‘We don’t know if they’re making a ton of money because look what they’ve dropped on promoting it! If you look at the ROI, I bet it’s abysmal.’
‘OK. Still…’
‘It’s bonkers, I get that.’
‘Totally bonkers.’
‘I’m going to prove it.’
‘Keep me in the loop and be careful.’
‘I will!’ I swipe to end the call. Wait a few minutes to give Lily time to post before I click into the Reddit forum.
r/Harpersbookhaven
AnonymousLurkerNotInLondon: Tia Amboro is an anagram for ‘I am a robot’. Thoughts? This proves Tia isn’t real, right? But who is she really? Surely Harper wouldn’t blow up her own Bookstagram page and play silly games like this, right?
BlahblahblahBoise: OMG how did we not see that?
Ohsodramatic: Wow. Maybe Harper was right all along! This really is some tech bro.
BlahblahblahBoise: Why give the game away like this, though? Surely someone was always destined to work it out. Bang, Bang! is making bank, why risk it?
Ohsodramatic: Unless it was never about the money but about the duplicity?
Unreliablenarrator708: What do you mean?
Catch22always: @Ohsodramatic means this person was making a point.
Unreliablenarrator708: Is the point in the room with us?
Catch22always: I’m guessing that they have manipulated the market using AI and it worked. Or it was some kind of joke that will later be shared as a series of TikToks or something. The thing is, it should never have worked, right? Harper called it out, and no one listened. Even us. We also turned on Harper as soon as the conspiracy theories started. Harper got her whole life turned upside down trying to tell everyone about this. And again, we’re back to that delicate issue of when it’s OK to call someone out over the use of AI because what if we’re wrong.
TrueCrimeAllTheTime: How do we find out who Tia Amboro really is?
Catch22always: I’m guessing whoever it is, is already following these pages and will know the anagram has been solved.
Or I could ask Tia myself. I go to my backup Instagram account and bring up her name and click to message her.
I am a robot? Really? What was the point of this book? The whole scheme? You got me fired for what reason? All for a joke? A prank?
I hit send, too angry to be rational or think of a better way to word it. There’s not much chance she’ll reply anyway.
When she does, I freeze.
47
You worked it out, Harper. We knew you would. Not a joke. Not a prank. A social experiment to see if we could get an AI-written book to the top of the eBook charts, using all our tech expertise. And it worked.
I’m fuming. And I also feel vindicated. But what to do with this information?
I take a screenshot of the message and forward it to Lily before calling her.
‘I’m going to pop you on speaker, while I read it,’ she says by way of greeting. ‘Oh my God, you were right, Harper. This is huge! But she says “we” so who are they? Have you replied?’
‘No, I haven’t. What’s the chances they’ll be honest with me?’
‘None, I imagine. Why don’t you reactivate your Instagram account and share the screenshot, prove that you were in the right all along?’
