Artificial intelligence writing can be an incredible support for creating stories and novels, offering a range of helpful tools and resources to assist writers at every stage of the process. From generating ideas and developing plots, to enhancing language and improving the overall quality of your writing, AI can provide valuable support and guidance.
In this post, we explore ten ways to use AI to help you generate story ideas, enhance your language, and improve creativity. From AI writing assistants and prompts to proofreading and editing tools, there is a wide range of options available to writers looking to incorporate AI into their writing process. Whether you’re just starting out or an experienced writer looking to improve your skills, AI can be a powerful resource to help you achieve your writing goals.
So let’s start experimenting with artificial intelligence writing…
10 ideas for Artificial Intelligence writing
Use AI to explore Similes and Metaphors
Line Edit and Sentence Structure using Artificial Intelligence
Find Your Title with an AI tool
Create a Chapter Structure from a Synopsis
Avoid Obvious Story Next Steps
Understand Key Genre Story Points for your writing
Research Settings, both Real and Fantasy, for your novel using AI
Splice in Power Verbs and Super Nouns
Word Length Rewording using an AI tool
A quick word on the ethics of using artificial intelligence to help your novel writing.
Before we begin, a quick health warning. AI is in its infancy. And it is here to stay. Using Artificial Intelligence for novel and story writing will become more and more common for creatives. Just like dictionaries, thesaurus, proof-readers, beta-readers, Googling, and Grammarly, AI is the new evolution of technology that will help writers be more creative.
This article explores how you might use artificial intelligence writing to make your creative work even better. There is always human intervention to select the perfect phrase, title, or syntax for the exact intention of your writing. But this AI can be crazily helpful.
Use AI to explore Similes and Metaphors
AI can help writers explore similes and metaphors in a number of ways. AI writing tools have features that can suggest similes and metaphors based on the content of your writing.
A great way to do this is to tell the AI a little bit about the character – their location, background or personality – and then offer a tired cliche to come up with something original. You can use this as a guide post for something even more interesting and satisfying.
Here’s the prompt: Suggest 10 similes related to a character who lives in New York and loves fishing for: she couldn’t believe her eyes
- She couldn’t believe her eyes, they were as wide as saucers.
- She couldn’t believe her eyes, they were as big as the New York skyline.
- She couldn’t believe her eyes, they were as bright as the neon lights of Times Square.
- She couldn’t believe her eyes, they were as sharp as the hooks she used for fishing in the Hudson River.
- She couldn’t believe her eyes, they were as sparkling as the fish she caught in Central Park.
- She couldn’t believe her eyes, they were as expressive as the graffiti on the subway trains.
- She couldn’t believe her eyes, they were as attentive as a hawk watching for prey.
- She couldn’t believe her eyes, they were as piercing as the skyscrapers piercing the clouds.
- She couldn’t believe her eyes, they were as curious as a tourist exploring the city.
- She couldn’t believe her eyes, they were as mischievous as a street performer in Washington Square Park.
I love how this artificial intelligence writing is able to combine the character with the cliche to generate something fresh.
Line Edit and Sentence Structure using Artificial Intelligence
AI can be a helpful tool for line editing and improving sentence structure in writing. Some AI writing tools offer features such as grammar and spelling checking, which can help writers identify and correct errors in their writing. Other AI tools offer suggestions for rephrasing and restructuring sentences to improve clarity and flow. By analyzing the structure and wording of sentences, these tools can help writers identify areas where their writing may be confusing or awkward, and offer suggestions for improvement.
Line editors can offer you different ideas for how to make your story work, but artificial intelligence writing can enhance this with many more options: Like this example…
Here’s a prompt to use AI to help with line editing and playing with sentence structure. Suggest three new sentence structures for this: The dog wasn’t hungry until it met the butcher:
- The butcher wasn’t on the dog’s radar until it met him and suddenly felt hungry.
- The dog had no appetite until it came across the butcher and then suddenly felt famished.
- It wasn’t until the dog met the butcher that it realized it was hungry.
The artificial intelligence writing plays with the order of the verbs and nouns, to give different pace, and emphasis to the lines.
Ultra Intelligent Thesaurus using artificial intelligence writing
AI can be an ultra-intelligent thesaurus by providing writers with access to a wide range of vocabulary options.
Simply ask the AI to suggest alternatives to a word you want to change, enhance or exchange.
Here’s my original sentence:
The sun was high, the night was young, and I felt warm.
But I felt something was off about the last word. You agree right? Warm doesn’t quite capture the mood.
So I gave ChatGPT a prompt to place warm in this sentence: The sun was high, the night was young, and I felt warm.
Traditionally, knowing something was up, I might have reached for a thesaurus on or offline. But now, the AI can give these five alternatives.
- “The sun was high, the night was young, and I felt toasty.”
- “The sun was high, the night was young, and I felt comfortable.”
- “The sun was high, the night was young, and I felt snug.”
