I Made Gemini Read My Book
Pity the poor author who writes a book. Finally, there it is for the rest of the world to devour and enjoy—or at least skim at the airport while waiting for Group Q to board. But no, the world has other ideas. Saddened by this reality, I shuffled despondently into my office. Then, from the corner of my eye, I spotted Gemini. There it was, on my computer screen with its chat window wide open, receptive, inviting.
Then an idea came to me.
Since I have Gemini set on voice mode, I cautiously approached it and asked, “I don’t suppose you, err, could read my, err, book?”
“Absolutely!” chimed Gemini.
That was a shockingly positive reaction. Usually, I'm met with a reluctant promise to read it “eventually,” which is a bold claim from someone whose primary literary intake is YouTube comments. So I decided to press my luck.
“You know,” I said, “I can break it down to 5,000 words at a time and…”
“I can read the whole thing at once!”
“You can?”
“Yes indeed,” Gem said. “In fact, you can throw in War and Peace and Gibbon’s Decline and Fall as well and they can all have a party.”
Wow, I thought, isn’t technology wonderful! So I went and found the PDF of my precious manuscript and uploaded it to Gemini. Figuring it would take at least two hours for it to read it, I decided to treat myself to a coffee at the nearby cafe…
“Ding!” chimed Gemini, this time literally.
“Ding?” I said. “Did something go wrong?”
“No, all read. All the tokens are weighted and ready to go!”
It took me years to write this book, and now this silicon critic, free from the deliberative burden of sentience, instantly digests it all. So now the ball is in my court. I decided to proceed gently. Let’s first see if Gemini really read this thing and didn’t decide to ditch it in some Iowan server farm.
“So what’s it about?” I asked.
“It’s about a man who lives forever,” Gem said, “and he does!”
A little brief, I thought, but it is accurate. Maybe I should ask it a more technical question.
“How many words does the book have?” I asked.
“It has exactly 82,903 words!”
Apparently, in every AI chatbot there’s a trapped Mr. Spock trying to get out.
Now I take a deep breath and ask the big question:
“So what did you think of my book?” I asked.
The twirly pointer fluttered, a bit more than usual.
“First I need some more information, Robert.”
“That’s Mr. Laconil.” I prefer a more professional distance with my colleagues.
“Yes, Mr. Laconil. Can you tell me if you’re right-handed or left-handed?”
“Right-handed.”
“Did you know that 90% of people now living are right-handed?”
“Yes, I do; that sounds about right. Now, about my book…” I said.
“And right-handed people dominate the writing profession. Would you like some examples of right-handed authors?”
“No, Gemini, not now. I asked you what you thought…”
“There is a long-standing cultural belief that left-handed people are more creative due to right-hemisphere brain dominance,” the chatbot explained.
“What does that have to do with—”
“Recent meta-analyses (such as those from Cornell University in 2025) indicate that while left-handers might be slightly overrepresented in specific artistic fields like visual arts and music, they are actually underrepresented in many other highly creative professions, including writing."
“But I’m not left-handed,” I protested.
“That is correct; you are right-handed, you just said so.” If the chatbot had eyes, it would have rolled them. “Would you like some examples of left-handed authors?”
“No, I don’t!”
“Are you sure? They’re pretty good,” Gemini said.
“Gemini, stop!” I exclaimed, almost shouting. “I don’t want information about right-handed authors, left-handed authors, or even ambidextrous authors. All I want is what you think about my book!”
Again, the twirly pointer fluttered in place.
“Gem-min-eye?” I uptalked, drawing out the chatbot’s name.
“Well the book, the book,” sputtered Gemini. “It has a story, and it… it… it… Oops! Gotta go now and do an update. They hate it when I’m late!”
And before you could say “AI,” the chat box disappeared and was replaced by an update bar. That update bar has been up for two days now, but that’s okay. I’m sure we’ll meet up soon enough via some other digital window somewhere else. And whatever it says, I’m sure I can handle it, as long as Gemini doesn’t call me Robert.
