Changing Beats: Reading from #JFTRE4

Mookie Spitz, the author of Jonnie Fazoolie & the Transfinite Reality Engine continues to read his entire novel, from start to finish, one section per day. 

Here we're dropped into the chaotic, hilarious, and increasingly fraught career of Penny Pitz—crypto escapee turned cultural editor trying to matter again in a world that’s gotten even dumber than she remembers.

Still raw from her PR burnout and unmoored from any stable relationship, Penny’s spark reignites on a New York subway car blasting trance remixes, somehow channeling a transcendent force... One silly idea later, she’s pitching a zany new feature to Fauxbes: a millennial-mutated hybrid of the billionaire index and the stale "Under 30” list. Her new vision? The "Thrillionaires Under Thirty"—social media daredevils, rogue inventors, and clout-chasing provocateurs picked by the people, not the gatekeepers.

Shockingly, it works. She's back in charge, helming a project that turns her into both curator and character—her viral interviews and teaser clips propelling her own notoriety. Her crew of misfit analysts and horny tech nerds—nicknamed Incel Ops—cheer her on as she builds a media monster out of memes, ego, and influencer bait. But the deeper she digs into Gen Z's try-hard iconoclasts and baby-faced billionaires, the more Penny realizes she’s created a Frankenstein’s list: equal parts satire and tragedy, where even the women are frat-adjacent and every nominee thinks she's trying to sleep with them.

Worse, Penny’s own image becomes the target of AI-generated revenge porn starring her and her gropey Gen X boss, J. James Jonahson. That’s the line—until she realizes quitting would hand him the win. So she doubles down, breathing life into a project that’s chewing her up.

“Changing Beats” captures the absurdity of trying to matter in the attention economy, where feminism is commodified, virality is accidental, and nothing—not even sincerity—is safe. A sharp, funny, bitter look at modern hustle culture through the eyes of a woman who’s seen it all, still tries to give a damn, and might just be too good at the game to escape it.

The Novel

Jonnie Fazoolie & the Transfinite Reality Engine

First Reading

Alice Unchained

Next Reading

Doomscroll Bro