Investigate A Robot Romance with Autonomous/Agency

I love robots. And detective stories. And queer romance, and pining, and banter. I love stories about people figuring themselves out, and stories about the ways people's jagged edges fit together.

So I grabbed all of those things, and I stuffed them in a mixing bowl, and I smashed them together with a potato masher until they became a novel. 

If that sounds like a delicious recipe for fiction to you, Autonomous/Agency will be right up your alley. This story has been a labor of love, composed between teaching classes and attending staff meetings, while stirring pots of soup or waiting for bread to rise, on computers and phones and scrap paper. And now, the day when these characters slip out of my hands and into yours has arrived-- the first five chapters are now available in a convenient ePub format, awaiting your consumption. Further chapters will be added over the next few weeks, free unless you become so wildly enamored with Ian and Victor and friends that you're overwhelmed with the need to throw cash at me.

“He's a robot,” Masa blurted, looking dishwater grey.

Ian stared for a moment, then squinted, then scrunched up his face and blinked rapidly. “You're pulling my leg. He's—” 

“He’s a robot, and I built him, and I think as long as he’s with me, he’s in real danger.” Masa wasn’t smiling. He was dead serious.

Ian stopped and gestured vaguely but aggressively. “That's illegal.” 

Masa shrugged, all the antsiness drained out and refilled with cold, still despondency. “Not for long. The moratorium on self-aware AI development is coming up for revaluation next January, and I have it on good authority that we're getting a repeal.”

Ian fidgeted with his collar. “You’re telling me freckle-face out there is a fucking robot. And his missing ‘brother…?’”

Masa nodded, unblinking. With the truth out, his exhaustion was obvious on his skin and in his eyes. Behind his glasses his flesh was thin and purple.