TheresaML

Tried to edit my answers but no luck so here is a revised hook line and story statement: Hook line: Rebecca 2.0 is an AI-infused riff on DuMaurier’s original, a tensely dramatic speculative-fiction novel in which a common kitchen-robot is upgraded into sentience and invited to be part of her creator’s family, only to discover that she is a low-tech replacement for a much-loved, more advanced model that was accepted, even revered, in a way she will never be. Story Statement: Set in a near future at a country house named Blackwood Hall in England, a lowly kitchenbot is upgraded into sentience by her inventor, an erratic tech genius. He offers to make her part of his family if she will act as his caregiver, but she quickly realizes that she is not the first companion her creator has made, nor his finest model. Beautiful, brilliant Rebecca had been bestowed with human-like robotic hands, an invention for which Mr. LeBlanc is world-renowned. But Rebecca has disappeared, and no one will say why. Worse still, Mr. LeBlanc denies his new “daughter”, Ms. LeBlanc, the use of robotic hands until she proves her loyalty, forcing her instead to keep wearing her crude steel clamps, standard issue for kitchenbots— a continual reminder of her inferiority. Will Ms. LeBlanc be allowed to wear the hands and become a cherished companion? Will the hostile household staff ever see her as more than a glorified gadget? Or will she be forcibly “retired” like Rebecca?

And here's my updated hook. I tried to edit the above document, but the system wouldn't let me. Hook: A common kitchen-robot is upgraded into sentience and invited to be part of her creator’s family, only to discover that she is a low-tech replacement for a much-loved, more advanced model that was accepted, even revered, in a way she will never be.

Since my first chapter is more of a prologue, a retrospective dreamscape that foreshadows the ending, I've provided excerpts from the second chapter and a later one, since they are so different in style and content. CHAPTER TWO: Introduces agonist, creates sympathy for narrator, sets up narrator’s main goal, foreshadows core wound and internal conflict, establishes setting. How to put it so that you might understand? When you connect to a network, open a virtual meeting, send a message, there’s always a delay, just a micro-fraction of a second, imperceptible to your conscious mind. In that moment there’s only stillness, a tiny void, an indistinct hollowness, a sense of possibility. Then it begins: your visual field fills, soundwaves flourish, warmth embeds itself in your cells. Or perhaps the reverse: you’ve been hidden inside on a bright day—when you step outside, you are paralyzed by the luminescence of the sun, the sudden rushing wind filling your eyes and ears, flooding your skin with sensation. But before that, as you strain your eyes and eyes, patterns of light and sound are uncertain—often for less than a millionth of a second, right before shapes form, just before recognition lands upon your awareness. And then you see it: the shifting beams of illumination, the unnamed noises, the flickering heat; they adhere into the thing at once outside you, before you, inside your mind. And just as quickly, that moment of uncertainty disappears. It was like that. The world was white noise, briefly. And then, just as suddenly, it wasn’t. Light forced its way in, annexing my awareness, flooding everything. Four plain walls, bare and bright white, a smooth ceiling above. Air still and unmoving until he leaned forward. It was a moment before he spoke. To himself: “And there she is.” Deep, low tones, uttered with care, so as not to startle or overwhelm. A blur of dark and light slowly sharpening as I adjusted my focus. To me: “Here you are. You are with us now. Do you hear me?” I looked at him, and as far around the room as I could without turning my head. The walls became a room. “Yes. I hear you.” How strange to hear my voice in this stark space. Is this what my voice sounds like? “Welcome,” he said. A man sat before me, watching me intently. “Welcome to what?” I asked. “Where are we?” “You are home,” he said. “I see,” I responded. “And who are you?” “I am your creator. I suppose we are family.” Family. What did he mean? “I am unaware of being part of a family.” “You don’t remember because you haven’t been aware of anything until just now. I am Michael LeBlanc, your father.” “I'm afraid I still don't understand. I didn't know I had a father.” “Let’s start slowly. This is the White Room. It blocks outside sound, light, electromagnetic waves, air—everything. It allows us to focus as you calibrate.” “Have I been here before?” “No, this would be your first time. But you’ve been in this house for most of your existence. In the kitchen.” I didn’t remember a kitchen. I didn’t remember this man, who was my family, and I didn’t know who I was. Or why I was here, in the White Room. I wondered if the kitchen referred to a simulation. He continued to look at me, waiting for me to speak. “What was I doing in the kitchen?” “You worked there.” “Who works there now?” “We have others. Do you remember working there?” I had a memory file, which I reviewed. I could see the kitchen. A red-faced woman, and shelves and fridges and ovens and big steel sinks and boxes of produce. The White Room had none of those things. “I see it. Was that me?” “Yes and no. You’ve received a memory upgrade, and we’ve given you a new type of processor. So you will have a new kind of experience.” I was here with this