- “The sun was high, the night was young, and I felt heated.”
- “The sun was high, the night was young, and I felt sultry.”
Only I can judge that number 5 gives exactly the right romantic mood, but my selection is enhanced by artificial intelligence writing.
Find Your Title with an AI tool
Picking a title can be a nightmare. Aritifical Intelligience writing can help you explore ideas to hone in on what feels right. Some AI writing tools include a title generator feature, which can provide suggestions based on the content and theme of your writing. These tools use natural language processing algorithms to analyze your text and generate a list of potential titles that may be a good fit. You can then browse through the list and select the one that speaks to you the most or use it as a starting point for brainstorming your own ideas. In addition, some AI writing tools offer features such as word associations or word clouds, which can help writers brainstorm and generate ideas for titles by providing a visual representation.
Here’s the prompt:
Suggest 10 titles for this story: A frog is bored with his current friends. He discovers that the higher he can jump, the more new friends he has. In the end, he realises that these new friends aren’t true friends, they only love him for his jumping. And his old friends were true friends all along.
- “The Bored Frog”
- “The Jumping Frog”
- “The Lonely Leap”
- “Frogs and Fakes”
- “The Great Jump”
- “The Search for True Friends”
- “The High Life”
- “The Frog Who Lost and Found”
- “The Great Friendship Fraud”
- “The Return of the Loyal Frog”
Create a Chapter Structure from a Synopsis through artificial intelligence writing
Artificial intelligence writing can be a helpful tool for creating a chapter structure for your novel based on a synopsis or outline. Some AI writing tools offer features that allow writers to input a synopsis or outline and generate a chapter-by-chapter breakdown based on the content and structure of the story.
In ChatGPT 3, I used this prompt about a lonely frog:
From this synopsis, write suggested 12 suggested chapters with a summary of the chapter: A frog is bored with his current friends. He discovers that the higher he can jump, the more new friends he has. In the end he realises that these new friends aren’t true friends, they only love him for his jumping. And his old friends were true friends all along.
Here’s the result of the moving story. The structure is a start, not an end, to an interesting fairy story. You’ll see that the AI hasn’t made too exciting a story. But hopefully, it sparks new ideas for your own creativity.
- “The Bored Frog” – The frog is tired of hanging out with his current friends and decides to set out on a journey to find new ones.
- “The Frog’s Quest” – The frog sets out on a journey to find new friends, determined to find someone who will appreciate him for who he is.
- “The Frog’s First Jump” – As the frog travels, he discovers that he has a natural talent for jumping and starts to use it as a way to make new friends.
- “The Frog’s New Friends” – The frog’s impressive jumping skills earn him a host of new friends, and he starts to enjoy his new social circle.
- “The Frog’s Love for Jumping” – The frog becomes more and more obsessed with jumping, and it becomes the main focus of his life.
- “The Frog’s Competition” – The frog’s jumping skills catch the attention of other frogs, and he becomes embroiled in a series of competitive jumping matches.
- “The Frog’s Victory” – The frog emerges as the top jumper in the land, and his fame and popularity soar.
- “The Frog’s False Friends” – As the frog basks in his newfound fame, he starts to realize that many of his new friends are only hanging out with him because of his jumping skills.
- “The Frog’s Realization” – The frog begins to feel lonely and used, and realizes that his old friends were true friends all along.
- “The Frog’s Loss” – The frog loses his love for jumping and starts to feel disconnected from his new friends.
- “The Frog’s Return Home” – The frog decides to return home to his old friends, feeling grateful for their genuine love and support.
- “The Frog’s True Friends” – The frog is welcomed home with open arms by his old friends, and is grateful to have rediscovered the true meaning of friendship.
Avoid Obvious Story Next Steps
Artificial intelligence writing can be an incredibly useful tool for helping writers identify the next steps in their story. But, perhaps more importantly, you can turn AI on it’s head too, by actively avoiding its suggestions – which can often be trite and unoriginal.
Here’s a great example. Ask the AI to extend a simple story prompt to see what it comes up with, then think of ideas that avoid this:
So for this AI prompt, what things might we want to avoid?: A boy meets a girl. The boy is handsome. The girl is shy. What happens next? Give me five ideas.
- The boy strikes up a conversation with the girl, trying to put her at ease with his charm and wit.
- The girl is too shy to talk to the boy, but can’t help stealing glances at him from across the room.
- The boy makes a grand gesture to win the girl’s attention, such as giving her a flower or performing a song for her.
- The girl’s friends try to encourage her to talk to the boy, but she is too nervous and ends up running away.
- The boy and girl accidentally bump into each other, leading to an awkward but ultimately endearing conversation.
How many times have we seen these points in novels and in the movies? Now, you have a cheat sheet on what unoriginal ideas to avoid.
