Peering into the future of novels, with trained machines ready

IN A NEW novella, Death of an Author, the writer, Aidan Marchine, describes a subpar plate of nachos this way:

“The cheese was congealed and the chips soggy, damp and smeared with a greasy film like some kind of lake scum. Gus forced himself to take a bite, but the flavour was rancid, a sickly sweet imitation of cheese. He washed it down with a swig of beer, but even that tasted ugly, like it had been sitting in the sun for too long.”

The writing is vivid, but there’s nothing particularly unusual about it. Aidan Marchine, however, is an unusual author – at least for now – because Aidan Marchine is a set of computer systems. Kind of.