Hard science fiction is a category of science fiction characterized by concern for scientific accuracy and logic. The term was first used in print in 1957 by P. Schuyler Miller in a review of John W. Campbell's Islands of Space in the November issue of Astounding Science Fiction. The complementary term soft science fiction, formed by analogy to hard science fiction, first appeared in the late 1970s. The term is formed by analogy to the popular distinction between the "hard" (natural) and "soft" (social) sciences, although there are examples generally considered as "hard" SF, such as Isaac Asimov's Foundation series, built on mathematical sociology. Science fiction critic Gary Westfahl argues that neither term is part of a rigorous taxonomy; instead they are approximate ways of characterizing stories that reviewers and commentators have found useful.
Robert Lull Forward was an American physicist and science fiction writer. His literary work was noted for its scientific credibility and use of ideas developed from his career as an aerospace engineer. He also made important contributions to gravitational wave detection research.
The Encyclopedia of Science Fiction (SFE) is an English language reference work on science fiction, first published in 1979. It has won the Hugo, Locus and British SF Awards. Two print editions appeared in 1979 and 1993. A third, continuously revised, edition was published online from 2011; a change of web host was announced as the launch of a fourth edition in 2021.
An overwhelming majority of fiction is set on or features the Earth. This also holds true of science fiction, despite perceptions to the contrary. Counterfactual depictions of the shape of the Earth, be it flat or hollow, occasionally are featured. A personified, living Earth appears in a handful of works. In works set in the far future, Earth can be a center of space-faring human civilization, or just one of many inhabited planets of a galactic empire, and sometimes destroyed by ecological disaster or nuclear war or otherwise forgotten or lost.
Robert Silverberg is an American author and editor, best known for writing science fiction. He is a multiple winner of both Hugo and Nebula Awards, a member of the Science Fiction and Fantasy Hall of Fame, and a Grand Master of SF. He has attended every Hugo Awards ceremony since the inaugural event in 1953.
Martha Kay Renfroe was an American writer of mystery and science fiction. Renfroe, who published her works under the pseudonym M.K. Wren, was best known for her mystery series featuring the character Conan Flagg.
David Stanley Garnett is a UK science fiction author and editor. His first novel, Mirror in the Sky, was published in 1969. Three of his books are comic science fiction novels: Stargonauts, Bikini Planet and Space Wasters. He edited a paperback anthology revival of Michael Moorcock's New Worlds magazine, two Zenith anthologies of original British SF stories, and three Orbit Science Fiction Yearbooks. He also writes under the names David Ferring and David Lee.
Works of fiction about the planet Venus have been written since before the 19th century. Its impenetrable cloud cover gave science fiction writers free rein to speculate on conditions at its surface; as it is very similar in size to Earth but closer to the Sun, the planet was often depicted as warmer but still habitable by humans. Depictions of Venus as a lush, verdant paradise, an oceanic planet, or fetid swampland, often inhabited by dinosaur-like monsters, became common in early pulp science fiction, particularly between the 1930s and 1950s, when science had revealed some aspects of Venus but not yet the harsh nature of its surface conditions. Some other stories portrayed it as a desert, or invented more exotic settings. When portrayed, the native sentient inhabitants, Venusians, were generally portrayed as gentle, ethereal and beautiful. Overall, Venus was considered to have much less of an established setting than its sister planet, Mars.
Rocheworld is a science fiction novel by Robert Forward which depicts a realistic interstellar mission using a laser driven light sail propulsion system to send the spaceship and a crew of 20 on a one-way journey of 5.9 light-years to explore a double planet that orbits Barnard's Star, which they call Rocheworld, and where they make many startling discoveries.
Jupiter, the largest planet in the Solar System, has appeared in works of fiction across several centuries. The way the planet has been depicted has evolved as more has become known about its composition; it was initially portrayed as being entirely solid, later as having a high-pressure atmosphere with a solid surface underneath, and finally as being entirely gaseous. It was a popular setting during the pulp era of science fiction. Life on the planet has variously been depicted as identical to humans, larger versions of humans, and non-human. Non-human life on Jupiter has been portrayed as primitive in some works and more advanced than humans in others.
Saturn has made appearances in fiction since the 1752 novel Micromégas by Voltaire. In many of these works, the planet is inhabited by aliens that are usually portrayed as being more advanced than humans. The planet is occasionally visited by humans and its rings are sometimes mined for resources. The moons of Saturn have been depicted in a large number of stories, especially Titan with its Earth-like environment suggesting the possibility of colonization by humans and alien lifeforms living there.
John Raymond Brosnan was an Australian writer of both fiction and non-fiction works in the fantasy and science fiction genres. He was born in Perth, Western Australia, and died in South Harrow, London, from acute pancreatitis. He sometimes published under the pseudonyms Harry Adam Knight, Simon Ian Childer, James Blackstone, and John Raymond. Three movies were based on his novels–Beyond Bedlam, Proteus, and Carnosaur. In addition to science fiction, he also wrote a number of books about cinema and was a regular columnist with the popular UK magazine Starburst and comic 2000 AD. Liverpool University holds a collection of his work consisting of both published material and drafts.
Marooned on Eden (1993), is a science fiction novel by Robert L. Forward, collaborating with his wife, Martha Dodson Forward.
Marie-Anne de Roumier-Robert was an 18th-century French writer. She wrote one of the earliest known works of science fiction, Voyage de Milord Céton dans les Sept Planètes.
Rescued from Paradise is a science fiction novel by Robert L. Forward, collaborating with his daughter Julie Forward Fuller. It is part of the Rocheworld series, about an expedition to explore planets found in orbit around Barnard's Star. This is the fifth and final book in the continuity. Some material from previous novels was rewritten and included as part of this story. In this novel, after settling down on the habitable moon Zuni, the crew struggle to survive various disasters and to communicate with a mysterious Civilization under the ocean.
The year 1911 was marked, in science fiction, by the following events.
The year 1921 was marked, in science fiction, by the following events.
The year 1926 was marked, in science fiction, by the following events.
The year 1932 was marked, in science fiction, by the following events.
Space travel, or space flight is a classic science-fiction theme that has captivated the public and is almost archetypal for science fiction. Space travel, interplanetary or interstellar, is usually performed in space ships, and spacecraft propulsion in various works ranges from the scientifically plausible to the totally fictitious.
