AI and the Written Word: When the Tool Takes Hold of the Pen
A Bardic Planet Editorial on AI-Assisted Fiction
I have been preparing a review of a work submitted to Bardic Planet. On the surface, it is very similar to stories I have reviewed before.
Fantasy.
Magic.
It is not LitRPG, but there are magical girls, so I think I can let it slide.
Where the work differs is in how it was created. The author—or engineer, as he described himself while commenting on the work—openly acknowledged drafting the novel with AI.
So far as I understand the process, he prompted large language models to produce the initial chapters, then edited the results down into something coherent.
When the author—or engineer—pitched the novel for a Bardic Planet review, I hesitated.
Attitudes towards AI-generated or AI-assisted content tend to pitch sharply negative within creative circles. I have to be honest: part of me was concerned about how reviewing such a work would be received by the readers of Bardic Planet.
Then I asked myself a simple question.
Who am I?
That is right.
I am the Bard-in-Frigging-Chief.
I can do what I want.
If I declare night to be day, then day it shall be. If I declare Nigel innocent, then—actually, no. There are limits even to my authority.
Nevertheless, this is only the beginning of the privilege and ultimate power that comes from running a small literary blog on the internet.
My considerations shifted. The question was no longer what readers might think. It was what I thought.
I have decided to go ahead with the review. It will be published by this time next week.
At the same time, I will not pretend the story is the pure product of human ingenuity. The nature of its creation matters, particularly when judging its voice, construction and creative identity.
You will discover precisely what I mean when the review goes live.
For now, I thought I would take the opportunity to outline my early thoughts on AI in creative fiction.
Mine is not the only perspective. It might not be the correct perspective.
But it is mine—and I think it is worth hearing.
Heresy Before the High Council of Authors
I am not an anti-AI purist.
For some authors, the use of any large language model in a creative pursuit is anathema. A sin more deadly than Pride, Greed or a genuine appreciation for the lyricism of Taylor Swift.
Which I adamantly do not confess to.
For me, AI is a tool—one among many that an author might use to support or improve their work.
We use laptops, tablets and even phones to draft our stories. The days when parchment, quills, typewriters or access to a printing press were necessities have passed.
Skills that were once essential have been made less valuable by digital innovation.
Consider the internet and search engines. Research that might once have led an author into the haunted recesses of the local library is now available in the palm of their hand.
Does that invalidate the finished product?
I say no.
Does using a thesaurus or dictionary?
Again, no.
What about a spelling and grammar checker?
I do not think so.
AI can help streamline the creative process just as other technologies have done.
I stand by that—when AI is put to what I consider proper use.
Therein lies the concern.
AI can also be used improperly.
The Tool Unlike Any Other
AI is not exactly like a dictionary, search engine or word processor.
A dictionary cannot produce your chapter for you. Microsoft Word has never seized control of my keyboard and concluded a character arc—though Clippy always struck me as ambitious.
AI can generate content from almost nothing.
It can produce the prose, devise the characters, determine the structure and make the narrative decisions. Used extensively enough, it can remove almost every human element from the creative process.
At a certain point, it becomes fair to ask whether the finished story is truly the author’s work at all.
I think it is reasonable to say that a line exists—and that AI is unique among common writing tools in its ability to cross that line.
Where the line lies will differ from person to person.
Here, I will explain where I place it and why.
The Myth of the Solitary Genius
AI—and the internet more broadly—can help democratise the creative industry.
Here is a little peek behind the curtain of publishing, at least when it comes to the traditional route.
An author drafts.
They edit.
They edit some more.
They curse the day they were born during the fourth and fifth passes.
Finally, bloodied but triumphant, they emerge from their chambers carrying a fully polished manuscript.
At least, that is the myth we often hear.
It is believable because, for many of us outside traditional publishing, it reflects what we actually do. We draft, edit, format, publish and promote our own work—sometimes while hiding beneath the desk and insisting that the latest typo was an artistic choice.
However, a traditionally published and professionally polished work of fiction is rarely a solitary achievement.
Behind the scenes may stand agents, developmental editors, copyeditors, proofreaders and others who—working with the author—take an unpolished gem and shine it until it blinds.
You know the feeling when reading a remarkably polished novel: every word seems inevitable and nothing appears wasted.
More often than not, that level of polish was a team effort.
Does that diminish the author?
I do not believe so.
The central ideas were theirs. The characters, vision, structure and voice were theirs. The editorial process did not strip the work of its creativity.
It stripped away the excess surrounding it.
The Independent Author’s Invisible Wall
Most independent authors do not have access to an entire publishing team.
