by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner
I think — think — I have a stable first chapter of the latest version of this scifi dramedy novel I’ve been working on. What I need, of course, is a human collaborators to help me out. A reader, if you will. Someone like Helen from The World According To Garp to read over and over and over again all these different versions of scenes I keep generating.
But all I got is AI.
And AI does a pretty good job, most of the time. Sometimes, of course, it get a wild hair and does something really wonky. But that’s only occasionally. I’m really pleased, in general, with what I’ve managed to come up with.
I just wish I did not keep finding structural issues with the plot so I have to revise the outline. This happens way, way too often. Even with the help of AI. There’s a big difference, sometimes, between AIs vision for the novel and my innate vison. So I struggle.
And sometimes I feel like the whole process has gotten out of my grasp and I have to figure out ways to lock the creative process down some so I’m still in control. All this back and forth between myself and AI causes me to feel like I’m spinning my wheels.
I’m not getting any younger. I still really want to wrap up this novel and start querying by late spring 2026. But…I don’t know. It could be fall 2026 before I get to that point.
Which is, I fear, kind of depressing.
