“Book” “Review”: Wood by Taylor Swift

February 2026

Okay everyone, settle down. This is an emergency. We have a paradox.

A paradox?

What happened?

Hubert, read the incident report.

Ahem. On September 6, Emily, Millie, Ellie, and Lily attended Bella’s wedding and participated in the bouquet toss. The agent on call directed the bouquet to Millie, as per the database. An hour ago, Millie, Ellie, Alice, Ella, and Olivia attended Mila’s wedding and participated in the bouquet toss. We’re still investigating the details of what happened, and this meeting is not to assign blame, but it seems that the agent on call missed directing the bouquet to Millie, and it ended up with Ellie.

Shit. It was Eugene, wasn’t it?

We’re not assigning blame right now.

Focus, we’re here to figure out what to do next. The first bouquet said Millie gets married before Ellie. The second bouquet said Ellie gets married before Millie. How do we square the circle?

Sorry, I’m still new. What happens if we don’t?

People notice the paradox. People stop believing in us. We lose our powers. The bouquet toss superstition goes the same place ‘don’t cut your hair on Sundays’ went.

People aren’t supposed to cut hair on Sundays?

Not anymore! They fucked up. They stopped punishing people who cut their hair on Sundays, so people stopped believing in them, and now they don’t exist. Do you lot want to stop existing? If not, start thinking. Give me ideas.

What if we have them both get married at the same time?

It won’t work. One of them will be earlier by a femtosecond or something. They can’t literally get married at the exact same instant.

We could do a joint wedding…

Okay, good, I like that. More in that vein please.

What if we stop them from ever getting married?

Then Lily or Alice or one of the others will get married before either of them, which still breaks the superstition. It’s not as bad as a paradox, but still.

We could have them almost get married, but then one of the fiancés dies a tragic death at the last second. At that point, I feel like people would forget about the paradox.

A tragic death? Geez.

It’s extreme, but I appreciate that you understand the gravity of the situation.

If you want extreme ideas… we could ask for the universe to branch off. Have one parallel universe in which Millie gets married first, and one in which Ellie gets married first.

And how do you propose we do that, hmm?

We ask the quantum department for help.

I thought so. I thought so. Are you fucking insane? You want to call in the quantum department for this? We might as well just all stop existing now.

I thought this was a brainstorming session! You know, no bad ideas.

Okay, you’re right. Sorry. Sorry. I’ll put it on the whiteboard, but please team, give me some good ideas.

Boss. I think I actually have something. I’ve been thinking about this for a while. You know, the ideal situation for a superstition is to be like Chinese fortune cookies. If it’s a good fortune, you believe in the magic of the cookie. But if it’s a stupid one, like don’t lick your boots or something, then it’s just a big old joke. No one stops believing in the cookies, they just treat it half-serious and half-joke, whichever is most convenient. If we could get the bouquet toss to a similar market position, then we wouldn’t have to worry about paradoxes anymore.

Okay, I think I’m following. Go on.

Like, what if the bouquet toss meant two things. The serious version is getting married next, what it’s always been. But the new, joke, version is getting laid in the, say, next month or so. So if someone doesn’t get married next, people will just joke about the other thing.

Okay, okay, okay.

That’s really good.

Damn Lindsay, you’ve been sitting on this?

I like the idea, but how do we make it happen?

Well, we’ll have to do a publicity campaign, obviously. Recruit some celebrities to talk about our new branding.

I have a cousin in the dreams department. I could have him send dreams to a few famous people.

Okay, talk to your cousin.

Paradox DOS-BT-4193: Resolution Report

Section F.3.1: Summary of outcomes

• DOS-BT secured a rebranding endorsement from the most famous pop star alive in 2025 (the “Endorser”; see Section F.3.5 for details).
• The Endorser devoted a whole verse of a song from her latest album to our announcement (see below Figure 32 for the text of the endorsement).
• Both the album and the song have been hugely successful (see Appendix K: Music Charts).

Section F.3.2: Other outcomes

DOS-BT is investigating (see Investigation DOS-BT-97843, currently pending) the possibility that the means used to secure the endorsement may have resulted in the song becoming more suggestive than originally intended.

Figure 32: Text of the endorsement