Shy Girl, a horror novel by Mia Ballard, was one of those buzzy books that leapt from self-published prominence into full-on trade publication. Until yesterday, that is, when publisher Hachette pulled the book from the UK market and canceled plans to bring it to the US.
The move came after a New York Times investigation suggested that AI had been used in significant parts of the work.
“If it isn’t AI, she’s a terrible writer”
Shy Girl was self-published in 2025 and quickly found an audience on social media. The novel follows a depressed, OCD woman named Gia who, down on her luck, encounters a “sugar daddy” who pays off her debts. All she has to do? Live as his literal pet. Eventually, of course, living like an animal makes her into an animal, and things apparently get nasty.
Creepy. And the prose? “I’m obsessed with the way Mia Ballard writes,” said one reviewer on Goodreads.
Not everyone thought the book was good, though, or even well-written. Another reviewer on the site called the book “absolute f—ing garbage. overwritten, repetitive, poorly executed, atrocious formatting. nothing to do with actual feminine rage and revenge.”
Soon, the questions moved beyond the literary. Had the book really been “written” at all? Complaints started to surface that the prose sounded, at least in places, like chatbot writing.
In January 2026, someone claiming to be a long-time book editor posted a long Reddit thread claiming the books had all the hallmarks of AI lit. “If so, I find it repulsive that it has been picked up and published by the second largest publishing company, at least in the UK,” said the Reddit post. “If it isn’t AI, she’s a terrible writer. Her writing is truly indistinguishable from an LLM.”
Then a two-and-a-half hour (!) YouTube video dropped, making the same claims. It garnered 1.2 million views.
Even AI detection companies like Pangram got in on the action, claiming that the book had the hallmarks of being largely AI-generated.