously unreliable; we give here a current consensus. His adopted name (he said) was taken from Joaquin Murieta (?1829-1853), a famously legendary California desperado (who may have never in fact existed). Miller's poetry, which was nonfantastic, wears surprisingly well; he was active as a journalist from about 1862, making use – as did Ambrose ...
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 ...