Synopsis: An AI tutor faces deactivation if she cannot prove her worth by saving a teenage pupil with an "unsolvable" problem - she's a budding serial killer.After Dinner Conversation is a growing series of short stories across genres to draw out deeper discussions with friends and family. Each story is an accessible example of an abstract ethical or philosophical idea and is accompanied by suggested discussion questions.Podcast

Named Top 10 "Best Lit Mags of 2023, 2024" by Chill SubsCarefully curated stories from our monthly magazine to create a themed short story book about the philosophy and ethics of technology. Perfect for classrooms and book clubs, each story is 1,500-7,000 words and comes with five suggested discussion questions.Story Summary ListAbrama's End Game: Abrama learns the gods created her dimension as their ...

"After Dinner Conversation" Magazine - March 2021Bill And The Tooth Fairy: An adult loses a tooth and attempts to appease the tooth fairy.Sienna's Monster: A trouble girls leaves for college and is forced to come to terms with the monster that haunts her nightmares.Soon The Sentence Sign: A bar fight turns into a brush with the colonial AI driven judicial system....

A fun, smart and surprising dive into the past, present and future of accents – and the enduring power of sounding differentAccents have long held our fascination. As far back as the 7th century BCE, Egyptian pharaohs experimented with babies to test out theories about the “original” accent and the Old Testament relays how a small difference in the pronunciation of “s” became a fatal litmus test of tribal belonging. Still today, from dinner parties to job interview...

Michael O'Rooke goes out for Halloween one night and has a life-altering experience. He dies.And then he comes back to life.Over the next couple decades, this happens again and again. Why, he isn't really sure, but it allows him to live the way he's always wanted to, out and proud and free. He just hopes he's able to find love before he dies for good.

Heinz von Foerster was the inventor of second-order cybernetics, which recognizes the investigator as part of the system he is investigating. The Beginning of Heaven and Earth Has No Name provides an accessible, nonmathematical, and comprehensive overview of von Foerster’s cybernetic ideas and of the philosophy latent within them. It distills concepts scattered across the lifework of this scientific polymath and influential interdisciplinarian. At the same time, as a book-length interview,...

CReLs gnadenloser Countdown läuft. Auf der Suche nach wirksamen Waffen gegen die KI machen Nova und Red einen IT-Experten der ersten Stunde ausfindig. Statt zu kooperieren, bedroht er sie zunächst. Nur mühsam kann Nova ihm hilfreiche Informationen abringen. Doch ein Handlanger von CReL kommt ihr auf die Schliche. Die tödliche Eskalation scheint unvermeidlich.

Im Nobelkaufhaus Harrods liegt ein lebloser Körper auf Eis zwischen den teuren Champagner- Flaschen – ausgerechnet vor der feierlichen Neueröffnung! Der einfältige Inspector Littlechild verhaftet eine junge Obdachlose. Millie und Eliza zweifeln an deren Schuld und ermitteln heimlich im Kaufhaus. Hinter der mondänen Luxus-Fassade stoßen sie auf giftige Intrigen.

Die Spuren von Corteon Fringe führen nach Venedig, und die Schlinge um den Hals von Nova und Red zieht sich gefährlich zusammen: Eine übergriffige Ex-Freundin nutzt Reds Notlage schamlos aus. CReL offenbart ihren eigentlichen Plan, der viel erschreckender ist, als bisher angenommen. Und selbst in ihrem Mind Palace ist Nova nicht mehr sicher.

The Curse of the Missing Boot: A Tale from The RookThe Booger Curse is back—grouchy, supernatural, and with a proven track record in sudden fatalities. Upon the treacherous and poorly-drained wastes of Bogmoor Moor, the final English heir to the house of Booger has been most frightfully slain—scared to death, the coroner suggests, by a spectral hound of considerable discourtesy.Hope arrives in unlikely form: one Wyatt Booger, recently located in the wilds of Texas,...

The city of The Rook is a glorious misstep in architectural history—a London that overshot the mark. With Elizabethan arches elbowing Georgian facades and Victorian rooftops flirting with steampunk plumbing and ambient sorcery, it teems with whispers and wonder. Home to oddities both human and hypothetical (goblins are never ruled out), the city beckons the curious to poke about its secrets.In Book One – The Hydromancer's Stone, an ancient statue was unearthed beneath the city, tho...

No Ghosts. A Dance Number. Popcorn. Shakespeare Was Never Like This.In the riotous Court of Fools, Bill Makepeace—the famed bard of Blackheap Street—finds himself in a most theatrical pickle. His beloved theatre has burned to the ground, the funds to rebuild are nowhere in sight, and lurking in the wings is none other than Obadiah Dregmoor: cockle-seller kingpin and aspiring mollusc-based snacks baron, eager to secure a slice of any future takings....