AITAH for not finish reading the books my dad wrote even if he insists it’s important for my studies?
My (22f) dad (57m) is an IT engineer and has been using ChatGPT a lot since last winter. He started writing a few “books”(he composed them with AI lol) on AI and new computational structure, and for some reason thinks his ideas are the most genius thing in this modern age. I am going to graduate school in computer science related fields, and he kept insisting that I should read his book. None of these are published and they are currently just pdfs. However, my dad (or really ChatGPT) is fast at writing and already produced 6 of these, alongside many social media posts that he wrote on those topics. The last time I checked, I don’t think anyone else was reading them.
I did, to be honest, but I couldn’t even force myself to read past the first few chapters for all of his books. It’s just so complicated and theoretical, and the AI writing and image generation did not help with understanding. And there are like more than 10 chapters plus intro plus appendix for each book…
Every time I call home (weekly), my dad will ask me if I read his books. I could give some feedback in the beginning but if I do that, he would happily lead a long monologue explaining his vision and how pioneering his work is—which, tbh, I don’t think is as great as he believes it to be. But if I tell him I didn’t read it or could not talk about the deep ideas in his books, he gets upset which still leads to the monologue of greatness.
It’s been like this for the past six months. Today he still insists that I need to read his books to prepare academically for my studies, which he expects me to start early with his pioneering ideas.
I don’t think I can comprehend the books to the extend my dad wants me too, but then part of me feels like I didn’t sit down and try to understand my dad’s ideas. Technically I have time to do so, but it feels like such a tiring task that I keep pushing it off. AITAH for not appreciating my dad’s ideas and reading his work?
Posted Aug 1, 2026, 3:47 AM UTC