When readers flipped through the “Heat Index: Your Guide to the Best of Summer” section in the Chicago Sun-Times and The Philadelphia Inquirer last week, they expected curated picks—but instead discovered more than half the titles were pure AI fiction.
King Features, the content distributor behind the supplement, has since fired freelancer Marco Buscaglia. He admitted on Facebook that he leaned on artificial intelligence for research without fact-checking, calling it “a really stupid error on my part.” The tech publication 404 Media first reported the blunder.
Ghost Titles by Real Authors
Among the phantom picks were The Last Algorithm by Andy Weir—a science-driven thriller about a self-aware AI secretly shaping global events—and Nightshade Market by Min Jin Lee, billed as a riveting tale of Seoul’s underground economy. Both authors are real, but the books aren’t: Lee took to X to clarify she has no plans to write Nightshade Market.
AI’s Growing Pains in Newsrooms
This isn’t the first time AI shortcuts have tripped up media outlets. In 2023, Sports Illustrated mistakenly listed non-existent authors for product reviews, and Gannett paused its AI-driven sports stories after similar errors emerged. King Features emphasized its strict policy against undisclosed AI use, noting only the Sun-Times and Inquirer ran the faulty supplement.
As news organizations race to explore AI’s potential, this episode highlights a critical lesson: no algorithm can replace diligent human oversight.
Reference(s):
A newspaper's summer book list recommends nonexistent books. Blame AI
cgtn.com
