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ChatGPT Can Be Useful To Authors, Even If It Still Seems Weird
Is it cheating?
Ok, I’ve avoided ChatGPT forever (a month-ish). This whole AI thing is creepy, and soon we’ll be using AI to provide all our creativity. Robots are taking over the world! But today I saw an interesting Medium article on using AI to come up with headlines, and I had to admit it was a brilliant idea. I mean, I’ve used headline generators before. And while the results are usually weird, it will often trigger something in me so that I can come up with a better headline.
So why not do this for the books I write?
No. Not writing the book. There’s a line. But the title?
It’s so weird, it could work.
Coming up with a title for any of my books is right up there with writing a blurb about it. THE WORST. I can write 75,000 words to a story, but sum it up in just a few to make people want to read it? Impossible. I decline. Do not make me do this.
Alas, I must if I want to actually put my books out there. That said, I’m not sure I have ever come up with a good title.
Case in point:
A Symphony of Cicadas. This is the title of my first book, and yes, it’s poetic. But could you tell me what it’s about? Would you read this book based on the title?
Okay, how about my bestselling book?
Loving the Wind. Without the subtitle, WHAT THE HECK IS THIS BOOK ABOUT??? You would think this was a romance novel, or a weird nature book. But no, it’s a young adult Peter Pan prequel story.
My problem with both of these books is that I chose it from some poetic phrasing inside the story. It was a good line, so I thought, why not make that a headline?
Sometimes this works. Often, it gets lost in translation.
So anyways, I am preparing to push the first book in the Sunset Bay series out into the world, and the one thing holding me back is the title. Its test title…