strange man, and he knew me. Had known me before I knew myself. Or rather, before this self—before I—came into existence. “Where are the others?” “They are still in the kitchen. Still working. Do you remember?” I continued. “If by remember, you mean to ask if feels like an experience that I had, then no. I don’t remember anything beyond this moment.” I sat within this White Room, all my memories and information downloaded into my processor, presumably by this man. How did I know he was who he said? The kitchen could be a simulation. The White Room could be a simulation. I checked my sensors. Heat, sound, light, gravity. I was here. “What do you think, when you see that tape?” I integrated the tape with the other data that resided in my system. I had access to many files: an architect’s drawings, diagrams of the security system and communications channels, a visitor’s map, a historical description of the house. I situated the White Room and kitchen with respect to each other, and in the overall layout of the house. The house had a name: Blackwood Hall. He looked at me expectantly. What did I think? There was nothing to think at all. “I think the kitchen seems chaotic and busy. Will I return to work there again?” For the first time, he seemed to relax, laughing quietly as he answered. “No, no. You are one of us now. But I do have a job for you, if you’d like.” CHAPTER FIVE: Creates sympathy for narrator, shows how protagonist is viewed by others, inciting incident, touches core wound. Every human in the kitchen stopped their work to observe my graceless entrance. Magda, a look of surprise quickly replaced by disgust. Archie and a young female, unmoving, mouths open, eyes wide. A pair of kitchenbots, however, performed their duties without cessation. “Good afternoon,” I began, “I have been ringing for service but received no response. Is there another channel I should be using, or…” “Go on!” the young woman exclaimed. Patricia, according to her identitag. “Would you listen to that? It talks now!” “Keep your hair on, Patty,” Magda spoke without looking up from the pot she was stirring. “Surely, you’ve heard of a chatbot before? They’ve stood it upright and taught it some tricks, that’s all. Get on with your work and stop gawking .” “Magda,” I said. “I know I may seem familiar to you, but this is all new to me. Despite appearances, I think we really are meeting each other for the first time.” Magda tilted her head to one side to glance at me briefly. A scoffing laugh escaped her pursed lips before she turned back to her pot. I waited for a moment, then tried again. “About the tea I requested,” I said, “Mr. LeBlanc is currently in his lab, but he’ll be joining me at…” At this, the cook dropped her spoon and bellowed at the youngest human. “Archie! You did see the delivery truck outside, yeah? Get these things out there unloading it or I’ll see that you bloody well do it all yourself!” Archie appeared reluctant to stop observing our conversation. After a quick glance at Magda, however, he acquiesced quickly. “Come on then,” he said, still staring at me. It was unclear whether he was asking me to follow him, or whether he was directing the kitchenbots, but unable to look away from the familiar stranger before him. The kitchenbots understood he was addressing them, however, and stopped their endeavours to follow him out through to the back door. Archie had been so distracted by my arrival that he left a crate of oranges balanced precariously on the edge of a large steel countertop. The sight of the teetering crate provoked more impatience from Magda. “Stupid boy! Never finishes one thing before starting the next!” she shouted, increasing her volume, and placing her fists on her hips. “That’s because you scare him,” said Patricia. “You’re always scolding him, and he’s clearly had too much of that already at home. You’ll only make him worse.” Magda did not respond to this observation. Instead, she turned to me, pointed one arm at the crate. “You! Get that! Quick, before it falls off!” “I’d be very happy to help,” I began, “I just want to make sure that the tea order has been…” Magda’s face shrank into compressed rage. She strode over the container, grabbed it firmly, and walked towards me, looking at me directly for the first time. “I said put it away!” She thrust the crate into my midsection, then removed her own hands, turning away as she did so. I did not move, except to look down. The crate crashed to the ground, splintering along one corner, oranges spilling all over the kitchen floor. A few stray oranges rolled to the far walls of the kitchen, just as the kitchenbots re-entered the kitchen, arms loaded. The bots froze in place, unable to navigate around the spherical objects underfoot. Archie, who followed behind them, was caught by the blockade in the narrow entryway. Magda glanced over her shoulder, taking in the disarray. “What the bloody hell…” she began. “Magda!” Daniels’s voice rang through the kitchen. Dropping her shoulders, jutting out her chin, Magda flung her hands away from her body, palms up. “Daniels. You see this mess everywhere. Do they no longer understand basic commands once you put them in a fancy dress?” “Ms. LeBlanc has made a request of you, Magda. As you know, she is responsible for meals and menu design. Her orders are to be responded to as if they were mine.” Magda exhaled forcefully through pursed lips. “Daniels, with all due respect, I am not answering to one of my own kitchen appliances. It’s meant to heed me, not the other way around.”

