I Really Need To Get Over Myself & Read The ‘Comp’ Novel To My Novel, ‘Annie Bot’

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

Oh boy. I just don’t want to do this. I don’t want to read Annie Bot because I’m afraid it will be so much better than my novel that I’ll get discouraged. But I have it to read, waiting for me.

So, very soon, I’m going to force myself to read it.

All of this is part of the “scary” part of post-production. I also need to psych myself up for writing query letters, etc, even though I know, I KNOW that my novel is “too spicy.”

But it’s not lurid. It’s just spicy.

My novel, from what I can tell, is very, very different from Annie Bot in most ways other than the general premise. My novel is told not from the POV of the sexbot, but from the “owner.”

While Annie Bot is apparently something of a feminist screed, my novel is meant to be a fun scifi dramedy that is self-aware enough to now how innately silly some of what going on with in it is.

But, lulz. As I keep saying, this novel is more of a test run for the real novel that will probably actually get sold. The next novel I’m working on. The one that isn’t expected to be nearly as spicy.

I’m About To Wrap Up The Latest Draft Of This Scifi Dramedy WIP I’ve Been Working On…Soonish (Maybe)

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

Because I’m so fucking moody, I won’t say I’ll be done with this novel I’m working on anytime soon. It could be two or three weeks before I finally wrap things up and piviot to the “color correction” part of the process.

“Color correction” in this sense is just rewriting scenes here or there that really need it and also some last minute name changes for characters who had placeholders.

I’m also really paranoid about there being any “AI Slop” lodged here or there in the text itself, so I am going to be really aggressive to finesse things so that’s not there to be read. I really don’t want to do all this hard fucking work only to be told “AI wrote it” and it can’t get published.

I have written this damn novel. I have used AI as an “AI first” novelist, however to develop, etc things. But the copy is mine. I recently saw someone on Tik-Tok essentially call people like me literary traitors for having anything to do with AI at all.

Shrug. I know what I’ve done and I know this is a novel good enough to query. But I have another novel that I will write after this one I’m working on that I think maybe the one I actually sell, for no other reason than it’s not as “spicy” as this novel I’m working on.

Even without the spice, any novel I write will have problems selling because of, well me. I’m a fucking kook. I’m old(er). You name it. Liberal white women will find some reason to “cancel” me before it’s all over with, but it’s better to have loved and lost than never loved at all.

I am looking forward to seeing literary agents poking around this website in my Webstats in a few months. That will be both fun and unnerving.

The United States Is Lurching Towards a ‘Hard’ Autocracy…Or Civil War

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

As I often say, the saying goes you go bankrupt gradually then all at once and that’s exactly what’s going on with the USA right now politically. Either we find oursleves in a situation where Congress is forever in control of MAGA and we drift into a more “hard” autocracy than we would otherwise imagine….or we have a civil war.

Now, I have written a great deal about my musings about civil war or revolution over the years and I look like a fool now because none of them have come anywhere near coming true. But, in my defense, the issue is that Republicans have generally won so they, being the people who seemingly want a civil war so bad, have be placated and so nothing has happened.

Meanwhile, pressure is ever-so-slowly building on Blues.

There is going to come a point where Blues may be forced to fish or cut bait when it comes to the USA as we currently imagine it. If it becomes clear that Republicans are going to impose MAGA values on the entirety of the USA, Blues, not Reds, may revolt.

I don’t want that, but it’s….possible. It’s something to think about. Because it the horrible tribalism that has infected the MAGA side of things may also begin to pop up within Blues if we are controlled by MAGA for the next few decades with no end in sight.

‘Nobody Cares Anymore’ — Lyrics To A Pop Ballad Written By ChatGPT

Nobody Cares Anymore

Verse 1
There’s a stain on the ceiling from the summer of ‘09
Still shaped a little like the state line we crossed that night
Your old number lives somewhere deep inside my phone
Like a boarded-up house nobody calls home

And every now and then I hear that song downtown
Coming through the speakers thin and worn out
Like a ghost trying hard not to be seen
Like us in faded magazine print

Pre-Chorus
Funny how a fire can feel forever
Till forever turns into folklore weather

Chorus
It was a long time ago
And nobody cares anymore
Not the kids outside the liquor store
Not the couples locking bathroom doors
The world kept spinning like it always does
Turned our wreckage into dust
Now your name’s just something floating through
A room I don’t belong to
It was a long time ago
And nobody cares anymore

