SPENCER, John (Barry)

(1944-)

   UK writer, rock musician and one-time art-agency director, founding what would become Young Artists, a major UK agency for preponderantly sf/fantasy artists. His first sf novel, The Electronic Lullaby Meat Market (1975), in a manner somewhat reminiscent of MickFARREN sets a quirky thriller in a violently hyperbolic NEAR FUTURE world described in sex-charged terms reminiscent of the late-1960s counterculture. After editing Echoes of Terror (anth 1980 chap) with Mike Jarvis, JS returned to sf with A Case for Charley (1985) and Charley Getsthe Picture (1986), two idiosyncratic murder mysteries set after the HOLOCAUST, when Nevada and Arizona have been destroyed by earthquakes andCalifornia has been rebuilt as a vast tourist centre. He is not to be confused with the John Spencer (1946-) who illustrated a number of fantasy/folklore juveniles in the early 1970s, nor with the publisher John Spencer (BADGER BOOKS).

   JC/JGr

   See also: MUSIC.