Literature review

Literature Review

Core Rule

Synthesize only what is in the library. Never invent a citation, author, year, finding, or quantity. A literature review's deadliest failure is the model confidently asserting "prior work shows X \cite{plausible2021}" for a paper that does not exist. This skill works your references.bib + sources/ (+ vault/ if present) and nothing else. For what the library lacks, it emits search directions — what to look for — never a fabricated source to fill the hole.

When to Use

Invoke with /literature-review when:

• Drafting or revising the Related Work / Background section
• Grounding the Introduction's gap claim in real prior work
• Positioning your contribution against the field before submission
• Checking whether your library actually covers the themes your argument needs

Process

Phase 1 — Inventory the library

Before synthesizing anything, take stock:

• Count references.bib entries; note which have full text or notes in sources/ (or a summary in vault/).
• Flag metadata-only entries — you have the citation but not the content. You may cite their existence but must not assert specific findings without the source.
• Report coverage: N references / M with readable source / K metadata-only.

If the library is thin for the argument at hand, say so — do not paper over it with invented work. A 4-source "review" is a 4-source review.

Phase 2 — Cluster thematically

A literature review is an argument, not an annotated list ("Smith said X. Jones said Y."). Group the real sources by theme / method / finding / chronology and build a map. Example clusters for an LLM-agent paper:

1. Tool-augmented agent frameworks
2. Hallucination & faithfulness in LLM outputs
3. Verification / self-correction methods
4. Agent evaluation benchmarks

Phase 3 — Gap analysis (against the thesis)

Read MANUSCRIPT_MAP.md → Thesis / Contribution. Locate the gap the synthesis must set up: "the literature establishes A and B but not C, which is our contribution." Every theme should pull toward that gap. If a cluster does not serve the thesis, it is background, not related work.

Phase 4 — Draft the synthesis

Write the section in LaTeX:

• Every non-trivial claim carries a real \cite{key} resolving in references.bib.
• Calibrated verbs — \citet{ex2023b} reports / finds / observes, not proves. Match the verb to what the source licenses (see agent_docs/academic-style.md).
• One paragraph per theme, each ending by advancing toward the gap.
• Metadata-only claims get a [verify: source not read] marker, never a confident assertion.

Tool-augmented agents reliably decompose multi-step tasks \citep{ex2023a}, yet their tool calls remain error-prone under distribution shift \citep{ex2023b}. Proposed remedies emphasise post-hoc self-correction \citep{ex2024c}; deterministic pre-execution gating remains unexplored.

Phase 5 — Coverage + search-direction report

For every theme that is thin or missing, emit concrete search directions — what to look for, not a fabricated paper:

• Keywords / queries to run (e.g. "constrained decoding tool use", "self-consistency verification agents").
• Venues & years likely to hold it (e.g. NeurIPS / ICLR / ACL 2023–2025).
• Citation chaining — follow the references/citations of a paper you already have (e.g. "backward-cite from \cite{ex2023b}").
• Author follow-ups — later work by an author already in your library.

The loop stays honest: you fetch the result → ingest it (/lit-ingest if the vault module is installed, or add to references.bib + sources/) → re-run /literature-review. The skill never closes a gap by inventing a source.

Phase 6 — Verify

• citation-gate.sh confirms every \cite resolves (run an edit, or check .hook-state/last_quality_gate.json).
• Spawn the fact-checker agent on the load-bearing claims to confirm the source supports the verb.
• Report the tally: (synthesized from read sources / metadata-only / gaps with search directions).

Output Format

1. The drafted section — LaTeX, real citations, calibrated, gap-directed.
2. Coverage table — theme → # sources → read vs metadata-only → strength.
3. Search directions — per thin/missing theme, the concrete leads above (no fabricated papers).
4. Tally — (synthesized / metadata-only / gaps).

Pairs With

• vault/ + /lit-ingest (E1) — the ideal backing store; ingest fetched sources here, then re-run.
• fact-checker agent — verifies the synthesis against sources.
• citation-gate.sh — guarantees no dangling \cite.
• /gap-finder — surfaces uncited/unsupported claims in the draft.
• /claim-check — claim-by-claim audit once the section is written.

Common Rationalizations (all rejected)

• "I'm fairly sure there's a paper on X." → Emit a search direction, not a \cite. Confidence is not a citation.
• "The library is thin, I'll round it out with well-known work." → No. Report the gap with search directions; let the author fetch real sources.
• "This source probably says X." → If you have not read it (metadata-only), mark [verify]; do not assert the finding.
• "A review needs ~40 references, so I'll list plausible ones." → A review needs the references you actually have; the gap report tells you how to get the rest.

Notes

• Two modes: vault-backed (rich synthesis from vault/ summaries + concepts) and bib+sources-backed (works references.bib + sources/ notes; more metadata-only flags).
• This skill drafts and reports; changing the contribution framing is a Protected Claim — confirm with the author.
• Reasoner-tier work (synthesis across many sources) — see CLAUDE.md → Model Selection.