When a friend recently sent me this New York Times profile of influencer Braden Peters, known as Clavicular, in a text that said, “This reminds me of your novel in its futuristic weirdness,” I was on a mountain, retreating from technology and screens.
Once my wi-fi was enabled again, I began a bizarre trip down a “looksmaxxing” rabbit hole. So much for my tech cleanse.
When I started writing “The Distractions,” the novel my friend was referencing, in 2012, much of what we’re seeing now didn’t exist or hadn’t yet proliferated.
By the time it was published in 2025, the same year Clavicular’s online popularity soared, much of the futuristic landscape I’d “imagined” for the book — most of which I feared was too farfetched for readers to suspend their disbelief — was bleeding into reality.
On my book tour, I saw a robot crossing the street in LA, which my companion dismissed as “just DoorDash.” Waymo vehicles increasingly navigate San Francisco’s streets. I saw “servergrippers” — a term I coined in my novel for automated baristas — serving espresso at SFO.
