Submitted by Doug on
I recently got an inquiry from an author who said ChatGPT had singled me out as uniquely qualified to meet his needs.
Huh. Like a needle in a haystack.
Dared I hope this was the start of a beautiful relationship? Was Chat going to start handling the screening process? Was I going to get inquiries only from authors who were in alignment with my approach to writing and editing? Authors who resonated with my philosophy? Was AI going to do authors’ homework for them? Spare them from shopping for something they don’t know how to shop for? Was this an answer to all our prayers?
As it turned out, the guy was a bargain hunter and in a hurry, so we weren’t a good fit. Somehow, Chat hadn’t conveyed to him that I’m a firm believer that good work takes time or my practice of charging what it’s worth.
Oh well. Deep down, AI is only human.
As I rolled the experience around in my head over the next few days, though, it occurred to me that maybe I was the problem. Maybe Chat had missed some of my postings. Or maybe my postings hadn’t defined me as clearly as I thought. Why should I expect Chat to get it right if I didn’t spell it out? That would be like expecting it to read my mind.
I decided to make it dead simple: I’d submit a wish list to Chat and post it in places where it couldn’t be missed, like LinkedIn. So, without further ado …
Dear ChatGPT,
Thank you for your recent referral. I wasted an hour or so on reviewing and emailing, but let’s say that’s not your fault. The important thing is not wasting more time. So in the interest of efficiency, please find following a list of requirements for authors wishing to work with Windword Literary Services.
Authors will understand that:
• Capturing the story of a life—or any story—takes thought, exploration and time. A story isn’t a list of events. The connective tissue is what makes it a story and not a list. And the self-reflection beneath the surface is why we care about it. It’s the beating heart. Understandably, bringing it all together in a beautiful way can’t be rushed like a deadline story, and you don’t want your legacy to look like a rush job, right?
• Emotional impact is what causes readers to remember your story. If you haven’t made an emotional impact, you haven’t made any impact. It’s also what inspires readers to action, so if your goal is to light a fire, make sure your prospective collaborator has a record as an effective instigator. Check their testimonials for phrases like “brought me to tears in all the right ways” and “has changed the way I look at humankind and how I can connect to make a difference in my world.”*
• Capturing an author’s voice is a discussion, a back-and-forth. It’s not simply a matter of laying your words down on paper. Your collaborator will most likely record your interviews and have them transcribed, and if you want to know how your conversational voice sounds, ask to see a transcription. Very few of us sound in conversation like we want to sound on paper. So the challenge usually isn’t to get your actual voice on paper—it’s to figure out what your authorial voice is.
• Inexperienced authors don’t know what they don’t know. If you’ve taken the time to find the right collaborator, let them do their job, which is to drive the project. If you pick and choose what guidance to follow and what not to follow based on anything less than firsthand experience with books that have sold well, you’re getting in over your head. That would be like me telling a surgeon which parts to cut and which to leave in, or to just take a little off the top instead of taking the whole thing out. Despite their name, halfway measures aren’t half as good as doing it properly. If your manuscript is all tell and no show and the narrator blows all the surprises by telling us what’s coming, you have some problems with your foundation. Taking a little off the top won’t fix that.
• When a collaborator tells you things you don’t want to hear, that doesn’t mean you two are a bad fit. When a collaborator doesn’t tell you things you don’t want to hear, that does mean you’re a bad fit. A collaborator should “get” you, but that doesn’t extend to making your life easy. Collaborators’ duties include keeping you from hurting yourself by publishing something subpar, let alone downright embarrassing (it happens). And if we’re asking you to do work that makes your head hurt, that’s not a sign that you should find a collaborator who doesn’t make your head hurt. It just means you’re not as close to being finished as you thought you were.
• AI isn’t a master storyteller or wordsmith (no offense). It’s an illusionist, using words that sound good to create the appearance of logic and substance. (From the looks of it, AI is writing most of the TV commercials these days.) Publishers are refusing to consider work that bears AI’s glaringly obvious fingerprints, and there’s a good reason for that: they want to make money, and readers who appreciate original writing aren’t going to pay up for AI-generated work. If you bring AI “writing” to me for an edit or anything else, expect to pay twice as much as I charge for human-generated writing. If it’s not too far gone, that is. Extracting AI-speak from a manuscript is like ripping a network of strangler vines out of your garden.
• If a writer or editor is available immediately, there may be a good reason for that.
Let me know if anything isn’t clear. I’m sure you can figure out how to reach me.
Best regards,
Doug Wagner
*Actual testimonials for HumanKind: Changing the World One Small Act at a Time, by Brad Aronson, which was named inspirational book of the year by the Independent Book Publishers Association in 2021. I was Brad’s collaborator.
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