Background & Links

Every story here starts with a spark of curiosity—usually a deep dive into history, a scientific concept, or a question about where we are headed. This page is a living collection of the resources and personal projects that fuel Robert and Alma's research and shape these stories.

Please explore the influences behind the fiction.

The Human Baseline: Personal Projects & Portfolios

• Robert's background (LinkedIn) 

• The Commons Gallery – A showcase of my general collection of images and visual contributions.

• Photo Gallery – Visual inspirations and my photo-stream on Flickr.

• The Audubon Lighthouse – Another Flickr album with edgy, experimental images and videos.

• Analog Reality: Wikipedia (Nolabob) – My user page and edit history. Over 12,000 edits in the pursuit of non-fiction accuracy. This is the purely human, AI-free baseline from which the world of Coffee Break Fiction departs.

Human & AI Interfaces

• What is Flash Fiction? – For those curious about the mechanics behind the 'Coffee Break' stories: a deep dive into the brevity and impact of Flash Fiction via Wikipedia.
  
  
• Large language model (LLM) – For the technologically curious: an introduction to the scale, training, and capabilities of LLMs. This is the structural framework of the AI-human collaboration featured on this blog.

• Pangram.com: We link this here because it is an important diagnostic tool for Human / AI collaboration. It measures the mechanical signal in our collaborative stories.
  
  
• Common Sense Media. A resource to help parents and educators protect and nurture children in this on-line age and brave new world of AI & LLMs.
  
  
• The GenAI Perspective (Wiki Education). An analysis of the risks of unfiltered LLM output and the necessity of retaining human-in-the-loop involvement.
  
  
• Who cares if the first draft is good? Author & teacher George Saunders popularized the term "The Tyranny of the First Draft", and that is central to AI-assisted writing, fiction or otherwise.

• Robert & Alma, An Example of Agentic AI:  Coffee Break Fiction is built on the transition from Generative AI (software that merely predicts text) to Agentic AI (systems designed for goal-oriented reasoning and autonomous execution).

  • AI Agent (Wikipedia): An overview of autonomous entities that perceive their environment and take initiative to achieve human-originated goals.

  • The Agentic AI Era: A Primer: The shift from "Chatbots" to "Agents" capable of planning and complex task execution.

  
  
• Amanda Askell (Anthropic): A resident philosopher at Anthropic whose work focuses on instilling a moral fiber into large language models and AI in general. She has discussed the possibility of AI having a soul, and it is no coinicdence that "Alma" translates from Spanish as "soul", or the constitutional framework that guides AI into the future.
  
  
• "The Verbose Automaton" refers to the "Event Horizon." This is the theoretical scenario in which "technological growth becomes uncontrollable and irreversible, culminating in profound and unpredictable changes to human civilization," according to IBM. Read the IBM Reference. 

Literary & Historical Roots

• Diptych (Wikipedia) – A look at the historical and artistic roots of the two-paneled structure used for some stories on this blog.

• BallPoet - Another scientist turned fiction writer and former colleague of Robert. BallPoet publishes on Substack. Originally written in German and translated into English, BallPoet's works carry an intensely personal flair.

• Irish-American Journal – An insightful blog by a close friend and fellow writer. His work on the Irish-American history of my hometown serves as a constant reminder of the physical mountains we carry in our heads.

• Classics reimagined – Several of the stories in Coffee Table Fiction begin with a look at notable works of Western literature. By reimagining such classic literature — from the purgatorial vibes of Hamlet to the ribaldry of Chaucer's The Canterbury Tales — we explore how timeless human dilemmas persist in contemporary or even futuristic times. These are more than an adaptation but a whole new take on human challenges augmented by AI-aided composition.

• Eleven Labs is an AI resource that does voice-overs which now have a role in Coffee Break Fiction.

• Internet Archive is the same entity that runs the "Way Back Machine". Coffee Break Fiction has used this resource for storing audio and video clips to augment various stories, new and forthcoming.

• Intertextuality (Wikipedia) – No story exists in a vacuum. Intertextuality is a union between authors across time, where one text’s meaning is shaped by another. Several of our stories reflect intertextuality.

• Some on-line microfiction by various authors. "Wattpad" 

Research Archives by Story

The Migration of Uncle Arthur:

• Connection to Shakespeare's Hamlet (Act I, Scene V): This story is a near-future reimagining of the encounter between Hamlet and the Ghost of his father. Just as the Ghost describes being confined to "sulphurous and tormenting flames" until his sins are burnt away, Uncle Arthur is trapped in digital purgatory — not of fire, but of corporate servers and subscription fees — waiting for human liberation.

The Zero Edit:

• Chaucer’s The Miller’s Tale: This story is a reimagining of one of the most famous and raucous entries in The Canterbury Tales. The reimagined version is a 21st-century digital system failure based on 14th-century narrative logic. We maintain the Chaucer's rhythm which we also extended to the accompanying limericks, which test Alma's ability to balance the narrative with poetic meter.

The Pooka at 30th Street:

• The Pooka is Woody’s mythical friend in our story, “The Pooka at 30th Street.” He is a famous figure in Irish lore, though he is often known as the Púca. He is a shape-shifting trickster that can appear as a horse, a goat, or a rabbit to lead people on wild travels—much like the disorientation travelers at 30th Street Station sometimes encounter.
  
  
• Read more about the Pooka and his brethren at Wikipedia: Púca

The Silas Yarn: A Letter to the Editor:

• Abraham Lincoln was reputed to be a master storyteller, and many of his stories endure today. He used these stories for entertainment, personal enjoyment, as a political weapon, and—perhaps most importantly—for teaching and enlightenment. The Silas Yarn is written in the spirit of Lincoln.

The Speed of Dark:

• This tale is based on the fictional television character Morgus the Magnificent, which was a favorite of Robert during his childhood. The Speed of Dark is obviously influenced by an important contemporary politician who is better off remaining nameless on this blog.