Monday, March 4, 2024

You get a free book for my birthday month!

This has been the best winter ever in terms of weather. We had real winter for a month. That was just long enough to appreciate winter. Anyway, moving on to Spring! Yay! I can deal with occasional days of snow in between the good ones, but being able to work in the yard in FEBRUARY is pretty damn awesome. Especially when the months that I'm usually trying to squeeze in lawn clean up are filled with book events.

Between the stick picking up duties and bonfires, I'm putting the final editing touches on One Shot At The Sphinx. Which led to sitting down to re-read the series to make sure I have all the facts straight. Oh, the perils of writing a prequel after building the world for six books. And while I'm reading, I got the bright idea to reformat the paperback interiors to celebrate the series being tied up. Is it actually done? It might go on (there are notes for another book) but the core series is complete. I'm not changing the content, just doing a facelift. #projects.

Painting on Laya's Vacation is slow going. The cover is done but I haven't found my grove on the rest yet beyond doing a full mock up of the book. My brain needs to wrap up the series first before it has the power to delve into this undertaking.

Writing on I9 is on hold, also until the series is wrapped up, because it turns out that working on two sci-fi projects at once makes story details easy to entangle. Oops. #dontcrossthestreams

March is my birthday month, so this year, I'm offering sales on some of my ebooks. 

A Broken Race is only .99 Feb 26 - March 4 on Amazon

Not Another Bard's Tale and Dreams Of Stars And Lies are only .99 - March 3-9  on Smashwords

Sahmara is FREE March 20-24

Mid-Michigan Women's Expo 

My one February event was a blast other than a medical emergency with one of the other attending authors the morning of the first day. Nothing like a medical scare to start things off. Thankfully, everyone is ok now and we agree on the need for having an emergency contact list for group events like this in the future. 

18 Authors and so many books


March is full of fun author events. You can find me at:

Hall of Heroes Comic Con - March 2&3

West Michigan Women's Expo - March 15-17

Alma Con - March 23&24

If you're not familiar with 
and find links to all the other 
participating writers.

This month's Insecure Writer's Support Group question is:

Have you "played" with AI to write those nasty synopses, or do you refuse to go that route? How do you feel about AI's impact on creative writing?

This month's co-hosts are: 

Miffie Seideman  https://miffieseideman.com/  

Kristina Kelly    http://kristinaseyes.com/

Liza http://middlepassages-lcs.blogspot.com/   

Jean Davis http://jeanddavis.blogspot.com/  

I'm not a fan of AI in writing. I don't use it beyond the common features of Grammarly and Pro Writing Aid. Even then, I don't like the more AI involved features those programs offer. #theresistance

Could AI help me write my synopsis? Sure. Can I write a synopsis? Also sure. Having done it a few times, writing a blurb or a synopsis isn't a terrible chore anymore. I've gotten fairly comfortable with it.

Could AI help me brainstorm scenes? Yep. I could also just sit here and close my eyes and brainstorm scenes. Again, having written quite a few books, I'm fairly comfortable and confident in my ability to keep the writing momentum going.

Could it help me pick out appropriate keywords for ads? Now this I might delve into a little because I'm not comfortable there yet. But that's not quite as much on the 'creative' end of the AI abilities as much as other aspects. Like all tools, AI has its uses. Just be responsible so we don't end up with #skynet blowing us up over bad grammar.



33 comments:

  1. Sorry about the medical scare at the convention.
    I've not played with AI yet. I don't even have Grammarly.
    Enjoy your birthday month and thanks for co-hosting!

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  2. Happy birthday! Other than the way AI has already crept into my life, (Hello Google, Siri, etc.) I haven't explored it. I could see it being helpful for research maybe, but definitely would not use it to write. Happy IWSG.

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  3. Happy birthday. Thanks for co-hosting. :)

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  4. Hi, I know Grammarly uses AI but I am not comfortable with it. I like Grammarly and have been a preminum customer for over 12 years. So, I am very careful now when I use it.
    Thank you so much for co-hosting.

    Shalom shalom,
    Pat G @ EverythingMustChange

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  5. Hello fellow cohost! Congrats on completing a series and prequel! That's fantastic! I'm in the AI resistance mostly as well. Once it can do marketing for me, maybe I'll sing another tune. I'd rather be writing!

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  6. I'm right there in the resistance with you. I don't have much interest in trying to short-cut my processes--the point of this is self-expression, not technological expertise. @samanthabwriter from
    Balancing Act

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  7. Happy Birthday, Jean. Hope your month is fun and festive. I agree with you about AI. Scary what will happen next. I'm always going to lean towards the human factor. Cheers to you and thanks for co-hosting.

