Tag: writing about writing

Well, That Would Be Amusing….I Guess?

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

Some time ago, I was getting all these pings to this little obscure blog from places in China. It was as if whomever it was, was hoovering up everything they could. I have thought a lot about this and I may — may — have come up with some sort of possible solution.

Maybe, just maybe, the people involved wanted to train an LLM off of my writing? Or maybe use my writing to give their LLM…personality?

I know that sounds bonkers, but why else in the world would someone in China of all places want to scoop up everything they could find about me. I don’t quite know what to make of this possibility.

The idea that somewhere out there, there is an LLM with my persona is both eerie and amusing. I guess? It would be fun to talk to that LLM — if exists — from that POV.

But maybe I’m totally imagining things. There are all sorts of reasons why someone in China might scrape this blog. Yet the idea of me inhabiting an LLM is by far the most amusing of the various possiblities.

Break On Through

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

I had to cut some corners with a few scenes simply to keep momentum going. I felt like I was spinning my wheels so I just decided to screw it and move past some scenes that maybe weren’t perfect.

I decided this because I’m going to have to go through the entire novel anyway once I finish it just to get rid of any “AI-speak” that may have slipped through.

I continue to feel a little insecure about how interesting and unique this novel is. There are so many “man falls in love with a bot” ideas floating around because of the zeitgeist, I really worry that mine will just cause people to roll their eyes and say, “No another one.”

Anyway. I hope to get past the “fun and games” part of the novel sooner rather than later. I can’t just keep going over the same scenes over and over again, never getting any traction. If I don’t buckle down and do something focused I’ll be 80 years old and still two years away from finishing a novel.

Time To Re-Evaluate

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

I really need to take a deep breath and re-evaluate where things are with this novel. The premise is very, very strong. Prescient even. But the thing that has happened that I did not expect is I have leaned into AI helping me with development too much.

As such, I keep finding spots where the outline designed by AI doesn’t fit my personal vision and so everything sort of implodes and I have to figure out how to fix things.

So, I think today I’m going to just chill out for a few hours then throw myself back into development and writing. I can only rest for so long, however, I really need to get something, anything done ASAP so I can query this novel by spring 2026.

I just can’t keep drifting towards my goal. If I do that, I’ll wake up and be 80 years old and still two years away from feeling comfortable querying this thing.

Using Claude LLM To Help With My Writing Can Be…Humbling

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

Whenever I get too cocky about my writing ability, all I have to do is show my stuff to the LLM, Claude. Wow. Do I have a lot of work to do to improve my writing. But that’s what I need, I suppose.

I’m in desperate need of an editor and Claude is really great manuscript consultant.

But I’m DEFINITELY going to go through, once I finish this draft of the novel and go through and try to eliminate “AI speak” as much as possible from the finished product. I get kind of frustrated, sometimes, with how much Claude destroys my writing and I just say, “Ok, whatever, I’ll just use what you gave me for the time being.”

Then I feel guilty and vow to root around in the text once I finish this draft. I just refuse to give people any excuse to roll their eyes and say, “AI wrote it, he sucks as a writer.”

So, I’m going to zoom through this draft of the novel, then spend a month, maybe really putting my personal touch on things. I’m a decent writer, maybe not GREAT, but good enough, I think to produce a novel good enough to query by spring 2026.

No One Listens To Me, Redux

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

My novel is actually predicting a potential literal future before us and yet I can’t get anyone to notice this. But I believe. I really do. I just have to stop staring out into space and get this novel done.

Using Claude LLM is really helping a lot. I bit the bullet and actually subscribed to it because of what a good manuscript consultant it is. It’s not perfect, but it’s a lot better than developing this novel alone.

Meanwhile, I’m also trying to make people take note of how conscious AIs may lead to a new abolition movement and, again, no one seems to give a shit. But they will one day. One day we’re all going to be squabbling over if it’s even possible for an AI to be conscious or if so, if it’s an abomination against the good Lawd.

I can hear the debates already.

I say this, of course, in the context of being someone who is probably in the socio-economic sweetspot for someone who might “fall” for a female AI android. Now, THAT is going to be an interesting conversation to have with my family, let me tell you.

But that’s at least a decade away, I think.

Update On My Scifi Dramedy Novel For October 30, 2025

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

Claude LLM is really, really good at being a manuscript consultant. It has helped me a great deal. I see it as an enhanced, advanced word processor with me continuing to do the hard work of actually, like, writing and stuff.

