I thought I’d chat a little about the current stories I’m working on (well, I was working on them, and may get back to working on them again Real Soon Any Day Now). Now I’ve heard a lot of talk about people using these AI programs and these Chatgpt bots to write stories and I’m going to tell you now that I don’t need no internet robot to write ME a story with a formulaic plot sure to draw in millions of readers eager to open their wallets and just throw money at me (I also take Venmo and Paypal)! Why, just look at what I’ve come up with that will knock those Young Adult things about women in love with werewolves with funny-looking penises and those other ones with Racist Exotic Evil People being fought by Good Blond and White Good Elves right off the New York Times list! Here goes:
— an alternate world that is sort of like our own but if certain geographic and climate settings were slightly different, and the cultures were somewhat more egalitarian and empires and colonization attempts were mostly short-lived, temporary, and unsuccessful. There is, possibly paradoxically, more trade and cultural exchange. It’s “hard to describe” says the writer. Anyway, in this setting my protagonists do things like investigate murder, wander about, travel by boat, foot, and rarely, airship, and observe. There have been occasional intermittent impingements from what may be another existence all together — this is really the only fantastical element in this setting except of course for the setting itself being fantastic. Nobody does magic though there are some uncanny, unexplained happenings. The MCs sometimes brush up against the alien invaders and have an Adventure, unwillingly. Is there sex? Probably not, sex is gross.
— Another alternate world, maybe even this same setting, though without the other-existence-invader stuff. After a worldwide pandemic (yes), my protagonist, who had survived the disease, woke up to be told all the people he’d shared a house with were dead. But not of the illness: they had been poisoned. For a time he was suspected, and though ultimately exonerated he decided to leave the country and move overseas. Years later his mostly solitary existence as a studio magician in a large “trade city” is disrupted when someone begins harassing and following him. The past, it seems, can’t be left over the sea. But is it someone who still thinks he poisoned his friends, or the actual murderer? AU noir, maybe, definitely me trying my hand at a murder mystery.
I wrote a story about an antisocial teen getting sucked into the world of old film cameras. Read it here.
I write another story about two college-age people who go see an art exhibit, with unfortunate effects. Read it here.
A story I wrote in odd circumstances, about a troll. Just a brief little thing. Read it here.
Eventually I may move those over here. I’m also working on a three-parter there, but I got stuck on part three, so I’ve privated the other two parts for now. Plot: two agents of the crown, both, uh, very different in character to one another, are on an assignment. “Magickal” shenanigans ensue! Or are they? Nothing is entirely what it seems! I will update when I finish the story, sometime before my 70th birthday I hope.
Anyway, eat my dust, ChatAI-AI-AI.