I think we can all agree that Artificial Intelligence has come a long way in less than three years. Who would have imagined that computers in our lifetime would be capable of creativity? If I were to tell someone five years ago that a computer would soon be able to write an entire short story with only a few simple words as a prompt, you would have thought I was nuts. Fortunately for us writers, at least for now, those AI-written stories are not quite up to par. There is something inhuman about them. I can’t explain it. They seem too polished and flowery. I would much rather write my own story, anyway. There is something satisfying about creating something that people can enjoy.
Not everyone writes the same. Each writer is unique in how he or she tells a story. Their humanness, for lack of a better term, is evident in their writing. The differences in authors are essential because there are just as many differences in readers. If AI were to write all the books, they would all be too similar and only a handful of readers would enjoy them.
I think AI is a great tool to help me write, but I prefer to do the actual writing. There are ways in which AI helps me write, which I will talk about later, but where it is most helpful is in research. For example, in my latest book, Truth Be Told, one of the protagonists is an FBI agent. Since I was never an FBI agent, I needed to know what my agent could and couldn’t do. Simple things, such as whether she would drive her own vehicle or how she would dress. I also wanted to know a reason the FBI would involve itself in a case involving drugs.
The book I’m writing now, the fifth installment in my Last Healer Mysteries series, titled Last Hope, involves a small-town police station. I needed to know the makeup of the officers. Things like, would there be a captain or just a chief? How many officers would there be? What about a detective? I also had legal questions and questions about procedures for visiting someone in jail. All were answered by AI.
Another thing I recently discovered is its ability to help me visualize something so I could describe it better. For example, I wanted to describe the inside of a small-town lawyer’s office, so I asked AI to draw it for me.
It is almost impossible to get AI to draw something that is flawless. The woman in the picture above is trapped. She would have to climb over the desk to get out. Even so, it is easier to describe something when you have a picture to look at.”
In terms of writing, I use a program called Grammarly. It is like a spell-check on steroids. It is considered AI, but it is nothing like ChatGPT. It shows misspelled words, bad punctuation, and bad grammar. It also warns when you are writing in passive voice and suggests alternative words. If I were to write “go back,” it would suggest “return” in its place. It is most useful for me because I am terrible when it comes to getting commas in the right place.
Sometimes, many times, Grammarly gives bad advice, so each suggestion must be scrutinized. Here are I few screenshots of bad advice it has given me.
In this example, “further” is a better choice because “farther” represents an actual distance, whereas “further” is more metaphorical.
Here, “open” is correct because the question is, “What do you do…” not “What did you do…”
Here, the cabinets and drawers were not spewed everywhere, but the stuff inside them was.
This one changes who the boss is.
I have more, but you get the idea. It is a helpful tool, but knowing how to write is even more helpful.
My primary goal when using AI is not to make my writing easier, but to make my stories better. I want my readers to immerse themselves in the story and not be distracted by facts that I got wrong.