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Wednesday 18 February 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 18 February 2026
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Giant Spider Invasion, The
Film (1975). Group 75/Transcentury. Directed by Bill Rebane. Written by Robert Easton, Richard L Huff. Cast includes Steve Brodie, Alan Hale, Barbara Hale and Leslie Parrish. 76 minutes. Colour. / Noted by one critic, Michael Weldon, as the Monster Movie with the worst special effects since The Giant Claw (1957), this is fondly remembered as the one where the giant spider was built out of a modified ...
Niall, Ian
Pseudonym of Scottish author John McNeillie (1916-2002), most famous for the nonfiction The Poacher's Handbook (1950). His sf novel, The Boy Who Saw Tomorrow (1952), offers a quiet portrait of the effect on a small village of a young lad's Predictions of the Near Future. [JC]
Barnwell, William
(1943- ) US author whose most interesting foray into the sf/fantasy genre was his well-written Blessing Trilogy, consisting of The Blessing Papers (1980), Imram (1981) and The Sigma Curve (1981). Set in Eire (here called Imram), this complex quest through a Ruined-Earth world, where some sort of grand design by mysterious powers is operating, at first appears lively but conventional ...
Ludington, Andrew
(? - ) US author whose Alternate World Splinter Effect sequence, beginning with Splinter Effect (2025), focuses on explorations in chrono-archaeology funded by the Smithsonian. Its protagonist Rabbit Ward's primary task is to search, via institutionalized Time Travel, for artefacts at risk. In the first volume of the series, the now-lost menorah of the Second Temple ...
Dragon's Heaven
Japanese Original Video Animation (OVA) (1988). Anime International Company (AIC), Artmic. Based on the Manga by Makoto Kobayashi. Directed by Makoto Kobayashi. Written by Ikuyo Koukami. Voice cast includes Iemasa Kayumi, Yuko Minaguchi and Kei Tomiyama. 43 minutes. Colour. / A War that began in 3195 between mankind and the Robot rebels finally ends with a big win for humanity. The victorious forces return ...
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 ...