The novel has survived the industrial revolution, radio, television, and the internet. Now it’s facing artificial intelligence – and novelists are worried.

Half (51%) fear that they will be replaced by AI entirely, according to a new survey, even though for the most part they don’t use the technology themselves.

More immediately, 85% say they think their future income will be negatively impacted by AI, and 39% claim their finances have already taken a hit.

Tracy Chevalier, the bestselling author of Girl With A Pearl Earring and The Glassmaker, shares that concern.

“I worry that a book industry driven mainly by profit will be tempted to use AI more and more to generate books,” she said in response to the survey.

“If it is cheaper to produce novels using AI (no advance or royalties to pay to authors, quicker production, retainment of copyright), publishers will almost inevitably choose to publish them.

“And if they are priced cheaper than ‘human made’ books, readers are likely to buy them, the way we buy machine-made jumpers rather than the more expensive hand-knitted ones.”

Why authors are so worried

The University of Cambridge’s Minderoo Centre for Technology and Democracy asked 258 published novelists and 74 industry insiders how AI is viewed and used in the world of British fiction.

Alongside existential fears about the wholesale replacement of the novel, many authors reported a loss of income from AI, which they attributed to “competition from AI-generated books and the loss of jobs which provide supplementary streams of income, such as copywriting”.

Some respondents reported finding “rip-off AI-generated imitations” of their own books, as well books “written under their name which they haven’t produced”.

Last year, the Authors Guild warned that “the growing access to AI is driving a new surge of low-quality sham ‘books’ on Amazon”, which has limited the number of publications per day on its Kindle self-publishing platform to combat the influx of AI-generated books.

The median income for a novelist is currently £7,000 and many make ends meet by doing related work, such as audiobook narration, copywriting or ghost-writing.

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These tasks, authors feared, were already being supplanted by AI, although little evidence was provided for this claim, which was not possible to verify independently.

Copyright was also a big concern, with 59% of novelists reporting that they knew their work had been used to train AI models.

Of these, 99% said they did not give permission and 100% said they were not remunerated for this use.

Earlier this year, AI firm Anthropic agreed to pay authors $1.5bn (£1.2bn) to settle a lawsuit which claimed the company stole their work.

The judge in the US court case ruled that Anthropic had downloaded more than seven million digital copies of books it “knew had been pirated” and ordered the firm to pay authors compensation.

However, the judge sided with Anthropic over the question of copyright, saying that the AI model was doing something akin to when a human reads a book to inspire new work, rather than simply copying.

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Most novelists – 67% – never used it for creative work, although a few said they found it very useful for speeding up drafting or editing.

One case study featured in the report is Lizbeth Crawford, a novelist in multiple genres, including fantasy and romance. She describes working with AI as a writing partner, using it to spot plot holes and trim adjectives.

“Lizbeth used to write about one novel per year, but now she can do three per year, and her target is five,” notes the author of the report, Dr Clementine Collett.

Is there a role for government?

Despite this, the report’s foreword urges the government to slow down the spread of AI by strengthening copyright law to protect authors and other creatives.

The government has proposed making an exception to UK copyright law for “text and data mining”, which might make authors and other copyright holders opt out to stop their work being used to train AI models.

“That approach prioritises access to data for the world’s technology companies at the cost to the UK’s own creative industries,” writes Professor Gina Neff, executive director of the Minderoo Centre for Technology and Democracy.

“It is both bad economics and a betrayal of the very cultural assets of British soft power.”

A government spokesperson said: “Throughout this process we have, and always will, put the interests of the UK’s citizens and businesses first.

“We’ve always been clear on the need to work with both the creative industries and AI sector to drive AI innovation and ensure robust protections for creators.

“We are bringing together both British and global companies, alongside voices beyond the AI and creative sectors, to ensure we can capture the broadest possible range of expert views as we consider next steps.”

There are developments in the quest for peace in Ukraine. 

It’s been one of those days when different snippets of news have come together to create a picture of sorts. The jigsaw remains complicated, but the suggestion is neither the Ukrainians nor the Europeans have been privy to the developments.

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The most intriguing development came at lunchtime on Thursday.

“He must have got this from K…” wrote Donald Trump‘s special envoy Steve Witkoff on X. He clearly thought he was sending a private message.

He was replying to a scoop of a story by Axios’s Barak Ravid.

The story revealed a “secret” plan to end the Ukraine war. The report suggested the Americans had been talking secretly to the Russians about a renewed effort to bring the war to an end, which involved Ukraine ceding land it still controls to Russia.

Who is “K” in Witkoff’s message? It’s probably Kirill Dmitriev, who has become Putin’s unofficial and unlikely envoy to Washington. Kyiv-born and Stanford-educated Dmitriev is, essentially, Witkoff’s Russian opposite number.