Verse 2
I saw your brother at a gas station in the rain
He talked about the Braves and skipped your name
Like people do when the edges have gone soft
Like grief eventually becomes a shrug you forgot

There’s a photograph still folded in my coat
You’re half cut off and neither one of us looks old
Sometimes I think about throwing it away
But I kinda like what survives decay

Pre-Chorus
Some nights the past feels close enough to touch
Some nights it feels like somebody else’s blood

Chorus
It was a long time ago
And nobody cares anymore
The band stopped playing our song years before
The bar we met in ain’t a bar no more
There’s strangers living in the house you knew
Painting over every proof
And all our little tragedies dissolve
Into nothing much at all
It was a long time ago
And nobody cares anymore

Bridge
Maybe that’s mercy
Maybe that’s fate
Maybe every memory has an expiration date
Maybe love’s just smoke hanging briefly in a room
Before the windows open and it disappears too

Final Chorus
It was a long time ago
And nobody cares anymore
Except the moonlight on the dashboard door
Except the way the thunder sounds before a storm
Except some part of me that still turns around
When your kind of silence comes unwound
But the world moved on the way worlds do
Without asking me or you
It was a long time ago
And nobody cares anymore

‘Single At 26’ — Lyrics To A Country Pop Song

Single at 26

Verse 1
You walk in like a Friday night hurricane warning
Boots on the floorboards, whole room turning
Bartender forgets what he was reaching for
Half the county lining up by the door

But you smile like somebody just passing through
Like you already know what every line’s gonna do
There’s a little black crack running through your gold
Like a secret you ain’t ever told

Pre-Chorus
Everybody wants you
Nobody stays
That’s a strange little weather pattern, babe

Chorus
Single at twenty-six
Looking like a sunset crossed with dynamite sticks
Kiss like a matchbook, eyes like smoke
Got a couple exes that don’t joke
Yeah you laugh like there’s nothing wrong
Dance like you already heard the song
I ain’t saying love don’t exist
I’m just wondering how a girl like this
Gets to single at twenty-six

Verse 2
You know every word to the sad Tom Petty tracks
But you disappear halfway through the slow dance
Sometimes you lean in like you’re fixing to stay
Then your whole soul drifts about five states away

There’s a silver chain hanging loose on your neck
Like you forgot what it was supposed to connect
And every guy here’s got some theory or two
But none of ’em sound quite true

Pre-Chorus
Maybe you’re waiting
Maybe you ran
Maybe somebody got there before any man could

Chorus
Single at twenty-six
Little bit heaven, little bit apocalypse
Phone lighting up but you let it ring
Like you owe absolutely nothing
Yeah you move through this town so strange
Like a fire that don’t leave no change
I can’t tell if you’re broken or fixed
But girl, how’re you still
Single at twenty-six?

Bridge
Maybe you got tired of being looked at that way
Maybe forever came and left one day
Maybe you’re the kind that people almost know
Like a radio station fading in and out slow

Final Chorus
Single at twenty-six
Sitting there cool as a cigarette kiss
Blue jean halo, dangerous grin
Looking like the trouble trouble gets in
And when I ask if there’s anybody else
You just raise your glass to yourself
Like the answer’s somewhere I missed
Yeah, what’s your deal, babe?
Single at twenty-six

‘Patient Zero’ — Lyrics To A Country Pop Song Written By ChatGPT

Patient Zero

Verse 1
Neon bleeding blue into a whiskey glass
Rain tapping numbers on the window like the past
There’s a girl at the bar with her hands around a flame
Laughing with a stranger like I used to say your name

Funny what survives after all these years
Smoke in the rafters and certain kinds of fear
I still wear your leaving like a wire under clothes
Guess some things get buried, some things just corrode

Pre-Chorus
You kissed me like a secret with nowhere left to go
And I turned into the kind of man I swore I’d never know

Chorus
I was patient zero
First one in the line
First set of cracked headlights drifting past the county sign
You broke something open in a boy too young to know
How easy hurt can travel when nobody says no
Now there’s hearts all over this town
With a little of my smoke
Yeah, I was patient zero

