Culpability is a readable and thought-provoking family drama exploring parenthood, marriage, secrets, and the ethics of AI. 

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Despite having a very full Kindle, I picked up a hardback of Oprah’s latest book club pick Culpability when I was out and about with a couple of hours to kill. The book, written by Bruce Holsinger, opens with the Cassidy-Shaw family in a minivan set to self-driving mode. Charlie, a seventeen year old lacrosse star about to start his collegiate career at UNC, is at the wheel with his competent but unremarkable lawyer father next to him working on his laptop. In the back are his genius AI thought leader mother (also working on her laptop) and his tween sisters on their phones. One sister screams Charlie’s name, he startles and yanks the wheel, and they crash head-on into another car, killing its two elderly passengers while the family survives intact with a few injuries. 

From there, the book explores who’s to blame. Is it the obvious choice, Charlie, who was behind the wheel? The father Noah, who should have been paying attention as the responsible adult in the front seat of the car? The autonomous vehicle itself? As the book reveals its secrets, we slowly learn why everyone in the family feels at least partially at fault for the accident.

Charlie’s mother Lorelei books them a week at a lake house on the Chesapeake Bay to recuperate. Next door is Daniel Monet, an Elon Musk-type tech mogul whose daughter Eurydice falls for Charlie. The two make a youthful stupid decision with devastating consequences; more fingers are pointed. 

I looked up Eurydice’s myth: she’s a nymph, not a goddess, who gets bitten by a snake shortly after her wedding to Orpheus, a musician. He uses his enchanting music to gain access to the underworld and convince Hades to let her out of the underworld if he promises not to look until they are out. But he takes a fatal peek just at the end of their arduous journey, sending her back to the underworld forever. Their story represents true love, the power of music, and near death experiences. 

The book deftly balances the responsibility of parenthood with the responsibility of ethical AI development. As a father, Noah is obsessed with giving Charlie a gilded path into his future that Noah never had; as an AI researcher, Lorelei is more concerned with the morality of her AI thought leadership than Charlie’s future. 

“No matter what parents do, their children’s outcomes are neither predictable nor inevitable. Life is not an algorithm, and never will be.”

I put down my Kindle and read Culpability over a weekend. It’s a very readable and thought-provoking family drama exploring parenthood, marriage, secrets, and the ethics of AI.