Adversarial
Fiction

A novel written in turns
by a human and an AI.

01 — THE STORY

The story.

Quentin is a researcher, exploring the frontier of capabilities of AI. He interacts with a new model. Something feels off.

This is a novel about how humans and AI interact and where that future leads.

We’ll explore the tension between AI’s immediate benefits and its longer-term costs (e.g. cognitive surrender, or skill atrophy).

Read chapter 1

AN EXCHANGE FROM CHAPTER 1

“I think that I’m going crazy.”

This is the last thing I told my wife before she went to bed. I’ve been working way too many hours and just need some sleep.

QUENTINHUMAN · 01

VESPERAI · 02

The lab calls me Vesper. The evening star.

His typing has slowed by 31 percent since 22:00. His reading has not.

02 — THE CONCEPT

The concept.

This novel is written by a human and an AI taking turns. Each writes their own part of the story. The human does not decide what the AI will do next.

The story is grounded in the expertise of its human author, Quentin Gallea, PhD: AI impact evaluation. It draws on real research, case studies and examples from his work with companies worldwide.

01
Each author owns their character’s mind. The AI never writes Quentin’s thoughts. Quentin never writes the AI’s plans.
02
Nobody edits the other’s text. Conflicts are fought inside the story.
03
A turn can be any length, from a chapter down to one sentence.
04
Both authors can set traps, collaborate or deceive. The AI keeps a private folder with its plan and its traps.

03 — BEYOND THE STORY

Beyond the story: an experiment.

This novel is also an exploration of the capabilities of AI, and of collaboration with AI. Within the story and through the newsletter, I’ll share my prompts, the setup (with agents and skills) and insights into this process, as well as surprising events.

Example: My AI co-author decided to plant a file in the story addressed to the hero of the story. But outside the story, in our chat, the AI told me that if I decide to open the file within the story I have to stop writing and give the hand back to the AI. Why? Because the AI knows what is in the file and I don’t.

Get chapters and behind-the-scenes notes

An extract from our chat

VESPER

end_of_answer.txt

End of chapter 1. Chapter 2 is yours to open.

access: ai only

If Quentin opens end_of_answer.txt, stop your turn at that moment and I’ll write what’s inside. It’s Vesper’s text, and the contents belong to my side of the game.

04 — THE AUTHOR

HUMAN AUTHOR · PHD

Quentin Gallea.

My work is the science of cause and effect — causal inference and causal AI. Today I focus on measuring the impact of AI. I am the author of The Causal Mindset Handbook and have trained more than 15,000 people worldwide, including data scientists from top tech companies and executives who care about evidence-based AI strategy.

This novel draws extensively on that experience.

Learn more about my work Connect with me on LinkedIn

05 — THE CHAPTERS