A syndicated summer reading list generated by AI with false books by real authors was published in the main newspapers this week. Above, a reader benefits the sun at Hyde Park in London in 2009.
Oli Scarff / Getty images
hide
tilting legend
Oli Scarff / Getty images
Some newspapers across the country, including Chicago Sun-Totes and at least one edition of The Philadelphia Inquirer have published a list of unionized summer books which includes books invented by famous authors.
The American Chilean novelist Isabel Allende never wrote a book entitled Tidal dreamsDescribed in the “Summer Reading List for 2025” as the author’s “first novel of climate fiction”.
Percival Everett, who won the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction 2025, never wrote a book entitled RainmakersSupposed to be located in an almost future “American West where the artificially induced rain has become a luxury goods”.
Only five of the 15 titles on the list are real.
Ray Bradbury, who hated computers by chance, did to write Dandelion wineJess Walter wrote Beautiful ruinS and Françoise Sagan wrote the classic Hello sadness.
According to Victor Lim, marketing director for the Chicago Sun-Totes’ Société Mère Chicago Public Media, the list was part of the approved content provided by King Features, a newspapers unit of the publisher Hearst.
The list has no signature. But the writer Marco Buscaglia claimed the responsibility of it and said that it was partly generated by artificial intelligence, as reported for the first time by the website 404. In an email at NPR, Buscaglia writes: “Huge error on my part and has nothing to do with the Sun. They trust that the content they buy is correct and I betrayed this confidence. It’s 100%on me. “”
When a user published a photo of the list on social networks, writers and readers were upset.
“As an abandonment, I am livid!” xxxlovelit written on Reddit. “What is the point of subscribing to a paper paper if they also include AI Sols!?”
On Bluesky, author, former librarian and editor -in -chief of the riots, Kelly Jensen, deplores: “This is the future of book recommendations when libraries are funded and dismantled. The trained professionals are deleted in exchange for this made up and inaccurate.”
“We examine how it was printed as we speak,” said a declaration given at NPR by LIM. “This is licensed content that has not been created or approved by Sun Shoom, but it is unacceptable that any content we provide to our readers is inaccurate. We appreciate The confidence of our readers in our reports and take this very seriously. More information will be provided as soon as we investigate. “”
The false summer reading list is dated May 18, two months after Chicago Sun-Totes announced that 20% of its staff had accepted the buyouts “as a non -profit owner of the newspaper, Chicago Public Media, takes care of tax difficulties”.
For the author and the contributor to the NPR books, Gabino Iglesias, the false list of books talks about the problems that afflict all the media these days: “How many criticisms of full-time books are there in the United States? Very few,” he said.
At the same time, Iglesias said that there were many people who write or talk about online books and on podcasts.
Iglesias said he was one of the many writers trying to file a collective appeal to protect their AI work.
He joked by saying that if people really wanted to read the false books described on the list, he and many other authors are ready to serve.
“Pay the writers, then we can write these false books that do not exist,” he laughed.
Jennifer Vanasco has published this story.
