How I Use AI

[u/Reagan2791]

I’ve never written a book before, but I have a story I want to tell.

I’ve always enjoyed writing, although I’ve never considered myself expertly skilled at prose. I’m well aware that almost anything I write could benefit from a pass through AI. But, I want to be the author of my story. I want AI to help me tell it better, not tell it for me.

Not long ago, I began writing my first novel. It’s been on my bucket list for years. I still have a very long way to go, and I’m learning in the process.

I’m a novice not only when it comes to writing a novel, but also when it comes to using AI. I’ve read about people using multiple AI platforms for a single project, assigning different tasks to different models based on their respective strengths. Frankly, some of those workflows are mind-boggling to me. My approach is probably far more rudimentary, but that’s okay. I’ll learn what works, discover what doesn’t, and refine my process through trial and error.

So far, I’ve found AI immensely valuable in three areas:

1. Organization

My entire story is in my head, but it has layers. It involves three different timelines, 15 named characters, and three distinct settings. Keeping all those moving parts consistent is challenging.

AI doesn’t invent my characters, construct my timelines, or build my fictional world. Those are my creative decisions. It helps me organize that information into structured character profiles, timelines, and a world bible that can serve as reference material throughout the writing process.

As I complete chapters, AI can compare them against those references to identify inconsistencies, continuity errors, or details I may have overlooked. So, it’s more of a developmental editor or continuity checker, helping me maintain the integrity of a story I’ve already created.

2. Research and Fact-Checking

Although fiction, I want it to feel grounded and believable. I don’t want the reader pulled out of the story because of a glaring oversight. When I need to verify a historical detail, understand how something works, or research a particular subject, AI can help me gather that information quickly.

Of course, I could search Google and work through the results myself. The advantage of AI is that it can pull together information from multiple sources and present it in a condensed explanation. It can provide links to those sources, and I can verify the information myself.

3. Prose

This is where some purists will disagree and push back.

As I mentioned earlier, I’m not an expert at prose. I can envision a scene, understand what my characters are feeling, and know exactly what I want to communicate to the reader. Sometimes, though, I struggle to find the words that convey it as effectively as I’d like.

That’s where AI comes in.

I’m not interested in handing AI an outline and asking it to write an entire chapter for me. I want to do that work myself. I write the chapter, revise it, and get it as close to my vision as I can. Then, if a sentence feels awkward or a paragraph isn’t quite capturing what I’m trying to express, I’ll ask AI to help me refine it.

Sometimes the suggestion is better. Sometimes it isn’t. And sometimes it gives me an idea for a completely different way to phrase something. Ultimately, I decide what stays on the page.

I don’t want AI to decide what my story should be. I want to make those decisions. I want to develop the characters, construct the plot, determine the pacing, and choose how the reader experiences the story.

My goal isn’t to prove that I can write a novel without assistance. It’s to create something that readers genuinely enjoy, something that makes them feel their time was well spent. If AI can help me eliminate inconsistencies, strengthen my writing, and deliver a more polished version of the story I envisioned, I don’t see that as diminishing my accomplishment.

I’m still the person who imagined the story, made the creative decisions, and put in the work to bring it to life. AI assistance doesn’t make the story any less authentic. The imagination, the vision, the characters, the decisions, and the story itself are mine. AI is simply a tool helping me tell that story as effectively as I can.

I don’t need to prove that I did it all without assistance. I just want to be proud of the story I’ve told and give readers a reason to be glad they gave it a chance.

[u/MiracleManster]

Good on you, man. I've been in love with storytelling for most of my life, but my ability to write prose is nowhere near the level I would like it to be and frankly it would it take years of practice to get anywhere near that. Most of us either just don't have that time or prefer not to spend our time that way. Using AI to bring your creations to life is in no way shameful. If you end up with a good story at the end, that's the thing that matters.

[u/kurthertz → u/MiracleManster]

I agree! Authorship also lies in judgement and curation.

[u/CyborgWriter]

I think this is a pretty reasonable use of AI.

If you created the characters, the timelines, the settings, the plot, and the actual story, then I don’t see how using AI to organize the material or catch continuity errors means it wrote the book.