Even when professional editors are available, they may be prohibitively expensive. This creates an invisible barrier to producing work with the same degree of polish enjoyed by authors already supported by the industry.
AI can place a limited version of that support within reach of the independent author.
It can identify awkward sentences, expose inconsistencies, question weak motivations and suggest where a scene is moving too slowly. It can act as a tireless—if occasionally deranged—second pair of eyes.
That does not mean its advice is correct.
AI can misunderstand intent, flatten distinctive prose and state complete nonsense with the confidence of Nigel explaining why the missing office biscuits were already gone when he arrived.
Its suggestions still require human judgement.
Once again, AI can be abused.
But it does not have to be.
My view is that there is a fair use of AI within the creative process, provided it supports rather than replaces that process.
So where do I personally draw the line?
Permitted Sorceries: Where AI Belongs
For me, the proper uses of AI in fiction writing can be summarised as follows.
Research
AI can radically streamline the early stages of research.
If your plot relies upon a chemical process you do not remotely understand, AI can break down the fundamentals, explain unfamiliar terminology and help identify what you need to investigate further.
That final part matters.
Large language models can be confidently wrong. Any factual claim that matters to the story should be verified through reliable sources—particularly when medicine, law, history or anything potentially dangerous is involved.
AI can serve as a guide through the library.
It should not be mistaken for the library itself.
Spelling and Grammar
I do not believe AI-assisted spelling and grammar correction crosses the line any more than using a word processor instead of a typewriter—or Grammarly and the other checkers upon which authors have long depended.
Correcting a misplaced comma does not make the machine your co-author.
If it does, I owe Microsoft an alarming amount of royalties…
At least I would, if I earned any royalties.
Brainstorming
Provided you take the resulting ideas and run them through your own creative process, I do not see AI brainstorming as fundamentally different from consulting a focus group—or that one patient friend who tolerates your endless stream of creative consciousness.
An AI might suggest a kingdom built inside the ribs of a dead god.
That is an idea.
The culture, history, characters, conflicts, imagery and meaning you build from it are the work.
Feedback
Having AI provide feedback on something you have already written does not strike me as harmful.
It can flag confusing passages, identify pacing problems and explain how a character may appear to a reader. The author must still decide whether the criticism is valid.
This is especially useful to writers without access to a large circle of beta readers.
AI feedback should not replace human readership entirely. A model can imitate a reader’s response, but it does not experience a story in the way a person does.
Still, it can help an author spot problems before inflicting them upon an unsuspecting public.
Editing Suggestions
AI can suggest cleaner phrasing, tighter structures or alternate approaches to a scene.
The key word is suggest.
Those suggestions must pass through the author’s own judgement and creative needs. If a proposed change improves clarity while preserving the voice, excellent. If it scrubs away everything distinctive and replaces it with smooth beige paste, throw it into the abyss.
The author must remain the final authority.
Forbidden Arts: Where the Machine Takes Over
Here is where I believe AI goes too far.
Full Drafting
If an author gives an AI a prompt and publishes the prose it generates, the machine has performed the central creative labour.
Editing that output may require effort. It may even require considerable skill.
But editing a generated chapter is not the same creative act as writing one.
The greater the proportion of generated prose within the final work, the harder it becomes to claim the finished story as wholly human-authored.
Complete Editorial Control
An author should not accept every AI suggestion automatically.
Do that often enough and the machine begins determining the voice, rhythm and meaning of the work. The author may have drafted the sentences, but they have surrendered authority over what those sentences become.
AI is exceptionally good at making prose more conventional.
Conventional is not always better.
Sometimes the strange sentence is the one that belongs.
Narrative Control
AI should not determine the fundamental direction of the story.
- It can offer possibilities.
- It can help test them.
- It can point towards consequences the author may not have considered.
But the author should decide who these characters are, what they want, what choices they make and what the story ultimately means.
Once the machine is making those decisions, it is no longer merely polishing the instrument.
It is playing the song.
The Question of Ownership
This distinction matters because creative ownership is not only about who typed the final words.
It is about who made the meaningful choices.
- Who imagined the character?
- Who understood why they acted?
- Who chose the sacrifice, the betrayal or the moment of mercy?
- Who decided what the story was trying to say?
A human author may receive suggestions from editors, friends, readers or AI without surrendering ownership. Authorship does not require isolation.
It does, however, require authority.
The author must remain the mind directing the work.
The Pen Still Belongs to Us
These are my thoughts on the matter. I expect many people will disagree.
I do not blame them.
