Science fiction fandom or SF fandom is a community or fandom of people interested in science fiction in contact with one another based upon that interest. SF fandom has a life of its own, but not much in the way of formal organization.
Marion Eleanor Zimmer Bradley was an American author of fantasy, historical fantasy, science fiction, and science fantasy novels, and is best known for the Arthurian fiction novel The Mists of Avalon and the Darkover series. Noted for the feminist perspective in her writing, her reputation has been posthumously marred by her daughter Moira Greyland's accusations of child sexual abuse, and for allegedly assisting her second husband, convicted child abuser Walter Breen, in sexually abusing multiple unrelated children.
Jacqueline Lichtenberg is an American science fiction author.
The Darkover series is a collection of science fiction-fantasy novels and short stories written by Marion Zimmer Bradley. The series is set on the planet of Darkover, where a group of humans have been stranded and have developed their own unique culture and society. The books focus on the conflicts between the human settlers and the native population of Darkover, as well as the struggles of the various factions on the planet. The series is known for its complex world-building and exploration of themes such as gender, sexuality, and mental illness. Occasionally, Bradley collaborated with other authors, and she also edited and published Darkover stories by other authors in a series of anthologies. After Bradley's death, the series was continued, mostly by Deborah J. Ross with the permission of the Marion Zimmer Bradley Literary Works Trust.
The National Fantasy Fan Federation is one of the world's oldest science fiction fandom organizations. The organization was founded in April 1941 when all science fiction, horror, and fantasy literature was lumped into one category called "fantasy." The group actively encourages the development of writers, editors, and artists.
The Sword and Sorceress series is a series of fantasy anthologies originally edited by American writer Marion Zimmer Bradley, and originally published by DAW Books. As she explained in the foreword to the first volume, she created the anthology to redress the lack of strong female protagonists in the subgenre of sword and sorcery. At the time, most female characters in sword and sorcery were little more than stock damsels in distress, or pawns who were distributed at the conclusion of the story as "bad-conduct prizes" for the male protagonists. Many of the early sword-and-sorcery works featured attitudes toward women that Bradley considered appalling.
Betty JoAnne Trimble, known as Bjo, is an American science fiction fan and writer, initially entering fandom in the early 1950s.
Kirk/Spock, commonly abbreviated as K/S or Spirk and referring to James T. Kirk and Spock from Star Trek, is a pairing popular in slash fiction, possibly the first slash pairing, according to Henry Jenkins, an early slash fiction scholar. Early in the history of Star Trek fan fiction, a few fan writers started writing about a romantic and sexual relationship between Kirk and Spock, highlighting a romantic or sexual element to the friendship between the men. As of 1998, most academic studies on slash fiction focused on Kirk/Spock, as Star Trek was by that point one of the longest-lived and most prosperous subjects of slash fiction, while its mainstream popularity made it one of the most accessible titles for academics and their audience. As the first slash pairing, K/S was created and developed largely independently from the influence of other slash fiction, with most of the conventions of the slash genre seeing their debut first in K/S slash.
Star Trek: The New Voyages (1976) is an anthology of short fiction based on Star Trek, edited by Sondra Marshak and Myrna Culbreath. Although published professionally, the collected stories were written and submitted by fans. Many of the stories were previously published in fanzines, or collected in fan-published anthologies. The New Voyages was commissioned by Frederik Pohl following his acquisition of Star Trek Lives!, which featured essays on the growing Star Trek fandom, and a chapter on Star Trek fan fiction.
James Davis Nicoll is a Canadian freelance game and speculative fiction reviewer, former security guard and role-playing game store owner, and also works as a first reader for the Science Fiction Book Club. As a Usenet personality, Nicoll is known for writing a widely quoted epigram on the English language, as well as for his accounts of suffering a high number of accidents, which he has narrated over the years in Usenet groups like rec.arts.sf.written and rec.arts.sf.fandom. He is now a blogger on Dreamwidth and Facebook, and an occasional columnist on Tor.com. In 2014, he started his website, jamesdavisnicoll.com, dedicated to his book reviews of works old and new; and later added Young People Read Old SFF, where his panel of younger readers read pre-1980 science fiction and fantasy, and Nicoll and his collaborators report on the younger readers' reactions.
Fanfiction has encountered problems with intellectual property law due to usage of copyrighted characters without the original creator or copyright owner's consent.
Arthur William Saha was an American speculative fiction editor and anthologist, closely associated with publisher Donald A. Wollheim.
Sword of Chaos and Other Stories is an anthology of sword and planet short stories edited by Marion Zimmer Bradley. The stories are set in Bradley's fictional world of Darkover. The book was first published by DAW Books in April 1982.
Red Sun of Darkover is an anthology of fantasy and science fiction short stories edited by Marion Zimmer Bradley. The stories are set in Bradley's world of Darkover. The book was first published by DAW Books in November 1987.
Four Moons of Darkover is an anthology of fantasy and science fiction short stories edited by Marion Zimmer Bradley. The stories are set in Bradley's world of Darkover. The book was first published by DAW Books in November 1988.
Domains of Darkover is an anthology of fantasy and science fiction short stories edited by Marion Zimmer Bradley. The stories are set in Bradley's world of Darkover. The book was first published by DAW Books in March 1990.
Leroni of Darkover is an anthology of fantasy and science fiction short stories edited by American writer Marion Zimmer Bradley. The stories are set in Bradley's world of Darkover. The book was first published by DAW Books in November 1991.
Towers of Darkover is an anthology of fantasy and science fiction short stories edited by American writer Marion Zimmer Bradley. The stories are set in Bradley's world of Darkover. The book was first published by DAW Books in July 1993.
The role of women in speculative fiction has changed a great deal since the early to mid-20th century. There are several aspects to women's roles, including their participation as authors of speculative fiction and their role in science fiction fandom. Regarding authorship, in 1948, 10–15% of science fiction writers were female. Women's role in speculative fiction has grown since then, and in 1999, women comprised 36% of the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America's professional members. Frankenstein (1818) by Mary Shelley has been called the first science fiction novel, although women wrote utopian novels even before that, with Margaret Cavendish publishing the first in the seventeenth century. Early published fantasy was written by and for any gender. However, speculative fiction, with science fiction in particular, has traditionally been viewed as a male-oriented genre.
The Star Trek Concordance is a reference book by Bjo Trimble about the television series Star Trek. The first edition was self-published in 1969. A mass-market edition was published in 1976. The 1976 edition contains summaries from every episode of The Original Series and The Animated Series, as well as an encyclopedia of characters and technology from the series. It was used as a reference for later writers of the show.
