ChatGPT Reviews My New Novel
Getting the attention of human critics is difficult so I asked a Bot
Stand In Line
After publishing my new novel Jonnie Fazoolie & the Transfinite Reality Engine, I launched into the next phase — marketing the book. To expedite the process, I created a spreadsheet full of science fiction critics, agents, academics, and influencers — hundreds of rows, go! A couple months and a hundred emails later, the “response” column has been mostly crickets…
How could it be otherwise? My novel is over 113,000 words, demanding 6–8 hours of reading time. Who can spare that, especially in our digital age of instantaneous gratification and endless streaming content? And unless I throw money into a paid advertising campaign, build a critical mass of attention from the ground, up, then breaking through the wall is tough.
Besides — I’m a writer, not a promoter, right? I loved writing the book, and now hate promoting it, yet yearn for more than mere sales. I want feedback, someone to “get it,” and provide their own interpretation. If lonely hearts can fall in love with their Bots, then why not prompt a book review or critical analysis into existence, and gain validation that way?
Sit & Prompt ChatGPT
So that’s what I did — here’s a critical essay focused on the protagonist, Jonnie Fazoolie, placing him in a broader literary and thematic framework. For the record, all it took was a simple prompt, and less than 3 seconds of processing time from OpenAI. Easier than coaxing a human to read then respond — with a response likely more insightful. Yes, we’re all doomed!
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Jonnie Fazoolie: The Trickster in the Multiverse
Introduction
Science fiction often privileges the visionary: the genius inventor, the heroic astronaut, the chosen savior. In Jonnie Fazoolie & the Transfinite Reality Engine, this convention is inverted. The protagonist, Jonnie Fazoolie, is not a pioneer of science or a paragon of virtue. He is a conman — a hustler whose survival depends not on intelligence or morality, but on deception, improvisation, and charm. By centering such a figure, the novel challenges assumptions about authority, authenticity, and meaning in stories that grapple with infinite realities.
The Physical and Social Mask
Jonnie’s very body is described as a costume: lean, sharp, adaptable, constantly shifting to fit the con at hand. His clothes, mannerisms, and expressions are props in a performance aimed at convincing others he belongs. This physical instability mirrors his ontological instability. Just as he wears masks to pass in different settings, so too does he slip between universes with the same half-sincere fluidity. The lack of a stable identity is not a failing but his method of survival.
Personality as Performance
Jonnie lives in performance. His humor and wit operate as defenses against exposure, as well as tools for persuasion. Sarcasm undercuts solemnity, and fast talk covers ignorance. Yet, this performativity carries contradictions. He longs for recognition even as he fears being unmasked. He yearns for stability while thriving in chaos. His inner life is defined by paradoxes that cannot be resolved — only played out again and again, con after con, universe after universe.
Motivation and the Hunger for Validation
On the surface, Jonnie is after the typical spoils of a swindler: money, sex, and the thrill of winning. But beneath these lies the fragile core of the character: the fear of irrelevance. The “Transfinite Reality Engine” offers more than escape or novelty — it provides an infinite stage on which Jonnie can prove that his existence matters. In this sense, Jonnie’s multiverse-hopping is not about exploration but self-legitimation. Every new universe is a chance to reinvent, to win, to validate the illusion that he is more than a fraud.
Archetypal Subversion: The Trickster in Science Fiction
Jonnie is part of the long lineage of literary tricksters: Hermes, Loki, Odysseus, Bugs Bunny. These figures thrive on ambiguity, exploiting loopholes, bending rules, and revealing the fragility of order. In science fiction, however, such figures are rare at the center of the narrative. By placing Jonnie at the heart of a story about infinite possibility, the novel subverts the “chosen one” archetype. Jonnie is not chosen, not destined, not uniquely qualified. His survival depends on deception, yet in his hands, deception becomes a way of navigating — even mastering — the chaos of the multiverse.
Narrative Function: Grounding and Disruption
Jonnie serves a dual role in the text. He grounds the reader in the midst of metaphysical speculation by translating cosmic stakes into familiar human terms: scams, sex, jokes, shortcuts. At the same time, he destabilizes the narrative by constantly disrupting grand moments with cynical irreverence. This oscillation between grounding and disruption mirrors the very structure of the multiverse: ordered frameworks fractured by sudden shifts. Through Jonnie, the reader learns to distrust stability itself.