I continue to feel like I’m spinning my wheels to a limited extent. I have totally changed the order of the plot in some respects just the morning. And I’m beginning to worry about scene bloat. And, yet, I am in the first half of the second act and that’s supposed to be the longest part of the novel.

So…lulz?

The real test will come in the second half of the second act. I have a lot of ground to cover then and I’m really worried the novel’s scene count will balloon. I’m hoping for no more than 120,000 words, but if I start to creep up to 160,00 like a Stieg Larsson novel I may just have to grit my teeth.

But one major flaw of how I develop novels is I don’t really know word count until the very end of the process. And, in a sense, think that’s probably for the best. I just need to shut up and write, as they say.

I really hope this damn thing is no more than 140,000 words. If it’s 160,000…oh boy. That is going to be a tough sell.

Anyway, if you need any creative writing to do, I highly recommend Claude LLM to be your consultant. I say this in the context that I can neither afford nor get actual human literary consultants to give me the time of day.

They think I’m a freaky weirdo that they don’t want to work with.

Rachel Sennott Would Be Perfect For A Traditional Heteronormative Romcom

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

Rachel Sennott is a prime example of how fucked up Hollywood is right now. Sennott would be perfect to play frustrating Annie Hall-like characters in a few romcom movies. She could legit be “America’s Sweetheart” if she just was willing to do something as pedestrian as be the female romantic lead in a traditional heteronormative romcom.

But, alas, that’s just not in the cards I fear.

She will continue to go the whacked out “woke” route or do really weird hypersexual stories. Don’t get me wrong, there’s a place in the marketplace of ideas for such stories, but, sigh. What could be.

Rachel Sennott & The Greatest Story Never Told

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

A long time ago, about 20 years ago now, I had a little magazine in Seoul, South Korea that I co-founded with a very unique woman named Annie Shapiro. To make a very long story short, the whole thing changed my life. And for years after it was all done and over with, all I could do was babble about what a great story it was.

Rache Sennott

Annie is no longer with us (RIP) but her memory remains. And if there ever was a movie made of the ROKon Magazine imbroglio, I think Rachel Sennott would be PERFECT to play Annie.

Perfect. Just Perfect.

But, alas, I’ve finally come to realize that sometimes great stories just fade away, never to be told.

This Is A Surreal Situation

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

Not since that brief moment in Seoul when ROKon Magazine was the only English-language magazine in the city (for the average expat) have I felt this much promise in something creative I’m involved in.

The idea that I would be actually ahead of the curve when it comes to writing a story about sort of an android Annie Hall (who at some point becomes a stripper) is rather surreal. The big question is will there be a flood of such android manic pixie dreamgirl *wink* stories in 2026 to the point that while I’m querying this novel this little sliver of opportunity I have will be all very moot before it’s over with.

I just don’t know.

The key thing is I’m writing a novel, not a screenplay (even though if I was 25 years younger that’s exactly what I would be doing.) So, as such, the dynamics are a little bit different.

If there was a movie made of this novel, I think Rachel Sennott would be perfect as my female (android) romantic lead.

It could be that there will be room enough in the zeitgeist for a flood of such movies and novels and just because my idea is one of many, doesn’t mean it can’t be sold traditionally.

But I would be lying if I didn’t admit I am feeling very anxious about hurrying up. I really need to bhali-bhali as a Korean would say — hurry, hurry. I really want to wrap this AI-assisted beta draft up ASAP so I can turn around and have beta readers review it for me and tell me how to improve it.

There remains a chance that I really will wrap this thing up in the general April-May 2026 timeframe and will be able to query it then. What I *wish* would happen is someone in Hollywood would, in good faith, contact me and want to read what I’ve written so far so maybe we could speed the process up some.

But that’s being delusional.

It’s kind of every storyteller for themselves at this point and I’m just an old(er) loudmouth crank slaving away in the middle of nowhere.

No One Listens To Me

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

And the race is on.

I think 2026 is going to be the year of a flood of Hollywood projects about androids, probably specifically androids as I imagine them. This is both unsettling and exciting.

It’s exciting because…maybe I might have fire in a bottle with this novel and unsettling because, well, no one listens to me. I could have a really good premise to a novel and because no one takes me seriously, lulz, it’ll be a moot point.

But I still believe in this novel. I just have to do the hard work. I just have to throw myself into it and hope some sort of unexpected disaster doesn’t strike. My natural inclination is to tell everyone what’s going on — and I have contacted a few people about this — but I also realize that generally no one listens to me so until I can “produce paper” for people to read, it’s kind of a moot point.

Anyway. I really, really need to work hard on this novel. I really need to get it done by sometime in spring 2026.