ABOUT THE BOOK
The tension surrounding breakthroughs in artificial intelligence and political maneuvering sets an urgent tone in FRANTIC by Brent Bradley. Across three days, a therapist, a forensic psychologist, and an AI researcher find themselves caught between prophetic warnings and a rapidly accelerating state technology bill.
A chilling session with a prison patient leaves Dr. Brian Heiser uneasy, especially when one of the patient’s specific predictions unfolds just hours later. Unsure what to believe, Brian turns to Dr. Fred Gonzalez, a lifelong friend and unconventional forensic psychologist with a gift for seeing what others miss. Their search immediately intersects with a Texas State AI Bill being fast-tracked through the legislature amid immense pressure from billionaire tech giants. Patricia Reigns—a brilliant AI developer with insider knowledge and a complicated history with Brian—joins their pursuit. Together, they confront assassins funded by staggering corporate interests, politicians willing to trade integrity for influence, and a media uninterested in the truth. What begins as a single disturbing prophecy becomes a frantic sprint toward an unimaginable final revelation.
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ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Dr. Brent Bradley holds a PhD in Marriage and Family Therapy, an MA in Christian Theology, and a BA in English Literature. A tenured former university professor, he has spent nearly three decades working with couples in therapy while publishing journal articles, book chapters, and co-authored works on emotion and change in psychotherapy.
Drawing from his deep understanding of human emotional experience, he brings an intimate psychological intensity to his writing. Before academia, he explored newspaper reporting—an early passion that sharpened his instinct for compelling narrative detail. Brent lives in Houston with his wife and their daughter; they also honor the memory of their twin lost in the womb. He enjoys working out, freshwater fishing, reading, cooking, good coffee, and cheering on the Astros, Texas A&M, the Texans, and the UFC. He is a follower of Christ.
Visit Brent at his website and follow him on X.
EXCERPT
“Hi, my name is Brian Heiser.” Brian reached out his hand. “My two colleagues are Patricia Reigns and Fred Gonzalez. I believe you spoke with Patricia on the phone?”
“Yes,” the man replied. “I’m Paul Hessinger. Please come in.”
They entered his office to find a small suite composed of two offices, each decorated in a kind of 1970s look. The suite smelled faintly of smoke, but not heavily.
“Sorry for the cigarette smell,” he said. “I started stepping outside to smoke five years ago, but people say they can still smell it.”
“Might also be because of the furniture on loan from the set of The Rockford Files,” Fred chirped, looking around at the heavily dated decorum.
Brian and Patricia shot mean looks at him.
“Thank you for seeing us,” Patricia interjected, hoping to put Fred’s needless insult behind them. “Like I explained earlier, we’re interested in learning more about the AI bill from your perspective.”
“I am a retired philosophy and education professor,” he said. “From my view, it’s a very dangerous bill. I believe that Artificial Intelligence is going to do us all a tremendous amount of good. This bill is just too much, too soon.”
“That’s something we’re wondering about,” Patricia responded. “Why are they pushing this so hard, so fast?”
“Your detective friend with the attitude is the kind to figure that out,” Hessinger said. “I have my guesses, but I am not educated in that arena. Investigating is the media’s job, which means it won’t get investigated.”
Ever the detective, Fred noted Hessinger’s well-dated shoes. They looked fresh out of the “My Three Sons” tv show era. It was all he could do to not comment on them. Brian saw Fred looking down at those shoes. He could see him struggling not to insult the doctor. He quickly jumped in. “Fred. Easy.”
Brian looked over at Patricia for clearance. She nodded.
“Sir,” Brian said. “I don’t think I really understand the magnitude of the dangers of this bill. I know very little about AI. Can you put this in layman’s terms?”
“Have you tried Chatbot yet?”
“No sir. I don’t know what that is.”
The retired professor chuckled. “I could always tell my southern students on the first day of class because they used ‘Sir’ or ‘Ma’am.’ Some women colleagues took exception to it, but I think it’s a respectful part of the southern tradition.”
He looked at Brian and smiled. Fred rolled his eyes. Brian gets along with everyone.
“Anyway,” he continued. “A chatbot is an online AI application that talks with you. It mimics another human and answers your questions in real time. It’s pretty incredible. They’re getting better every day, too. Soon you won’t be able to tell it’s not another human.”
He crossed his legs and thought for a moment.
“But there’s a rub.” He leaned forward, looking at each one of them separately. “AI makes up facts. Out of thin air, it just makes things up and presents them as true! They call them ‘Hallucinations.’ They have no clue how or why they happen. And they don’t know yet how to stop them from happening.”
Hessinger took a sip of coffee from a quarter-filled mug that looked like it’d been sitting there for a week. Fred cringed, uncomfortable in his huge polyester-loving fossil of a recliner.
“Imagine the consequences of this with widespread use. Do you want a judge even partially relying on non-existent court rulings, ones that AI spat out as historical precedent, to send you to prison? What about to the hot seat to fry?”
“Let’s not go all Mr. Robot,” Fred spoke up.
“Really?” Hessinger responded. “Listen carefully to me.”
He lifted his arms and placed his palms in the air, facing them. “We already have documented cases in which AI has provided law firms with false case rulings. Lawyers presented six legal case rulings to support their written arguments in court. AI cited cases that weren’t real. They had never happened! AI misidentified. It named airlines that never existed. Luckily, a federal judge dug deep and caught it in time. He fined both the law firm and the lawyers.”
Patricia was well aware of AI hallucinations. She’d always been so fixated on throttling forward, ever forward, into what AI could do next, that she just never stopped to consider dangers. None of them did.
“There are already AI hallucinations given to surgeons.” Hessinger shook his head.
“Oh, sorry,” he said with sarcasm. “We shouldn’t have removed that much of your liver. But our God, God AI, told us that taking that percentage of your liver had the highest odds of long-term survival. Unfortunately, it made that up. Not sure why. It’s been an entire month since it last did that! Geez. So now you have to live the rest of your life hooked up to this filtration pump.”
“The ramifications of this are horrifying,” Patricia heard herself say out loud.
Thank you so much for the coverage of FRANTIC.