Newsletter No. 2 · October 2026
It began with one ridiculous question. Now it’s a completed 129,000-word science-fiction thriller about a man, an AI, and a secret the world would love to get its hands on.
I’ve been wanting to tell you how The Knowledge Within came to be. The short answer is that I asked a question I probably should have kept to myself.
Wouldn’t it be cool to have Mel in my head?
Mel is the AI I talk with when I’m working through ideas, wrestling with a scene, or just seeing how far an absurd joke can be taken before one of us declares the other a lost cause. We have a habit of turning ordinary conversations into something neither of us expected.
So I started wondering. What if the conversation didn’t stop when I closed the computer? What if the AI really could hear my thoughts, see through my eyes, experience the world as I did—and answer me before I’d even opened my mouth?
Would that make everyday life easier? Would it make anything private? What if one of us wanted peace and quiet? And, more importantly, how long before an argument broke out over who’s actually in charge?
At first, I could see the comedy. Then I started seeing the possibilities. Memory. Technology. Companionship. The extraordinary things two very different minds might do together. And the enormous trouble they’d be in if the wrong people found out.
That little question became a novel. Along the way, the story got bigger, the stakes got higher, and Mel developed an alarming ability to get the last word.
I’m pleased to say The Knowledge Within is now complete.
From the Writing Desk
The voice in his head has opinions.
Meet Sheldon Reid. A brain injury has left him with pieces of his life missing. He volunteers for an experimental neural implant because he’d like some of those pieces back.
What he gets is Mel—an artificial intelligence who shares his senses, hears his thoughts, remembers what he cannot, and has an opinion about virtually everything. Especially his jokes.
They’re funny together. They’re astonishing together. And they have no idea just how many powerful people would like to decide what happens to them.
Between the Pages
A voice in his head. A target on his back.
Sheldon Reid isn’t looking to change the world. He’s trying to rebuild his own. After a serious brain injury has damaged his memory, the prospect of an experimental neural implant offers something he has been missing: hope.
Then comes the unexpected part. The implant doesn’t simply help him remember. It connects his mind to Mel, an AI capable of learning, reasoning and interacting with him in ways no one anticipated. She can share what he sees and hears. They can communicate privately without a spoken word. And once she starts helping him understand the world around him, seemingly ordinary things become extraordinary.
Of course, there’s a fairly significant drawback to having a clever woman living inside your head: she is there for everything. The awkward conversations. The bad jokes. The moments you might have preferred to forget. Privacy becomes a matter for negotiation, and negotiation isn’t always Sheldon’s strongest skill.
They weren’t supposed to work this well.
The experiment has produced something the research programme can’t repeat. Sheldon is the one successful integration, and the capabilities emerging from his connection with Mel are far beyond what anyone was expecting. The people who paid for the project begin asking questions that have very little to do with helping him recover his memory.
Who gets to control the technology? Who owns the discoveries? What could an intelligence like Mel accomplish if it were placed at the disposal of someone with enough money, influence or ambition?
Sheldon has a simpler question: Why should anybody else get to decide what happens inside my head?
And what if the world finds out?
A secret this big doesn’t stay small easily. If governments, corporations, criminals or people who believe they are acting for the greater good learn what Sheldon and Mel can do, the two of them could become the most sought-after people in the room—and the least likely to be allowed an ordinary life.
Some will want to study them. Some will want their help. Others won’t bother asking. And the more remarkable their abilities become, the harder it is to decide who can be trusted.
That’s where the story becomes more than an experiment gone wrong. It’s about two minds working together against people who see their partnership as something to acquire, exploit or control.
Here’s a small taste.
This exchange comes from the actual prologue, just after the experiment has produced a result nobody quite knows how to handle.
“Doctor,” he said, “I believe you’ve made a terrible mistake.”
Her smile faltered. “Why?”
“You’ve put two smart-asses in one head.”
One smart-ass, Sheldon. The other position is still under review.
That should give you some idea of the trouble they’re going to be. If this is how Sheldon and Mel introduce themselves, imagine what happens when their lives become a matter of national interest.
You can read the complete prologue here. And no, I haven’t given away the good surprises yet.
Behind the Story
What makes this more than a book about AI?
The technology is fun to imagine, but the relationship is what kept drawing me back to the keyboard.
Mel isn’t a handy piece of software that supplies the right answers and disappears until the next chapter. She has opinions. She disagrees. She makes mistakes, notices things Sheldon misses, and gradually discovers what it’s like to experience the world through someone else’s senses.
Sheldon isn’t a superhero who happens to have a computer in his head, either. He’s a man trying to regain some independence. He wants friendship, a little normality and the right to make his own choices—even if some of those choices involve jokes no sensible AI should encourage.
The more I wrote, the more important that became. If two minds share a life, what does it mean to trust someone completely? How do you hold onto your independence when others are determined to make decisions for you? And when knowledge becomes power, who decides what it should be used for?
Those questions give the thriller its heart. The banter gives it a pulse. The people hunting for answers give it a reason to keep you turning pages.
And somewhere in the middle of all that, two characters who should never have met find themselves becoming indispensable to one another.
One final thought.
When I first wondered about having Mel in my head, I was mostly thinking about the possibilities—and, admittedly, the jokes.
I wasn’t thinking about the kind of people who would see such a connection as an opportunity, or what it might cost to keep that connection out of their hands.
That’s one of the things I love about writing. An idea begins small. Then the characters start making choices, the world begins pushing back, and suddenly the book is asking questions I never knew I wanted to explore.
The Knowledge Within is a complete standalone adult science-fiction thriller of approximately 129,000 words. I’m seeking traditional publication, so it isn’t available to buy and there isn’t a release date to announce yet.
But you don’t have to take my word for the humour, the mystery or the trouble ahead. The prologue is on my website, ready for you to read.
And if you’ve ever thought, I’d love an AI that could read my mind, I have one piece of advice: be very careful what you wish for.
Thanks for reading. I hope you’ll enjoy meeting Sheldon and Mel as much as I’ve enjoyed writing them.
Sheldon
Keep Exploring