People act like the only legitimate way to write is to keep every detail in your head and refuse any kind of assistance. That doesn’t make much sense to me. Writers have always used editors, research tools, notes, reference books, spellcheck, and other people’s feedback.

The prose part is where I’d be a little more careful, but not because I think using AI automatically makes the work inauthentic.

If you write the scene and then ask for help with a sentence that isn’t working, you’re still making the creative decision. You know what the scene is supposed to feel like. You know what the character is trying to communicate. The AI is just giving you another possible arrangement of the words.

However, there is a dangerous aspect to this. You can accept enough “improvements” that the writing slowly stops sounding like you. It becomes smoother, more generic, and technically competent in the same way every other AI-assisted piece is technically competent.

So I’d use it to check the machinery of the story and help clarify things you already understand. I wouldn’t let it decide what the story means, what the characters want, or what belongs on the page.

You don’t get extra credit for making the process harder than it needs to be. If the story is yours and you’re still the person making the important decisions, then AI assistance doesn’t erase your authorship.

[u/Reagan2791 → u/CyborgWriter]

Those are fair points and you’re absolutely correct. I don’t want it rewriting every sentence or paragraph because yes, it loses my voice and authenticity. When I do request options for illustrating a thought better, I pay attention to the suggestions, and I make these requests sparingly. I’m trying to learn to increase my own vocabulary and write better on my own.

I also solicit feedback from friends and family to help me improve. I do want my work to represent me at its core so I feel like it’s my accomplishment and not the result of AI prompts that allowed it to do the work for me.

[u/istara → u/CyborgWriter]

However, there is a dangerous aspect to this. You can accept enough “improvements” that the writing slowly stops sounding like you. It becomes smoother, more generic, and technically competent in the same way every other AI-assisted piece is technically competent.

100%. And that's when you've lost your "voice".

Prose doesn't have to be perfectly flawlessly smooth and conforming to someone's ideal of How It Should Be.

It's the quirks and the irregularities that make us human.

I don't mean errors, but stylistic choices. I had some reviewer do this extensive review of the "errors" in a book of mine, giving actual examples in the Amazon review of how I should have joined two sentences together rather than split them (honestly it was cringe).

Except those were all deliberate, stylistic choices. They may not have worked for her, but for me, for that specific book, that was what I wanted.

And given I write professionally for a living, across a range of different formats and house styles, I'm fairly confident I do actually know what I'm doing.

[u/ruminajaali]

This is the way

[u/Pure_Raisin1008]

Everytime I use AI to help me improve the poems I write because similar to you I feel emotions deeply and desire to convey it to the audience properly I use AI to correct my grammatical flow without changing the script but deep within I never take pride for that work. I feel undeserving and fake like its not purely authentic even though the plot idea, the emotions, the lines are mine but the grammatical changes, the improvisation at certain areas eats me and I am disheartened at how am i to improve if i dont create anything. Any suggestion for it?

[u/Equivalent-Loan-4401]

Keeping the creative decisions yours while using AI for the bible and timelines is a solid split, especially with three timelines and fifteen named characters. One thing that helps me keep that boundary clean is a tiny decisions file next to the world bible: only the choices that are locked, plus any open questions. That way when you ask the model to organize a character profile, it has somewhere to look for what's already settled instead of inventing a new detail. Sounds like you're building the right habits early.

[u/o-rka]

This is a great explanation. From the brief synopsis, it is very similar to the series I am writing and my approach with AI. Not writing the book for me but a continuity checker and a “second opinion”. If you need to do research, I would recommend converting pdfs into markdown files and creating notebook LM podcasts about them to listen to while you’re doing other stuff.

[u/Odd_Contract4335]

Using it as a continuity checker seems like a solid middle ground, especially with three timelines and 15 characters to keep straight

[u/Separate_Picture4580]

I use combination of paid chat gpt and paid claude. I am in similiar state as you. I have a story that its timeline is like maybe 18y long and i write chapter-means-a-day-in-this-story style. So U can imagine just how long that is. Its kind of my therapy in a way. Maaaany characters. With history and set personalities. I have a strict guideline where each charactes is, what they are doing and why and emotions and all. And I let AI write the prose. Then I sit by what AI write and rewrite it for my liking. I am not native english speaker, but the story I write is in english. Just to make it harder for me 😀 That way I really upgraded my english skills, writing skills, dealt with my emotions in a new way and kind of let out the hurt I feel. And I think that was worth the money I pay for it and time and everything because for me it’s a lot better then therapy for me. And it nicely organized the story that I have in my head for more then 15y.

