My position on AI is perhaps more nuanced than most writers. The irony is that I decided to write The Wyrmfeld Chronicles BECAUSE of AI. I got hornswoggled by the promise of Text to Video when I saw wooly mammoths lumbering across a winter landscape. At that moment, I recalled the story that had been slumbering in my consciousness like the dragon slumbering at the bottom of the Wyrmmere. And so, like Myrddin Emrys, I conjured up that which lay dormant for far too long.
Of course I later learned that AI images, despite unparalleled advancements is no where near ready for prime time. I’ll likely need to become a director if I want to see this story come to life. But that’s a post for another time.
As a technologist for over 25 years I am quite comfortable using AI tools. But they are far from mature. When I asked it to create unit tests based on a computer module I created in C#, it was close to worthless. I don’t ask it to create my prose, but I do find some value in having it analyze mine.
One example is that I fed the first scene in my novel into Gemini. When I introduce the reader to Wyrtgeorn I end the passage with “How did a Viking get baptized into a christian name and barony? Well, that is a story for another time.” (It really is, and it’s working title is: “The Resurrection of Wyrtgeorn”.).
Gemini said this:
“Well, that was a story for another time”: While this phrase attempts to create intrigue about Wyrtgeorn’s past, it can feel a bit like a narrative hand-wave. While you don’t need to explain it now, you could rephrase to suggest the depth of his past without directly stating it’s a story for later. For example: “His baptism into an Anglo-Saxon name and barony was a tale stretching back years, to the very eve of the Battle of Fulford.” This implies the story exists without overtly telling the reader to wait for it.
Fair enough. It caused me to reexamine my hand-waving. But I didn’t use that example text because it didn’t work. Instead, I chose to condense down the opening chapter “The Road to Fulford” down to a single paragraph.
I came up with this as a first draft:
The last time he had been amongst them was on the eve of the Battle of Fulford. And that had been years ago. It was on that battlefield where he met the man who became his adoptive father. The Day of Red Mud. The old fool stood squire to his son, only to watch him fall to a coward’s death. An arrow found the back of his neck when he broke from the line as it began to collapse.
Death by cowardice was a fate the old squire would not idly abide. He would sooner join his only son in muddy death than return home ignominiously. But Gudmund of Trondheim saw in the battered old man a lord he could ransom. Neither man got what he wanted that fateful day; for the hand of fate was at play, plucking on the harp strings of destiny.
I’ll use any tool that will help me look at my writing with fresh eyes.
Wyrmfeld Chronicles 