For this final request of ChatGPT, I’m going to use the opening scene from Wild Diplomacy, a short novelette I recently released. Previously my other books have had some outright dopey or subjectively wrong results from the A.I.
You can read the excerpt sample from Amazon to see what I give to the A.I. In this scene, Foress the gnoll sings, tries to catch a rabbit, and gets caught by some humans.
Thank you for sharing the introduction scene of your novelette with me. Overall, I think you have done a good job of introducing the main character, Foress, and establishing her goals and motivations. The description of her singing and her desire to convince others of the peaceful nature of gnolls is interesting and adds depth to her character.
It’s crazy that the A.I. is able to determine whether or not I established a characters goals and motivations. That’s incredible really.
I also appreciate the attention to detail in the description of the forest and the way you have used sensory language to bring the setting to life for the reader. The inclusion of the rabbit chase and Foress’s hunting instincts also helps to further establish her character and her place in the world.
And more, the fact that the A.I. could pick up my description as Foress’s hunting instincts. I never used that phrase or those words. It was able to interpret what I wrote. Really very clever.
One suggestion I have for improving the scene is to consider providing more context for the reader. While it is clear that Foress is on a mission to improve relations between gnolls and city-dwellers, it might be helpful to provide some additional information about the nature of their relationship and why it is important to Foress. This could help to add depth to the scene and make it more engaging for the reader.
There’s actionable feedback here. And honestly, it caught me a little off-guard. While only a novelette, I never really did establish a reason as to why Foress cared so much about diplomacy. There’s some motivation in there, about helping protect her kind, but not a personal reason for her.
If I had used ChatGPT before I published the book, I would have made this change.
Overall, I think you have done a good job of introducing the main character and setting the stage for the rest of the story. I hope these suggestions are helpful, and I look forward to seeing where the story goes from here.
Same word phrasing as before with Old Wizards Home. A bit of a template that the A.I. uses, perhaps? Or at least a template that it’s picked up from reading 100,000 writing assignments?
Alright, in the final post, I’ll give my thoughts on all this.
What I think…
What I think? It’s a little scary isn’t it? I’m not sure if the A.I. wasn’t able to pick up the nuance of things like humor, or sarcasm, or if I’m just not as good a writer as I think I am.
And on the last one, a piece of that feedback is something I wish I had.
So, I guess the only thing I can really say is that I might, maybe, think about throwing the odd scene in there to see what the A.I. says. It takes very little effort to do so, and I do wonder what feedback it will give to something that I haven’t tried to polish to publishing standard.
As for editors etc, at the moment, they’re not out a job. But this thing is getting good. Like lots of projects, I imagine the final 20% is going to take 80% of the time, but it’s heading that way. And I think a writing aid powered by an A.I. could be a useful tool.
I think it’s a bad tool for beginners, learning to lean on a crutch. But… who am I to say it shouldn’t be used? And even if Stephen King says not to allow A.I. to edit our stories, people are still going to do it. We can’t stop the march of progress.