In a sense, they are the yin and yang of this geopolitical puzzle. Witkoff is a real estate mogul. Dmitriev is an economist. They are opposing forces with backgrounds that are, on the face of it, equally unsuited to geopolitical conflict resolution. Yet their two leaders are trusting them with this huge task.

‘Territorial concessions’ in 28-point plan

So, back to the developments to have emerged over the last 24 hours.

First, we know senior US Department of War officials, including Army Secretary Dan Driscoll, have arrived in the Ukrainian capital to meet their counterparts there.

Their visit was scheduled but the focus shifted. The plan to discuss drone technology and the winter offensive morphed into a discussion about a Russian-presented peace plan Witkoff and Dmitriev had been discussing.

This is the second development. The Axios report – which Witkoff seems inadvertently to have suggested came from Dmitriev – claims the two envoys met recently in Florida (Witkoff’s base) to discuss a 28-point plan for peace.

A defence official told our partners at NBC News that Driscoll has been briefed on the 28-point plan. Driscoll and his military staff are thought to have been presenting an initial brief to the Ukrainian side of this Russian-sponsored plan.

Ukrainian sources have suggested to me in clear terms they are not happy with this Witkoff-Dmitriev plan. Sources tell me it includes “territorial concessions” and “reductions in military strength”. The Ukrainian position is the plan represents the latest attempt to “play the American government”.

What’s happening with security guarantees?

Ukraine wants security guarantees from the US. Trump signalled during Zelenskyy’s last visit to Washington that he was willing to provide those. This was framed by the Europeans as a huge positive development, even though the White House did not spell out the crucial detail – what would these guarantees actually entail?

The latest reporting, from Axios, suggests the security guarantees (still undefined, publicly at least) are dependent on Ukraine giving up the whole of the Donbas region – this would include about 15% of territory Russia does not currently hold.

Crucially, the areas of the Donbas from which Ukraine would withdraw (the 15%) would be considered a demilitarised zone. The plan is very similar to one floated by Vice President JD Vance in the months before Trump won last year’s election, which was roundly rejected as a non-starter at the time.

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Is Gaza plan the model?

Another source, from a third country close to the negotiations, has told me the Qataris are playing a role in the talks and were present at the weekend when Steve Witkoff met Ukraine’s national security advisor Rustem Umerov last weekend.

Qatari and Turkish mediation, along with the multipoint peace plan for Gaza, is being projected as a model transferable to Ukraine despite the conflict, challenges, and root causes being wholly different.

Other European sources told me this morning they were not aware of this Russian-American plan. It’s worth remembering it’s in the interests of the Russians to be seen to be engaged in peace proposals in order to avoid secondary sanctions from the US.

Zelenskyy has been in Turkey over the past 24 hours, where he singled out Trump’s efforts to find peace.

“Since the beginning of this year, we in Ukraine have supported every decisive step and the leadership of @POTUS, every strong and fair proposal aimed at ending this war.” Zelenskyy wrote. “And only President Trump and the United States have sufficient power to make this war come to an end.”

This is the vital language of flattery.

They’ve said they are offering him an opportunity to tell them everything, once and for all.

But as we hit the two-week deadline set by the US Congress committee investigating Jeffrey Epstein for a reply from Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor, will he agree to their request to open up about the paedophile financier?

The letter sent by the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform said members wanted to talk to him because of the widely reported allegations that have been made against him, which he denies, and because of his relationship with Epstein and what he may have seen.

The committee is looking into Epstein’s crimes and his wider sex trafficking network. Andrew was given until today, 20 November, to respond.

Legally he isn’t obliged to talk to them, and to be honest it’s hard to imagine why he would.

The only time he has spoken at length about the allegations against him and his relationship with Epstein was that Newsnight interview in 2019, and we all know how much of a disaster that was.

Yes, this could be an opportunity for him to publicly apologise for keeping up his links with Epstein, which he has never done before, or show some sympathy towards Epstein’s victims, even as he vehemently denies the allegations against him.

But while there is the moral argument that he should tell the committee everything he knows, it could also raise more uncomfortable questions for him, and that could feel like too much of a risk for Andrew and the wider Royal Family.

However, even saying no won’t draw all this to a close. There are other outstanding loose ends.

The Metropolitan Police still have to tell us if they intend to take any further action after they said they were looking into claims Andrew had asked one of his officers to dig up dirt on his accuser, Virginia Giuffre.

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There could also still be a debate in parliament about the Andrew problem.

The Liberal Democrats have said they want to use their opposition debating time to bring the issue to the floor of the House of Commons, while other MPs on the Public Accounts Committee have signalled their intention to look into Andrew’s finances and housing arrangements.

And then there are the wider Epstein files over in America, and what information they may hold.

From developments this week, it seems we are edging ever closer to seeing those released.

All of this may mean Andrew in other ways is forced to say more than he wants to, even without opening up to the Congress committee.