Fiction--it's not just for storytelling anymore. This book takes readers on a whirlwind tour through a range of perspectives from the arts and the humanities in order to reveal fiction's prevalence and functionality in the objects and processes that we are convinced are completely real. More significantly, however, it describes the myriad ways in which the elements that comprise this greater universe of fiction have been discovered, produced, harnessed, and/or used for purposes that stretch from the malevolent to the compassionate. This volume is a thought-provoking and enjoyable read--even at its most disconcerting moments. --Steve Kurtz, Professor Emeritus, University of Buffalo, cofounder of Critical Art Ensemble

Fictions, by definition, are works that present us with unreal stories and situations. And yet, these fictions--novels, songs, pictures, theories, and so on--are themselves actual things in the world. They are processes, performances, and objects. They portray unrealities, but they themselves are real. The essays in this volume, from a wide variety of points of view, all consider the reality of avowed fictions: their powers and effects, both for good and ill. --Steven Shaviro, DeRoy Professor of English, Wayne State University