Having mastered the art of Go, Google's latest artificial intelligence project is to make its intelligent assistant more conversational. To do this, the AI has spent the last few months reading erotic romance novels.

The efforts are designed to make the AI more personable and conversational, both in its understanding of human language and its responses.

After reading 2,865 of the novels, which include titles such as Fatal Desire, Jacked Up and Unconditional Love, the AI has started to write sentences that are akin to those in the stories.

Obviously, that doesn't mean that it is writing lines such as "She glanced down and turned as pink as the lace bra she was wearing", but more that it is starting to converse in a more natural way.

According to a Google spokesperson, romance novels are particularly helpful to learn colloquial language because they have predictable themes and plotlines, but use colourful and varied vocabulary to convey them.

The improvements could enhance how Google products such as Search, Google Now and Smart Reply interpret our language. For search, it could improve responses for queries written in a conversational tone, while Smart Reply would help it understand and respond to your emails in a more human-like tone. For Android smartphone assistant Google Now it could help the assistant respond in a more natural way.