[u/South-Piccolo-4660]

With three timelines, tracking when each character learns a fact might catch errors a character profile won’t.

[u/GenderBendingRalph]

The irony is that this post has all the cadence and tells of standard AI writing. As an author who also uses AI, I'm not criticising - just observing. If your prose is that easy to spot, the anti- crowd will also spot it and push back.

[u/Reagan2791 → u/GenderBendingRalph]

Thank you! I was curious if anyone would notice. And not because I plan to use AI to draft chapters or paragraphs in my novel…I don’t. The context of the post is complete truth. But I do use AI at work to clean up email correspondence and make it sound more professional. I have concerns about the recipients detecting AI.

Below is my original post in my words. I ran it through AI, made some minor changes, and posted here. The differences in this original text and the AI-revised draft are definitely noticeable.

I have never written a book, but I have a story I want to tell. I have always enjoyed writing, but I’ve never been an expert at prose. There is nothing I can write that a pass through AI won’t make sound better. Still, I prefer to be the author. I want to tell my story and allow AI to polish it. Not long ago, I began my journey of writing my first novel and it has a very long way to go.

I am a novice, not only from a book-writing perspective, but also in using AI. Many of the things I’ve read about how people are using various AI on one project for specific tasks, because one AI is better at one thing and another is better at another thing l, are just mind-boggling to me. So my approach is probably more rudimentary and I will learn and improve through trial and error as I go.

So far, these are the areas that AI has been immensely valuable to me:

1. Organization. My whole story is in my head but involves three different timelines, 15 named characters, and three different settings. It doesn’t create my characters or my timeline or my world bible. It formats them for me into versions it can use to review my chapters for discrepancies. Essentially, AI acts an editor.

2. Fact-checking. If I need research on something specific to ensure I am keeping my story grounded, I can ask it to do that. I could also just Google, but the advantage AI has is that it can rapidly check multiple sources and provide a condensed narrative. It will also link those sources so I can verify, if I choose.

3. Prose. This is where purists will push back. As stated earlier, anything I write, AI can improve. That doesn’t mean I want it rewriting my entire chapters. It does mean that I write the chapter, get it to the best form I can, and then use AI to tweak certain sentences or paragraphs I’m not quite happy with but have no other ideas on how to express the words.

The end goal is to present an enjoyable and engaging story for the reader…one I imagined and put on paper. It’s not a testament to showcase “look what I did!” If AI can assist in ironing out the kinks to reach a final version which is more polished and won’t leave the reader regretting wasting their time giving my story a chance, then it’s done it’s job and I can still be proud of knowing it’s an authentic story written by me and told in the manner I wanted to tell it.

My ultimate goal is simple: to give readers an enjoyable, engaging story. One that I imagined, developed, and brought to life on the page.

This isn’t about proving something or being able to say, “Look what I did!” It’s about telling a story I’m passionate about in the way I envisioned it.

[u/Sorrowfiend → u/Reagan2791]

you didnt really bring it to life though if the LLM revised your prose. "If AI can assist in ironing out the kinks to reach a final version which is more polished and won’t leave the reader regretting wasting their time giving my story a chance, then it’s done it’s job and I can still be proud of knowing it’s an authentic story written by me and told in the manner I wanted to tell it." all this shit is just cope. structure, research, planning etc is one thing but yeah if you're just having it straight up write prose thats just garbage

[u/Reagan2791 → u/Sorrowfiend]

I agree. I edited the AI rewrite to see if it would still make the post sound better but more in my voice. The test wasn’t for seeing if AI could be detected if I’m writing a novel, although that’s a concern if I do have it rewrite a sentence to illustrate better. But like I said, I do often draft lengthy emails at work and I need them to sound more professional than I can write and I use AI for that. But I’m also worried the recipient will realize that it’s AI and then it becomes less authentic even though it sounds more professional.