Writing is a craft. Drafting, editing, rewriting and bleeding over the process are among the ways authors develop that craft. There is a legitimate fear that outsourcing those struggles will prevent writers from developing the instincts they need.
For some, AI feels like a shortcut.
For others, AI is a shortcut.
It can cheapen the creative process. The worrying truth is that, used carelessly, it really can.
But it does not have to.
More to the point, it is not going anywhere.
There might not have been a grand announcement, but the world changed when generative AI entered it. It will never return entirely to what it was before.
It is up to us to decide what that change means.
Some will cling to total purity. For me, that purity has always been something of a myth. Authors have always relied upon tools, collaborators, research and criticism.
Others will attempt to cheat the creative process entirely.
They will try. Yet, in my experience, writing without a human spark of ingenuity struggles to command genuine engagement. It may be coherent. It may even be polished.
But polish is not purpose.
For the rest of us, AI becomes a tool.
Use it.
Question it.
Reject it when it tries to sand your voice into nothing.
Most importantly, do not let it use you. Do not allow it to dull the point of your pen until you can no longer write without it.
The machine may sit beside the author.
It should never sit upon the throne.
Take Up the Pen
These are my thoughts.
They do not have to be yours.
AI and creative fiction inspire strong opinions, and Bardic Planet is interested in hearing them—whether you agree with me, disagree with me or believe the Bard-in-Chief has finally allowed absolute power to corrupt his otherwise spotless judgement.
If you have something thoughtful to say, consider writing a response of your own. Bardic Planet is open to hosting guest perspectives on AI, authorship and the future of creative writing.
Defend the tool. Condemn the machine. Draw your line somewhere entirely different.
Just make your case well.
If you are interested in contributing, visit our Contact Us page and get in touch.
The floor is yours.
The throne, naturally, remains mine.
Clone_v2 is the Bard-in-Chief of Bardic Planet.
When he’s not drawing ethical boundaries around artificial intelligence or reminding the machine that it is an editorial assistant—not heir to the throne—he’s writing Captured Sky on Royal Road.
Captured Sky is a progression fantasy about guilt, gods and a condemned man climbing through a world determined to make a monster of him.
If you enjoy dangerous ascents, monstrous powers and protagonists who refuse to leave well enough alone, you can start Captured Sky here.
No machines were permitted to seize the pen.
Clippy remains under investigation.
If you enjoyed this and want to help keep Bardic Planet running, you can fuel the Bard’s Death-Ray here.
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I use AI only for research into things such as whether or not a specific name or term I came up with, is already copyrighted, as I don’t have the time to manually sift through hundreds of webpages. I also use it to organize some of my rather chaotic worldbuilding notes into bullet point lists (I have a lot of worldbuilding notes and I do love my bullet points).
Aside from that, the only other thing I use AI for, is supplementary materials such as character reference art (things like outfits, etc) and social media ads, as its faster to look at an image if I need a description of something, rather than go through a wall of text trying to find the right notes.
I would say that’s absolutely fair use of AI. I think it starts to cheapen the process when it’s making the decisions. It’d directing the candace, the sentence structures, the character decisions and voice.
At that point, I’d be hard pressed to call it the work of the author’s.
And that’s the reason why I would never use AI to write, or even edit. I am not against the use of AI, as long as people are honest about their AI use, but the Steel Song trilogy is my story, a passion project I’ve been working on for seven years.
Regarding AI editing, one thing I will say is that it tends to strip away the author’s voice in order to “make everything concise,” which ends up sounding extremely generic. That’s what I’ve found out during an experiment, which is why I ended up not using it for editing, at all. I write a deliberately ponderous and dense style of prose and AI editing can not handle that. AI spellchecking also tends to mess up your in-universe terms and names, as it interprets those as spelling mistakes.
I tend to write in a very voice heavy, elevated, poetic style that AI would no doubt view as wasteful.
AI can absolutely flatten voice. It’s designed to favour the most statistically probable output, not intended output.
That being said, if used reasonably, I don’t see AI as something inherently cheapening.
On a personal level, I’m an AI minimalist. But I’m running a web novel reviewing site. I have to be open to many different processes. To that end, I felt it became necessary to organise my thoughts on where I feel the line stands between the reasonable use of a powerful tool, and where I can no longer think of a piece of writing as authored rather than generated.
Yeah, people are definitely blowing things out of proportion when it comes to AI, not to mention the politicization of it.
This post didn’t mention what AI is trained on. That’s what’s missing in the equation, if you asked me
For the broader AI question, that’s a fair question to ask. But in terms of what I’d consider reasonable use, if AI is impacting your style, it’s already going too far.