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  8. "...working on two sci-fi projects at once makes story details easy to entangle." I never know how writers manage that. One and I'm tangling up scenes! Happy birthday month!

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  9. Happy March birthday! I have 6 family members with March birthdays. It must be a good month. Congrats on finishing your series and adding a sequel. I have never attempted a series fearing I would have too many errors like the protagonist has blue eyes in one book and brown in the other. Good for you! Unbelievable the "spring" weather in MI this year. Enjoy!! Thanks for co-hosting!

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    1. There's a definite need for a 'series bible' to keep track of all that stuff. Having the same editor do the whole series has been invaluable.

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  10. A medical emergency is certainly an intense way to start off a book event. So glad everyone's okay now.

    Happy birthday month!

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  11. I've missed going to our MI women's expos. Used to attend a bunch of them in the early days with fellow authors/writers but have drifted away from it since COVID. I tried AI editing but it took more time to convince it I was using slang or picked a particular word on purpose I gave up on it. I spent all my time editing its editing.

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  12. Agreed! I'm not going to use AI for my books, book covers, anything. Happy Birthday month!

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  13. I agree! AI has it's place and I think using it in data type situations (looking for key words, helping identify SEO keyphrases, helping my spelling) are all reasonable. It's when it begins to steal work to create financial gain for others and writing junk that reflect poorly on the majority of authors that I have some real ethical and legal concerns.
    Thanks for the post and co-hosting today!

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  14. Happy Birthday Ms Davis. Looks like we are generally on the same page regarding AI. The kicker will be when the programs are sufficiently advanced that certain types of readers will be attracted to the books. However, I find there's a certain quality of energy, something hard to describe, when considering a purchase of something that was hand-made versus mass produced through automation. That being said, I wouldn't turn up my nose if a Lamborghini landed in my driveway, LOL.

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  15. Happy Birthday, Jean! I hope you have a good one. Thanks for co-hosting IWSG. I'm with you on AI. Creativity belongs to humans. AI can help with facts and research.

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  16. Happy Birthday, Jean! I have a birthday in March too. Here's to great birthday celebrations! 🥂. Thanks for co-hosting today. Have fun visiting around.

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  17. Happy March birthday as well as other holidays in the month - enjoy all the shenanigans! This was a measured and insightful post - thanks!

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  18. Thanks for co-hosting today! And Happy Birthday! I have a trusty synopsis template example I use so using AI to help with that is unnecessary. Besides, although I'm fine using Grammarly, ProWriting Aid and Hemingway App, I wouldn't use AI for any part of the creative writing process.

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  19. Happy March birthday. Thanks for hosting this month. I agree with you on using AI as an aid to writing, a tool rather than the creator.

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  20. Happy Birthday month, Jean! #theresistance - haha! Right on, write on. Thanks for helping me believe there is such a thing. Real Writers Unite! Thanks for co-hosting ;-)

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  21. I use Grammarly for editing my writing. It catches a bunch of overlooked or sloppy punctuation, spacing, and lazy words, but their suggestions on anything else they're not that great

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  22. Happy Birthday, Jean! That's great that the women's conference went well. I agree that Al can be a tool and use it to help write articles for my job.

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  23. Happy Birthday. I have used Grammarly, but that is as far as I go. I'll do it all myself.

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  24. That's the new slogan: "AI Responsibly" :) I like it! I love seeing all your new books, I will probably never catch up on reading all of them, but I'm going to try! So keep going!!

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  25. Given the number of in-person events you attend every year, you are far ahead of the curve proving that you are a real person. I've even seen you face to face many times! Unless we are all living in a simulation, in which case all bets are off.

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  26. I'm also enjoying the milder winter because next year we could be buried in feet of snow.
    I'm with you. What is the fun of writing if we're not the ones doing the writing? Even if I whine about it, I enjoy the process of it.

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  27. I think you've hit the nail on the head. Even some of the more laborious chores are still enjoyable to do when it's your own work.
    Thanks for co-hosting this month :)

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  28. First of all, belated birthday wishes, second thanks so much for dropping by my page, and third #theresistance

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  29. I kinda figure if AI is here, make it work for us and assign it some of the time consuming chores. As we all seem to agree, I draw the line at asking AI to take over the creative side. That's up to us and where we grow as writers.

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  30. Having a program help with keywords doesn't sound terrible. Good idea! Actually creating for me is a deal breaker though.

    Great news on the series! Congratulations!

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  31. Happy Birthday! Glad everyone was ultimately okay at the gathering. We had someone at a writing conference have a massive asthma attack from airborne mango. Luckily, we had actually held a "CSI" type program and there was a paramedic present. Any other night it would have gone differently.

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