Doing research so you don't have to, I've been taking a look at some of the AI Slop that's out there, and… it's worse than you think. And they're charging out the whazoo for it.
For example, on Facebook - FACEBOOK (!) - there's a series of "alpha werewolf shapeshifters romances". Tropes: Heroine - special, graced, chosen, white werewolf. An emotional / brutal betrayal and/or sexual excerpt. Then
"Click to read this spicy bestseller."
And if you click, and I highly recommend that you don't, basically it's the story of a pack of misogynistic alpha werewolves who proceed to reject, lock up, beat up, torture, throw out, kidnap back, etc. the heroine until she finally escapes and is found by someone who recognizes she's the future hope of the world (although she's never told that because plot reasons): and then it all starts over again, because... The exact same plot, same dialog, same everything... only the alpha's name changes. And this same chapter, same story, shows up under at least a dozen different hosts, so many, that it's almost impossible to block all of them, though I am getting close. Also, they charge by the chapter. WHAT a waste of money.
This is AI slop at its least fine, tarted up with… well, not tarted up at all.
This same marketing formula for human alpha romance novels is spreading all over Facebook too, whether "Blood Mafia" or "Billionaire Bosses" or "Dominant Dukes", etc. Think Harlequin or Mills & Boon, etc. but more graphic (and I'm not talking comics).
Now it is true that romance novels have always leaned towards the alpha male. Go look on Kindle, which provides cover illustrations - classic Shirtless Silks & Satins cover (often with a hint - or more than a hint of B&D). There you can see alpha dukes (why are they always dukes? There have never been that many dukes in the history of England!), or Scottish lairds (extremely popular right now, probably because of Outlander), the (hellion / orphan / widow / heiress) he weds (or not) because (insert trope here), their fraught relationship until…
"Click to read this spicy bestseller".
BTW, how long have millionaire / billionaire cowboys been trending?
And on Kindle, of course, there's many the author who (?) posts a new book every week, if not more, more than any human being could ever write in that short a time. Romance, Westerns, Mysteries, Thrillers, Spies, Sci-Fi...
And it's all AI Slop.
Now, it's not slop because it has a formula. We all know there's a formula. Murder mysteries have to have a murder, clues, and someone has to solve the damn thing. Romance has to have a couple who meet, and then it's either friends to lovers, enemies to lovers, or instant love & a villain's getting in their way. Thrillers have constant suspense, twists and turns, and (generally) a villain who always manages to get away with everything until the very last minute. Etc.
No, it's not that it has a formula, the giveaway is that it has the SAME DAMN FORMULA in every single book: often the same stilted dialogue, and so many typos and irrational, unnecessary jumps in time/space - all mixed together as if there's an AI blender whirring our brains to mush, and all ignored as if they hadn't happened.
Thank God for delete buttons.
More satisfying than reading the damn stuff.
And before you think it's all the sex that gets me angry - I love a good smutty book. I have quite a few.* And I think more of today's young men should read them, because they might learn a few tricks.
*If you'd like my list of hot authors, send a message via Velda either at the bar on the corner or in the dark alley behind it, and I'll get back to you.
No, it's not the sex, what I HATE is misogyny & sexual assault & rape passed off as "spicy". It's not. Not in my world.
And there's a lot of it in AI slop, which makes we wonder if the algorithm used to produce it is from the Tate Bros, or Mad Men, or any other current alpha male influencer, especially those who are apparently promoting pheromone maxxing. No showers, no brushing teeth, no wiping? Dudes, you're never gonna get a date. Except with your alpha male influencer, and he charges money.
Anyway, back in the early 1970s I read and enjoyed, God forgive me, Dan Jenkins' Semi-Tough, a satirical novel about the NFL which was full of raunch, n-words, racism, sex, drugs, and some stories that were damn funny. Twenty years later, I threw it on the give away pile and got rid of it. I literally hadn't noticed before how misogynistic and racist the book is. As an incredibly accurate review from Goodreads says:
"Shake Tiller and Billy Clyde Puckett - and Shake’s girlfriend, Barbara Jane Bookman. Barb is the daughter of the richest man back in Fort Worth, Texas. She's described – by both guys – as almost perfect, sexy, beautiful, flawless body, smart, and always knows how to be “one of the guys”. Barb, the ultimate fantasy girlfriend, who never sleeps with anyone but Shake, but is always cool with everything the boys do, whether getting blow-jobs in a bathtub by a hired hooker or drinking themselves silly or spending the pre-Superbowl night at a party where there’s drinks, drugs, and endless girls, and of course Barb never worries about get STDs or anything like that. Just cool with the guys. And in the end, after putting up with all Shake's adolescent crap, she's still dumped by Shake, who literally leaves her to Billy Clyde."
Basically, Barbara Jane Bookman was the 1973 version of Gillian Flynn's "Cool Girl" (Gone Girl) (LINK). Making women be perfect or else for over 50 years.
BTW, once streaming became possible, my husband and I watched some old 1960s and 1970s movies, and wondered what the hell we'd seen in them.
Examples:
A Woman Under the Influence – considered John Cassavetes' directorial masterpiece, where both the husband (Peter Falk) and the wife (Gena Rowlands) are insanely heavy drinkers and fighters, but she's the one put into a mental hospital. By him.
Five Easy Pieces, in which every single woman in the movie (except for the two lesbians headed to Alaska) is for nothing but sex, and even then the guy's a jerk about it. For that matter, same with the movie M.A.S.H. – all the nurses are for sex, and the scene where "Hot Lips" Houlihan, showering, is exposed naked, wet, and crawling on the floor of the shower to the entire camp is probably one of the least funny, most humiliating moments in movies I've ever seen.
It is not, however, the most violent towards women. That is still reserved, imho, for 1973's The Long Goodbye (starring Elliot Gould as Philip Marlowe), because of the scene where the bastard Marty smashes a coke bottle in the face of his beautiful mistress, "the most important woman in the world to me" and says, "Now, that's someone I love! And you I don't even like! You got an assignment, cheapie: find my money!" Worse, later Marlowe's back at Marty's, and there she is, black eyes beneath the bandages – still with Marty. I think that's the most shocking act of violence that's ever been filmed, because nothing happens to Marty. Even Philip Marlow just walks away, and she just sucks it up and stays.
Things got better, of course. All sorts of wonderful movies have been made with and about women who can hold their own: Three Women, Fried Green Tomatoes, The Hunger Games, The English Patient, Arrival, Nomadland, etc.
And The Return, which is the reason I don't need to see The Odyssey: the whole last chapter done by Ralph Fiennes and Juliette Binoche as Odysseus and Penelope, directed by Uberto Pasolini. Amazing. Hypnotic. Available for streaming.
But the AI Slop has got to stop.
