Oprah’s Book Club Pick * New Yorker Best Books of 2025 * 2026 Aspen Words Literary Prize
Longlist * Kirkus Best Books of 2025 * Real Simple Best Books of 2025 * Washington Post
Noteable Fiction 2025 * NPR's 2025 "Books We Love" * Minnesota Star Tribune 20 Best of 2025 *
“I was riveted until the very last shocking sentence!”—Oprah Winfrey “The most of-the-moment
novel I’ve read all year and it’s the book of the summer.”— Real Simple “If you want an
engaging novel sure to spark great discussion about that thorny [AI] future this is it.” — Ron
Charles The Washington Post "A gripping impossibly timely thriller." —one of NPR's "Books We
Love" A suspenseful family drama about moral responsibility in the age of artificial
intelligence. When the Cassidy-Shaws’ autonomous minivan collides with an oncoming car
seventeen-year-old Charlie is in the driver’s seat with his father Noah riding shotgun. In
the back seat tweens Alice and Izzy are on their phones while their mother Lorelei a world
leader in the field of artificial intelligence is absorbed in her work. Yet each family member
harbors a secret implicating them all in the tragic accident. During a weeklong recuperation
on the Chesapeake Bay the family confronts the excruciating moral dilemmas triggered by the
crash. Noah tries to hold the family together as a seemingly routine police investigation
jeopardizes Charlie’s future. Alice and Izzy turn strangely furtive. And Lorelei’s odd behavior
tugs at Noah’s suspicions that there is a darker truth behind the incident—suspicions
heightened by the sudden intrusion of Daniel Monet a tech mogul whose mysterious history with
Lorelei hints at betrayal. When Charlie falls for Monet’s teenaged daughter the stakes are
raised even higher in this propulsive family drama that is also a fascinating exploration of
the moral responsibility and ethical consequences of AI. Culpability explores a world newly
shaped by chatbots autonomous cars drones and other nonhuman forces in ways that are
thrilling challenging and unimaginably provocative.
