It’s Insecure Writers Support Group day–the first Wednesday of every month. We’re here for you if you’re doubting or struggling.

IWSG was formed by Ninja Captain Alex Cavanaugh. Members post about their doubts and fears, discuss struggles and triumphs, and offer words of encouragement to others who are struggling.

Twitter handle: @TheIWSG

Hashtag: #IWSG

Every month, we announce a question that members can answer in their IWSG post. These questions may prompt you to share advice, insight, a personal experience or story.

The question is always optional.

August 7 question – Do you use AI in your writing and if so how? Do you use it for  your posts? Incorporate it into your stories? Use it for research? Audio?

My response will address using AI for writing long fiction only. I can’t speak to the research, creating social media content or audio.

I investigated AI after taking a free course from Joseph Michael. He made plotting with AI seem interesting. I plugged in a simple one sentence blurb and asked chatGPT to outline a romance. According to JM the first draft probably won’t be acceptable. You need to ask ChatGPT for several more drafts and keep at it until you find something you like. Actually, I found ChatGPT fun to play with. It does stimulate one’s imagination. And some of those drafts didn’t sound too bad to me—after all, we’re going to put our own spin on the characters, the conflict and the entire story… aren’t we?

So here’s the thing: as writers, we want the respect of our peers as much as we want readers to love our work. (Lord knows I deal with “imposter syndrome” enough. I sure don’t need AI to reinforce that.) Why would we risk being called a fake, a cheater, a liar? Where’s the joy in writing, creating the book of our heart—over and over and over again—if we don’t do the actual creating?

I’ll pass on using AI. There are enough fakes in our world.

Thanks for visiting me, and good writing!

jrf