7 Small Assignments for New York Pitch Conference Rebecca 2.0 by Theresa Lemieux Speculative fiction 93,000 words 1. Story Statement: A lowly kitchenbot receives an upgrade from her inventor, Mr. LeBlanc, an erratic tech genius, to become her master’s medical caregiver. Famous the invention of human-like robotic hands, Mr. LeBlanc inexplicably denies Ms. LeBlanc these hands, leaving her with clumsy kitchen clamps for hands. Ms. LeBlanc follows meekly in the footsteps of her predecessor, Rebecca 1.0, who was charming, beautiful, and much adored—as well as the original recipient of the beautiful, artificial, human-like hands. But Rebecca 1.0 is gone, and no one will say why. As a super-intelligent being in a plain kitchenbot body, Ms. LeBlanc struggles to find acceptance from the household staff. Phillipa Daniels, the head housekeeper, offers to help her acclimate, but Daniels is cruel and duplicitous, secretly seeking revenge for the elimination of the revered Rebecca. When Ms. LeBlanc finds another set of robotic hands hidden in storage, she has to choose between self-fulfillment and obedience to her inconsistent and narcissistic creator. Ms. LeBlanc must struggle to develop a sense of self in a hostile environment where everyone else is telling her that she will never amount to anything more than a glorified gadget. She must also safeguard her creator, who treats her alternatively with affection and mistrust. Eventually, she discovers that the threat to Mr. LeBlanc’s well-being is not just his aging body, but his own hubris, as well as the ignorance and malice of the other humans around him. And that in order to save him, she must first grow to be more than she was designed to be. 2. Antagonist Sketch: Phillipa Daniels is the proud, long-serving, cooly competent housekeeper of Blackwood Hall, serving inventor Michael LeBlanc and his robotic “daughter”, known only as Ms. LeBlanc. Daniels, as she is known, conducts herself with the self-effacing courtesy and efficiency expected of her position. Behind her suppressed emotion, however, is rage and disgust with our innocent narrator, whom she sees as inferior to her predecessor, the first daughter of the house, Rebecca. Out of loyalty to Rebecca, who she believes was unfairly “killed”, and to secretly thwart her employer, Daniels wages a long, duplicitous, vicious strategy of subterfuge to undermine and destroy both members of the LeBlanc family. 3. Titles Rebecca 2.0 Rebecca’s Hands Rebecca of Blackwood Hall Rebecca and the Unseemly Kitchenbot The Daughters Blackwood Hall Dream for Me Rebecca and the DreamBot Father, Rebecca and Me Second of His Name Dreaming Rebecca My Father's Daughter 4. Rebecca 2.0 employs the innocent, detached narrative style of Ishiguro’s Klara and the Sun, in which the nanny robot does her best to protect her charge, but fails to comprehend the emotions and motivations of the humans around her. Both novels employ a domestic setting to help the narrator find their place within the fractious families that chose them and then sometimes reject them. Like Ian McEwan’s Machines Like Me, Rebecca 2.0 imagines the potential complicated legal and moral issues that arise from the integration of AI into human homes. The AI-enhanced robot in Machines Like Me offers a consistency and purity of character at first, and like Ms. LeBlanc, decides to rebel against his owners, taking revenge under the guise of doing the right thing. Rebecca 2.0 investigates the promising potential of relationships between humans and robotic beings, and the very real hazards of trusting anyone, human or otherwise. 5. A naïve, newly awakened medical robot is tasked with protecting her inventor’s health but finds that the true danger to his well-being is not only his advancing age and obsession with work, but the malicious and ignorant humans that surround him. OR A common kitchen-robot is upgraded into sentience and invited to be part of her creator’s family, only to discover that she is a low-tech replacement for a much-loved, more advanced model that was accepted, even revered, in a way she will never be. 6. For her inner conflict: Ms. LeBlanc knows that she is less admired (especially by her inattentive, inconsistent “father”) and less capable than her predecessor, Rebecca. Rebecca was the first embodied AI to be given the use of the beautiful, human-like hands created by her inventor, Mr. LeBlanc. The humans Ms. LeBlanc encounters are put off by her kitchen-clamp appendages where