fiction

People who write fan fiction could find a paying market for their work courtesy of Amazon.

Unveiled Wednesday, Kindle Worlds is a new publishing venture from Amazon that promises to reward both writers and the original rights holders for new fiction based on existing stories and characters.

Authors who create works of at least 10,000 words in length will receive 35 percent of the net revenue based on the actual sales price, with royalties paid each month. Those who write shorter pieces between 5,000 and 10,000 words will receive a digital royalty of 20 percent of the sales price.… Read more

If you've ever read "Ender's Game," you should probably find a new pair of underpants before watching the newly released trailer for the upcoming movie -- it's chock full of lush CGI and epic spaceship battles.

The film, which arrives on November 1, features Asa Butterfield as Ender Wiggin, and also includes some pretty heavy hitters such as Harrison Ford (Colonel Graff), Ben Kingsley (Mazer Rackham), and Viola Davis, as well as up and coming stars Aramis Knight, Abigail Breslin, Hailee Steinfeld, and Jimmy Pinchak. Gavin Hood directs the movie.… Read more

With the introduction of the Mac App store several years ago, games have become as available on computers as they are on other Apple devices. Dark Saga CE for Mac's well-designed environments may appeal to some gamers, but the simple gameplay may not entertain many.

Gothic Fiction Dark Saga CE is available as a free trial edition with a 60-minute time limit; the full version of the game is available for $19.99. The game also requires an additional download of a Mac game store in order to play. After we accepted a lengthy user agreement, the store opened … Read more

Read any good books lately? I know, e-book prices can make it tough to indulge your love of the printed word. That's why I'm jazzed to see that the folks at StoryBundle have cobbled together another great batch of books for whatever price you want to pay.

It's true! The Indie Fantasy Bundle includes six full-length novels (actually, eight, as two of the selections include the first two books in their respective series), and you get to decide how much you want to pay.

As you might suspect from the "indie" designation, these aren't … Read more

As a child, I used to concentrate really hard on things like pencils and pebbles, trying to get them to budge with the sheer power of my mind. It never worked, but technology is getting us a little closer to the mind control dream. The Muse brainwave-sensing headband from Interaxon is a step in the right direction.

The Muse uses two sensors on the forehead and two behind the ears. You wear it positioned kind of like a pair of glasses. It measures your brainwaves and sends the information to a smartphone or tablet. Viewing that data in real time can show you if your mind is wandering, if you're relaxed, or if you're in a state of intense concentration.… Read more

Twitter may still be thought of as a place where people share what they ate for breakfast or pictures of their cats, but some think of it as a home for serious storytelling.

Already some have used the microblogging service as a home for innovative fiction projects, including Jennifer Egan's "Black Box" and a creative use of a faux-"Mad Men" narrative.

With that in mind, the company today announced the first Twitter Fiction Festival, a five-day event starting November 28 that will showcase "creative experiments in storytelling from authors around the world." … Read more

If you like reading, bundles, science fiction, fantasy, and/or supporting charity, today's your lucky day.

The folks at Humble Bundle, who regularly serve up indie games on the cheap, have created the Humble eBook Bundle, a collection of six sci-fi/fantasy e-books for whatever price you want to pay.

That means you can literally drop a penny to get half a dozen DRM-free novels. But you're not that cheap, right? Here's why you should give serious consideration to paying more:

Writers need to eat. I've often railed against e-book prices, but certainly a buck per … Read more

Technological futurism to Intel's Brian David Johnson is a lot more than engineering. He combines ethnography, science fiction literature, and consumer research to help the company know where things are going in the future just beyond the average geek's grasp.

I caught up with Brian at an Intel event where their engineering teams basically hold a science fair -- a really impressive science fair. In addition to what's in the video, I also assembled a slide show of a few more things that caught my eye. Check it out below.

One of the most interesting things I … Read more

Eminent science fiction writer Neal Stephenson wants to get real about swordsmanship, and he's passing the helmet to get it done.

The author, perhaps best known for his novels "Cryptonomicon" and "Snow Crash," is seeking donations on Kickstarter for a new video game called Clang that promises to provide a more realistic representation of steel-on-steel swordfighting. Working with Subutai, the goal is to create a game based on two-handed longsword combat that will play on game controllers already on the market, he writers in a blog explaining the project: