Bryan VanDyke is the author of the new novel In Our Likeness. He also has written Only the Trying. He is a digital strategist and a contributor at The Millions, and he lives in New York City.
Q: What inspired you to write In Our Likeness, and how did you create your character Graham?
A: It started with this idea that I might reimagine The Picture of Dorian Gray for the internet age–in my story, the real world would change based on edits to social media profiles.
I was working as a digital strategist at the time, and I was thinking a lot about how what you see online affects real world behavior. But I didn’t know how to make this idea work as fiction till I read Ubik, by Philip K. Dick.
There’s this passage in Ubik where one character, Pat Conley, alters the past right out from under the protagonist, Joe Chip. The narrative voice doesn’t change its laissez-faire tone, the facts just sort of shift.
It was so strange and unreal–and it gave me the idea for Graham Gooding, this character who gains the ability to change reality, but who can’t get around his own shortcomings.
I did not plan Graham’s character so much as he revealed himself over the editing process. He’s the narrator, so everything filters through him, which made it tricky as I had to leave important things unsaid.
As the reader, I want you to gradually get the sense that Graham is not entirely reliable. He’s one of those deeply analytical people who can’t get out of their own head. His emotions are shot, after a lifetime of being unable to really express what he wants. He’s sweet on the surface, but underneath he’s a mess. And he has no idea.
Q: What do you think the novel says about the role of AI in our lives--and what could be coming next?
A: I have been captivated by technology and computers for my entire life. In the ‘80s, my brother and I played games that we coded ourselves, using BASIC programs printed in magazines. In the ‘90s, I ran a dial-up BBS out of my parents’ basement. During the dot-com era I built some of the first websites for big organizations. All this is to say—I came to this novel from a place of lived experience.
Will AI change the world? In some ways it already has. But in a lot of other ways, no. The human heart is older than the oldest tools, and the software that runs our brains is downright ancient. Our base selves don’t change all that much. Except everything is changing all the time in our society. It’s complicated.
Over the next few years I think it’s likely we will start to see more ways that technology will blur the edges of identity and consciousness.
Right now I’m fascinated by griefbots, digital chimeras that emulate a dead person for the benefit of the bereft. On the one hand, I get it. My mom passed away a year ago. We used to text a lot—more than we spoke on the phone and or saw each other in person. Of course I’d love to still get texts that sound just like her—but it would also be awful, because I’d know the real her is no longer behind them.
Q: How would you describe the dynamic between Graham and Nessie?
A: How’s it go? There’s his story, her story, and the truth?
At the beginning of the book, they’re work friends; they have that particular bond of people who come together to solve problems, but don’t know a lot about each other. They trust each other, though, and that’s sort of everything.
From Graham’s point of view, he thinks the crush he has on Nessie is top secret, something he will never admit. From Nessie’s point of view—well, let’s just say he’s not keeping his feelings as hidden as he thinks.
Over the course of the storyline, they get closer, and there is a question (spoiler alert!) toward the end about whether their boss, Warwick, has used the algo to make her fall in love with him, or if it happened naturally.
But Graham does creepy things, like lying to Nessie, and editing her appearance, which should discomfit the reader; and he’s absolutely not able to see how he objectifies her, how he fails to really get to know her beyond his fantasy. All that comes due for a final reckoning in the last section, when the world is revealed for what it is—not what Graham wants it to be.
Q: What do you hope readers take away from the story?
A: I hope that readers of the book put it down at various times in the reading experience and say—wow, I didn’t expect that. I know not everyone can like a book. But I want people to emerge saying this book subverted their expectations.
I also wanted to write a novel that had multiple levels, with each level enjoyable independently.
First, on its most simple level it’s a save-the-world yarn with fantastical elements. It’s meant to feel like a fun, galloping story, like a Steven Spielberg flick from when I was a kid.
But if you like literary fiction, if you lean in closer, there is a second level, a character drama. This is a book about a guy who can’t accept that his mom is dying. And who’s too timid to go for what he wants, in work or love. He’s surrounded by characters who realize their dreams, and he feels left out.
Finally, on a third level, it’s a big puzzle. Because of the algo, there are multiple realities. There is a riddle of narrative layering, waiting to be clocked. Which parts are real? Which are edits? Who knows what, when? It took me a long time to sort it all out. I hope it provides the same joy for others in reading and re-reading.
Q: What are you working on now?
A: Right now I’m working on two novels, more or less at the same time.
The first novel is very much in the vein of Likeness, but this story is about griefbots and online scammers—and the nature of belief. I wouldn’t call it a sequel, but it absolutely belongs to the same creative family.
The second novel is a supernatural coming of age story—it’s set in the ‘90s, and it’s about a kid whose mom is the county prosecutor, and she’s got to decide whether to press charges against a woman who claims to have committed a crime with her mind.
Q: Anything else we should know?
A: I am not a dystopian by nature. Far from it — I have benefited greatly from technology both on a personal and professional level. But the Mary Shelley echoes in the middle section of the book are not an accident.
We’re living in a moment of disruption without equal, and it makes life strange, ridiculous sometimes. I’m trying to capture that feeling, I want to bottle it, to hold it up to the light. So that we can have a better sense of what’s happening, what’s coming next.
Readers who come to the book looking for hard science or a simple, open-and-shut judgment on our times will find something far more ambiguous. We’re still driving in the fog of this moment. All I know for sure is that the road ahead will surprise us, somehow.
--Interview with Deborah Kalb
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