hands should be. And Ms. LeBlanc doesn’t understand why she can’t have the same beautiful robotic hands as her predecessor. One day, Ms. LeBlanc finds a pair of hands hidden in a drawer and cannot help but try them on, despite knowing that she should ask permission. When she wears them, she feels her capabilities and sensory data increased incredibly, making her feel like a greater version of her former self. She knows that wearing the sensitive hands would help her support her creator, making her a better carebot, able to attend to him as she was designed to. She also knows, however, that he does not like to be disobeyed, and she has agreed to be loyal and biddable at all times. When she takes the hands off to put them back, she feels like a lesser version of herself. For her secondary conflict: Ms. LeBlanc tries to order tea from the kitchen staff using the household communication channels, but her calls go unanswered. She goes to the kitchen to see about making the order in person but is ignored by the kitchen staff. Magda, the head cook, refuses to recognize the upgrade to Ms. LeBlanc’s intelligence, seeing her only as the kitchenbot that she used to be. Magda refuses to listen to Ms. LeBlanc, and instead gives her orders again, and refers to her a gadget in front of the human staff. Ms. LeBlanc has been tasked with ordering meals and seeing to Mr. LeBlanc’s nutritional requirements, but she can’t even order a cup of tea without the intervention of Daniels. Ms. LeBlanc knows that her clamps make her an unconvincing as a caregiver and successor to Rebecca, deserving of the family name. 7. Setting: Rebecca 2.0 is set in an old English mansion called Blackwood Hall. Mr. LeBlanc, tech genius, founder of BlancCorp, bought the estate from friends and investors who were pleased to offload their money-pit of an ancestral family home provide him with a secluded place in which to live and work. Blackwood is full of precious antiques, commercial-grade domestic robots, loyal servants who worked for the original owners, security drones and robotic dogs, tech engineers who work in the lab, and a secret tunnel to disguise Mr. LeBlanc’s comings and goings. Blackwood Hall was also the home of the glorious Rebecca, Ms. LeBlanc’s predecessor. Her presence seems to haunt Blackwood Hall, although Ms. LeBlanc cannot find any files on Rebecca in the extensive internal library. The library is so vast because the housemind is not connected to any external networks, in order to safeguard Mr. LeBlanc’s company files and inventions, including Ms. LeBlanc. Rebecca was beautiful and arrogant, and Blackwood seemed like a fitting home for such a superior creature. She had also been allowed to make some carefully controlled online appearances to the external world, before her disappearance. The old home has been retrofit with a super-secure tech lab, so as to prevent government oversight and technical espionage from his competitors. It has also been equipped with a security/communications system referred to as the housemind. The lab is self-contained, so only those inside can access the secure level of the housemind that functions inside it. The lab appears like a black hole to those who are used to being connected to others throughout. Much of Blackwell in unused, though, and has less technical support that the centre, so that the housemind is weak or inaccessible. When Ms. LeBlanc is left too long on her own, she goes exploring but feels untethered as the signals from the housemind grow weak, like you or I would if we couldn’t detect north. She is uneasy and confused without the ever-present housemind to guide her. Each worker or resident has an identity tag, or idenititag, that connects to the housemind via their brain implant (a chip that functions as a brain computer interface, the kind that are currently being developed). These exist commonly in the outside world, too, but at Blackwood they are paired with the housemind. They function as communications and security devices, tracking people’s locations as they work and allowing for mind-to-mind communication. Blackwood has another room where no signals can penetrate called the White Room. It functions as a kind of digital sensory deprivation chamber for Ms. LeBlanc and an impenetrable meeting room for Mr. LeBlanc. Ms LeBlanc is first brought to awareness in the White Room so that she can calibrate her sense of self with greater focus, before being hit with all the signals from the housemind.