Robot book club
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Illustration: Aïda Amer/Axios. Stock: Getty Images
AI has become my reading buddy as I've plowed through my summer book list, helping me keep track of plots and characters, unpack themes, and make sense of wordy, old prose.
- Why it matters: The way many of us actually read books — a few pages before bed, a chapter at the beach, another on a plane — makes it easy to lose the thread. AI can help you pick it back up without starting over.
📖 I really got into using AI while reading James Fenimore Cooper's "The Last of the Mohicans." The text was far too dense for casual vacation reading. My first prompt asked:
- "I'd like a guide as I read The Last of the Mohicans who can help me understand what I've read and where the story is, without giving spoilers or getting ahead of my progress. Can you do this, chapter by chapter?"
- The robot agreed: "Cooper's sentences are long and his diction is archaic."
- It promised to give me "a recap of what's happened so far and clarify anything confusing. ... I'll stick strictly to what you've read. No hints about what's coming."
🔖 That's now become part of my reading routine: Tell AI where you stopped and ask for a spoiler-free recap so far, which often surfaces details I'd missed or forgotten.
🤔 Reality check: AI is working from its training data, not the actual text. The vibes can be right while the details are wrong.
- After I read James Jones' "The Thin Red Line," AI confused Captain Stein with Captain Staros, the corresponding character in the movie adaptation.
Pro tip: If the book is old enough to be in the public domain, tell AI to find the online text so it can be more accurate with its answers. "The Last of the Mohicans," for example, is available through Project Gutenberg.
