A script supervisor for an AI media conglomerate is caught between her intense need for an orderly life and her deeper, darker queer desires. From the creator of the Outside trilogy, a heartfelt interplanetary epic of identity, longing…and space pirates who smuggle inappropriate stories.
A script supervisor for an AI media conglomerate is caught between her intense need for an orderly life and her deeper, darker queer desires. From the creator of the Outside trilogy, a heartfelt interplanetary epic of identity, longing… and space pirates who smuggle inappropriate stories.
Kelli Reynolds loves creating stories more than anything in the world. But on Callisto, a generative AI company called Inspiration owns everything, including all the media, and only Inspiration determines which stories can be told.
Kelli has a rare and coveted job in which her autism is to her advantage: she precisely edits AI output into “appropriate” stories for Inspiration’s massive TV audience. Her proudest creation is the pirate Orlando—a dashing do-gooder based on stories she used to tell friends.
Re-enter Kelli’s ex-boyfriend Rowan, the person Kelli based Orlando on. Back when they were teenagers, their relationship was a secret. Kelli had thought that Rowan, a trans man, was her schoolmate Am, a girl.
Rowan is tangled up in the black market after he needed to get money for gender reassignment surgery. He needs Kelli’s help with something… illegal. So now Kelli has to decide: will she risk the safe, tidy story of her life now for the world she once wished for? What would Orlando do?
Passionate, dangerous, and tender, Ignore All Previous Instructions is a sweeping, poignant novel about forbidden love, growing up, and censorship.
Praise for The Outside Finalist for the 2020 Philip K. Dick Award Finalist for the 2020 Compton Crook Award Winner of a 2020 Earphones Award
[STARRED REVIEW] “Hoffmann confidently layers morality and disability rights into a breezily told adventure that bursts with sheer fun . . . This beautifully smart, uncynical space opera will charm fans of Charles Stross and Lois McMaster Bujold.”
—Publishers Weekly
“Compellingly written, tense, and thrilling, with fascinating (and weird) worldbuilding and brilliant characters, The Outside is a fantastic debut. I can’t wait to see what Hoffman does next.”
—Locus
“With a boffo combination of hard science fiction, cosmic Lovecraftian horror, both cyber-and-god-punk, some ridiculously charismatic aliens, and a fascinating female protagonist somewhere on the autism spectrum, Ada Hoffmann’s The Outside feels like it was made to order for us.”
—Skiffy and Fanty
“The Outside is a gripping examination of the battle between good and evil on a grand scale; Yasira is a complex character torn between faith and doubt in her search for the truth in a dark universe where nothing is as it first appears.”
—The Guardian
Ada Hoffmann is the queer and genderfluid author of the Outside space opera trilogy, the collections Monsters in My Mind, Million-Year Elegies, and Resurrections, as well as dozens of speculative short stories and poems. Their work has been a finalist for the Philip K. Dick Award, the Compton Crook Award, and the WSFA Small Press Award. They are also the winner of the Friends of the Merrill Collection Short Story Contest and a five-time Rhysling award nominee. Hoffmann’s novel-length work is represented by Hannah Bowman of Liza Dawson Associates.
An adjunct professor of computer science at a major Canadian university, Hoffmann now researches the social effects of generative AI on professional fiction writers. Their 2018 PhD thesis was on computer-generated poetry. Under their legal name, they have published over a dozen papers and presented their work at conferences around the world.
Hoffmann was diagnosed with autism at the age of thirteen. Their Autistic Book Party review series (2010–2023) was devoted to in-depth discussions of autism representation in speculative fiction. Much of their own work also features characters who are autistic or otherwise neurodivergent. They are a former semi-professional soprano, tabletop gaming enthusiast, and LARPer.
Hoffman lives in eastern Ontario with a curious black cat.
Ignore All Previous Instructions
Ada Hoffmann
A script supervisor for an AI media conglomerate is caught between her intense need for an orderly life and her deeper, darker queer desires. From the creator of the Outside trilogy, a heartfelt interplanetary epic of identity, longing…and space pirates who smuggle inappropriate stories.
Ignore All Previous Instructions
by Ada Hoffmann
ISBN: 978-1-61696-456-6 (print); 978-1-61696-457-3 (digital)
Published: 12 May 2026
Available Format(s): trade paperback, digital
A script supervisor for an AI media conglomerate is caught between her intense need for an orderly life and her deeper, darker queer desires. From the creator of the Outside trilogy, a heartfelt interplanetary epic of identity, longing… and space pirates who smuggle inappropriate stories.
Kelli Reynolds loves creating stories more than anything in the world. But on Callisto, a generative AI company called Inspiration owns everything, including all the media, and only Inspiration determines which stories can be told.
Kelli has a rare and coveted job in which her autism is to her advantage: she precisely edits AI output into “appropriate” stories for Inspiration’s massive TV audience. Her proudest creation is the pirate Orlando—a dashing do-gooder based on stories she used to tell friends.
Re-enter Kelli’s ex-boyfriend Rowan, the person Kelli based Orlando on. Back when they were teenagers, their relationship was a secret. Kelli had thought that Rowan, a trans man, was her schoolmate Am, a girl.
Rowan is tangled up in the black market after he needed to get money for gender reassignment surgery. He needs Kelli’s help with something… illegal. So now Kelli has to decide: will she risk the safe, tidy story of her life now for the world she once wished for? What would Orlando do?
Passionate, dangerous, and tender, Ignore All Previous Instructions is a sweeping, poignant novel about forbidden love, growing up, and censorship.
Praise for The Outside
Finalist for the 2020 Philip K. Dick Award
Finalist for the 2020 Compton Crook Award
Winner of a 2020 Earphones Award
[STARRED REVIEW] “Hoffmann confidently layers morality and disability rights into a breezily told adventure that bursts with sheer fun . . . This beautifully smart, uncynical space opera will charm fans of Charles Stross and Lois McMaster Bujold.”
—Publishers Weekly
“Compellingly written, tense, and thrilling, with fascinating (and weird) worldbuilding and brilliant characters, The Outside is a fantastic debut. I can’t wait to see what Hoffman does next.”
—Locus
“With a boffo combination of hard science fiction, cosmic Lovecraftian horror, both cyber-and-god-punk, some ridiculously charismatic aliens, and a fascinating female protagonist somewhere on the autism spectrum, Ada Hoffmann’s The Outside feels like it was made to order for us.”
—Skiffy and Fanty
“The Outside is a gripping examination of the battle between good and evil on a grand scale; Yasira is a complex character torn between faith and doubt in her search for the truth in a dark universe where nothing is as it first appears.”
—The Guardian
An adjunct professor of computer science at a major Canadian university, Hoffmann now researches the social effects of generative AI on professional fiction writers. Their 2018 PhD thesis was on computer-generated poetry. Under their legal name, they have published over a dozen papers and presented their work at conferences around the world.
Hoffmann was diagnosed with autism at the age of thirteen. Their Autistic Book Party review series (2010–2023) was devoted to in-depth discussions of autism representation in speculative fiction. Much of their own work also features characters who are autistic or otherwise neurodivergent. They are a former semi-professional soprano, tabletop gaming enthusiast, and LARPer.
Hoffman lives in eastern Ontario with a curious black cat.
https://www.ada-hoffmann.com/