Verse 2
There’s a scar on my knuckle from a night I can’t place
There’s a dozen empty bedrooms floating through my brain
Some of them were angels, some just passing through
Most of them were looking for somebody that was you

I got good at leaving before the morning came
Good at saying forever like it didn’t mean a thing
Funny how the fever starts to feel like home
After you spend half your life trying not to be alone

Pre-Chorus
Maybe you were lonely
Maybe I was weak
Maybe some doors only open when they break the hinges clean

Chorus
I was patient zero
First burn, first flood
First one to find out love can get inside your blood
Now I move through people like a curse I can’t outrun
Turning small-town girls into damage for someone
Yeah, the chain keeps stretching out
Long after you let go
I was patient zero

Bridge
Maybe there was someone who did it all to you
Maybe pain’s a language people pass around like truth
Maybe every sad song started somewhere just like this
One heart going dark halfway through a kiss

Final Chorus
I’m patient zero
Last call, closing time
Watching my reflection blur beneath the neon light
And there’s a kid by the jukebox looking twenty-two
Holding onto somebody the way I held onto you
I wanna tell him run
But I probably won’t
’Cause tonight he looks a little like
Patient zero

Ella Langley Is A Curious Situation

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

Ella Langley is probably my favorite artist at the moment but the dribs and drabs I’m learning about her personal life leave me….curious. She claims she has never had a serious relationship and she’s 26.

Given that she’s a smoking hot babe, that’s very unusual.

The obvious answer would be that she’s a modern day Leslie Gore and she’s a lesbian that doesn’t want to alienate her MAGA fanbase. She claims this is not the case, but the only other public woman I know in such a situation is Janelle Monet who eventually came out as gay.

So, huh?

Anyway, it doesn’t matter either way. I will note that she’s a sizzling hot babe. Apparently, she lost, like 20 pounds just in the last few years and totally revamped her style.

But what do I know. No one takes me seriously or listens to me. So, meh.

Getting Old(er) Sucks

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

I’ve started going to a new dive bar in my area and it’s just the type of place I could become a regular at without too much trouble. But for one thing — the regulars there sort of have decided I’m not for them.

So, either I press on and try to get into their good graces or I kinda of give up and just don’t go nearly as often as I would like.

But that’s not the real issue, the real issue is that I’m 100% extroverted and see the place as an opportunity to make new friends. But most of the other customers just see me as a middle aged creepy weirdo.

Especially the young women.

Who aren’t even that young! They’re in their 30s!

But, such is life. I’m reminded yet again that I should have moved to NYC when I left Seoul. But I just was not in an emotional state to do such a thing. Now, I think I might be able to pull it off, but for, you know, having no money and being too old and bonkers to do it.

Well, Now. Huh

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

I saw on Tik-Tok today some woman who was absolutely clear that AI could not be used in novel development. You could use AI to learn structure, etc, but you couldn’t actually use it to impliment it.

Oh boy.

Don’t quite know what to do about that.

I’m of the opinion that AI is like a spellchecker was 30 years ago. There probably were people who said you can use spellcheck to “help you learn to spell” but when it came to actually writing, you were forbidden from using it.

It’s all too late, for me, even if I wanted to change things. AI is too much a part of my workflow and I’m pretty strict about making sure that what is actually on the page is mine.

It took a while, but I figured out how to use AI in my workflow in such a way that all the text on the page is mine, even if a lot of the backend stuff that readers never see or know about is aided by AI.

Only time will tell if anyone is cool with that.

I Need To Focus (Redux, Redux)

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

My goal every day is to write at least three scenes every day on this scifi dramedy novel I’m working on. But I’m so fucking moody that, as always, I just sort of…drift…towards my goal.

It’s very annoying. I need to actually buckle down and get some work done. I need to realize that this idyllic situation I find myself in at the moment is going to wrap up pretty soon.

The entire context of my life is going to change pretty soon and I honestly don’t quite know what I’m going to do. It’s with that context that I really have to be fucking more careful when it comes to putting all my eggs in the basket of thinking this novel is going to solve all my fucking problems.

It’s just not.

Getting the type of success I need to live the life I want is so fucking rare with any novel — especially for a first novel novelist — that, I don’t know what to tell you. I’ve decided that even though I’m old as fuck (in publishing terms) that I’m going to keep working on novels no matter what.

I really enjoy the process.