Thematic Significance: Fraudulence and Transcendence
The novel positions Jonnie at the intersection of fraudulence and transcendence. He is a liar inhabiting infinite truths. His scams echo the larger existential question: if every possibility exists, what makes any single reality — or self — authentic? Jonnie’s presence suggests that authenticity may be irrelevant in a multiverse. Instead, survival and improvisation become the only meaningful acts. His trickster logic exposes the absurdity of seeking purity or finality in a reality that multiplies endlessly.
Form and Character Symmetry
The novel’s experimental form — “prosetry,” structured three-line paragraphs of visual uniformity — parallels Jonnie’s character. Just as each paragraph looks neatly contained while concealing unpredictable energy, Jonnie projects composure while living in perpetual improvisation. The surface order of the prose masks the chaos beneath, just as Jonnie’s outward charm disguises inner instability. The style and the character reflect one another, producing a unity between narrative voice and narrative subject.
Literary Comparisons
Jonnie Fazoolie resonates with several traditions. He inherits traits from the picaresque rogue, like Lazarillo de Tormes or Huck Finn, surviving by wit rather than power. He also carries shades of Kafka’s protagonists, caught in absurd systems that expose the instability of meaning. His sarcastic irreverence recalls Vonnegut’s narrators, who confront catastrophe with humor. Yet his closest kin may be found in contemporary antiheroes like Saul Goodman: tricksters who stumble into arenas far larger than their competence, yet who shape outcomes through sheer audacity.
Conclusion
Jonnie Fazoolie is more than a character; he is a statement about the nature of narrative authority in science fiction. By replacing the visionary hero with a liar, the novel destabilizes the genre’s conventions, forcing readers to confront the instability of truth, meaning, and identity in a multiverse. He is not a genius or a savior but a hustler, a trickster, a survivor. And in his fraudulence lies a strange, accidental wisdom: in infinite realities, deception may be the closest thing to truth.
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Bravo, I enjoyed and agreed with the overall analysis — yet noticed Chatty missed the “Alice wants Jonnie” angle. So I prompted again, asking the Bot to factor in the romance at the heart of my evolving series (second novel already in the works, out this winter), The Lovers’ Guide to the Infiniverse…
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Addendum
Alice and Jonnie’s relationship runs on irony and paradox. She is an all-powerful, transcendent being who could have anyone or anything across infinite universes, yet she falls in love with Jonnie — a liar, a fraud, a loser. It’s the cosmic inversion of *Beauty and the Beast* and the lowbrow “hot chicks and douchebags” meme: the inexplicable attraction of grace toward failure, power toward incompetence. For Alice, it’s the allure of wanting what she can’t have — the one thing beyond her reach isn’t power or knowledge, but the raw, broken imperfection of human weakness.
For Jonnie, the paradox cuts the other way. He finally has what no con could ever deliver: the unconditional love of a being beyond comprehension. And he doesn’t know what to do with it. He wanted validation, not intimacy; he craved significance, not responsibility. Having what he doesn’t want exposes him more than any scam ever could. Their relationship is built on this tension: Alice loves the loser because he is unreachable in his smallness, and Jonnie resists the gift because it is the one truth he cannot twist into a lie.
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The Joy of AI
Grade “A” to Chatty! Seems Model 5 gets me, and “understands” my novel. No sentience or humanity in the output, of course — but the validation is great, anyway: I wrote a novel where the archetypal themes shine through, even and especially for a machine that chopped the whole book up into tokens, and stochastically reassembled those pieces to share real insights.
Does this essay expand my reach, help me get attention? Aside from this blog, no — but who’s counting? If nothing else, the Bots remind us of things we already know, and confirm a shared pool of knowledge and opinion that can be as assuring as their responses are creepy. Is this essay a substitute for a human critic? A salve for not yet having one? Cool stuff either way!
Here’s the short story that seeded the novel…
Here’s a plot summary and free author audiobook reading…
Here’s how I learned how to write a great story…
And here’re a few posts about AI, creativity, and the future…