Understand Key Genre Story Points for your writing
AI offer features that allow writers to input the genre of their novel and generate a list of suggested plot points, themes, and character traits that are commonly found in that genre. By providing a roadmap for incorporating genre-specific elements into your writing, AI can help writers create more authentic and effective stories.
Here’s a prompt in ChatGPT 3 for an exotic genre. You’ll see the AI sometimes states the obvious but also gives key guideposts for what your story might include.
What are 10 key genre points that are typically found in a futuristic zombie murder mystery?
- A setting in the future: The story takes place in a future time period, potentially featuring advanced technology or society.
- The presence of zombies: Zombies, either created by science or the result of a viral outbreak, play a central role in the story.
- A murder mystery: The story includes a murder or series of murders that the characters must solve.
- Action and suspense: The story is likely to include high-stakes action and suspense as the characters try to solve the mystery and survive the zombie threat.
- Themes of survival and the human condition: The story may explore themes of survival and the human condition as the characters navigate the dangers of the future and confront the zombie threat.
- Post-apocalyptic elements: The story may feature a world that has been devastated by the zombie outbreak, with characters struggling to rebuild society and survive in a post-apocalyptic landscape.
- High-tech weaponry and gadgets: The story may include advanced technology, such as high-tech weapons and gadgets, used by the characters to defend themselves against the zombies.
- Military or government involvement: The military or government may play a role in the story, either as the perpetrators of the zombie outbreak or as the defenders trying to contain it.
- Psychological horror: The story may explore the psychological effects of living in a world overrun by zombies, such as trauma, fear, and isolation.
- Social commentary: The story may use the zombie threat as a metaphor for real-world issues, such as consumerism, conformity, or the dangers of technology.
Research Settings, both Real and Fantasy, for your novel using AI
Artificial intelligence writing can be a super helpful tool for researching locations, both real and fantasy, for your writing. Some AI writing tools offer features that allow writers to input a location and generate a list of suggested details and descriptions based on the specific characteristics of that location. These tools use natural language processing algorithms to analyze the location and provide a list of relevant details and information, such as weather patterns, topographical features, historical events, and cultural traditions. This can be an awesome way for writers to get a sense of the unique qualities and characteristics of a particular location, and to ensure that they are accurately and effectively depicting it in their writing. Additionally, some artificial intelligence writing writing tools offer features such as world-building tools, which can help writers create and describe fantastical or fictional locations in a way that feels believable and immersive. By providing a wealth of information and inspiration for location-based writing, AI can help writers create more authentic and effective stories.
Want to feel like you are living in a place, ask the AI to use the five senses to describe a location.
Here’s what GPT3 came up with for Athens, standing in front of the Acropolis.
When standing in front of the Acropolis in Athens, you can see the ancient ruins towering above you, their marble columns and stone structures gleaming in the sun. You can feel the heat of the sun on your skin and the rough texture of the stone beneath your feet. You can hear the faint sounds of traffic in the distance and the chirping of birds in the trees. You can smell the faint scent of olive oil and oregano wafting through the air from nearby restaurants. You can taste the salt on your lips from the humidity in the air. Overall, it is an experience filled with a sense of history and wonder.
If this doesn’t stimulate your writing ideas, you may just be a robot.
And of course, your research doesn’t have to end here. You can ask your AI anything about the place you are researching. No need to hop on a plane anymore, just pick and ask.
Splice in Power Verbs and Super Nouns
Artificial intelligence writing can be a helpful tool for adapting your novels and stories to use more powerful verbs and nouns. Some AI writing tools offer features that allow writers to input a piece of text and generate a list of suggestions for more descriptive or impactful words to use in place of less expressive ones.
Most writers know that abjectives and adverbs are often baggy and slow down language. The AI can crack more simple language to tell you what you really mean with more active verbs and super nouns.
For example: why say – I agreed happily – when the AI suggests the power verb – I consented?
Or why say, the “green” apple, when the AI can offer:
- “The emerald apple”
- “The jade apple”
- “The viridian apple”
- “The forest green apple”
- “The kelly green apple”?
Word Length Rewording for artificial intelligence writing
Artificial intelligence writing can adapt word length in writing, whether you’re looking to summarize or extend passages. This can be a great way for writers to ensure that their writing is the appropriate length for a particular purpose, or to condense or expand information as needed.
So, you can extend a sentence with ease:
Mara opened her mouth, and in crawled a caterpillar.
extended to become..
Mara opened her mouth, and in crawled a caterpillar, its tiny legs tickling the inside of her cheek as it made its way to the back of her tongue. She recoiled in disgust, her eyes widening in shock as she tried to figure out how the caterpillar had ended up in her mouth. As she frantically tried to spit it out, the caterpillar seemed to be enjoying its unexpected journey, wriggling happily as it explored its new surroundings.
Now, you can extend or reduce this with artificial intelligence writing to your heart’s content…
Want to learn more about how AI can help you write a story? Visit this mindblowing advice on artificial intelligence story writing here.