JNC Writing Support Group
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Great discussion. I have two ideas I’ve been working on outside of work and waiting for the inevitable sad news in March.
One is a standalone sequel (about 3,000 words in) to one of my submissions for this round while the other is an isekai that simply wouldn’t let me ignore it any longer. I’ll probably sub the sequel for the next round depending on what (if any) feedback I get.
The tone on the Isekai is wrong at the moment (or not as engaging as I’d like so far) but it is still in the ugly draft phase and the plot is coming together outside of my own ignorance (what exactly is the best way to optimise the running of an adventurer’s guild?).
I very want my extremely put upon office worker to actually use their admin skills rather than OP superpowers to drive the plot when they aren’t fighting monsters or helping the hero face the Demon Lord.
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@Alfaerin Well, I hope they give some sort of input from J-Novel, even if I don't advance. Looking at the contest description, they only promise input for those that make it past the first round. It's an awful lot of work to get a thank you but, you didn't make it note. I know that their end has to be pretty tough-- with close to 500 entries and figuring out something constructive but not totally discouraging for each one would have to be sort of draining.
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@jazzyjeoff @Alfaerin - It would be nice to get some feedback for those who drop out in round one but they’ve been clear it isn’t likely to happen.
Whatever happens, I’m glad I subbed and if it isn’t for them (unless they say never submit again and block me), I’ll be back for the next time they run this.
With almost 500 entries, anything more than “sorry, try again time” is probably way too much of an ask. Plus most publishers don’t necessarily give feedback on manuscripts outside of “we’ve chosen not to progress with your work at this time”.
Not that this has happened to me :)
Sometimes you get feedback but it isn’t the norm.
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@Damon-Cavalchini said in JNC Writing Support Group:
Sometimes you get feedback but it isn’t the norm.
I look forward to ChatGPT-5 (6? 7?), it will be able to read whole novels in a few seconds and then give feedback as good as a professional editor. "Hey, it looks like you're writing a novel..."
As for my own efforts, I'm currently working on 3 things:
- Adding a map and some illustrations (however did people who can't draw manage before AI?) solely for my own satisfaction to the novel I submitted. That's complete now except for the cover, probably going to need to brush up my rusty Blender skills for some of that.
- Carrying on with the other volumes of the novel, not that I'll win a prize for the first volume, but both of my beta readers want to know what happens next.
- Seeing if I can make my harebrained idea of combining a sci-fi/fantasy story set 200 million years in the future with an isekai somehow work.
The two story threads in that last one are currently kind of like oil and water, one thread is a deadly serious third-person (well, third-something!) story about someone placed under house arrest for her heretical views about evolution, and the other thread is a lightheared first-person isekai. I'm trying the alternating chapters approach right now, but it doesn't feel like it's working so I've clearly got a long way to go. I really don't want to drop the isekai part, though, because I'm very pleased with how it's started off, so if one part has to go it will have to be the serious one, I guess.
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@Angelus - It sounds great but the variation between might be hard to manage. Keep going with it and once you’ve finished, then tease it apart if needed.
That way you have skeletons of a story to work on.
I haven’t tried AI as an editor and I’m not sure how that would even work to be honest. I mean, how would recognise stylistic tricks that may not clean grammar but which highlight character?
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@Damon-Cavalchini said in JNC Writing Support Group:
I haven’t tried AI as an editor and I’m not sure how that would even work to be honest.
I'm about to find out! I've just discovered that Nvidia released a chatbot yesterday that runs locally on almost all RTX 30/40 graphics cards and that you can train on your own documents, so I'm downloading that now (only 35GB zipped!) and I'll see what it makes of my novel.
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@Damon-Cavalchini said in JNC Writing Support Group:
I haven’t tried AI as an editor
I wouldn't suggest it... AI tools are designed to be confidently incorrect. I wouldn't really suggest them if you can't verify their results through a secondary method.
Something like ProWritingAid is gonna be much more useful. It has tips from experts in writing. It can make your writing much more professional and detect bad habits. It also has detailed explanations about pretty much anything it suggests, so it's easier to understand why it suggests changing something. It's easily the best tool I've worked with. The only thing is that it helps improve writing style, but that's only half the battle with writing. What you write is also just as important.
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@Parity, ProWritingAid is AI-powered too, but at least (I assume) it's been trained for very specific tasks rather than a general-purpose chatbot. I guess I might consider it if it wasn't cloud-based.
After reading something captivating, book lovers simply need to talk about it with someone.
—Tearmoon Empire -
@Angelus It's AI powered in the same way that 1990's games had AI... In that, they use that term purely for marketing purposes. Behind the scene's, it's just rules and algorithms.
Generative AI, like Chat GPT, are operating on completely different principles. And they tend to lie, which is why you can't trust them.
ProWritingAid is seriously good, though. It has pretty much all the information you need to write in a professional style. It detects passive voice, grammatical issues, and stylistic rules. It can generate reports on sentence length, pacing, dialogue tags, and sentence structure. Like, you can use it to detect if you are overusing a certain sentence structure in comparison to published writing. It's crazy useful as an analysis tool.
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@Parity, I have my own analysis tools but they're pretty limited - word and phrase usage and proximity plus readability metrics, but I can see how something like ProWritingAid would be useful.
Certainly more useful than the Nvidia AI I've just been trying for a laugh. I asked it if it thought my competition entry could be considered a light novel, and it said that there weren't enough typical light novel elements such as harems and magical abilities in there for it to be sure!
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@Angelus said in JNC Writing Support Group …it said that there weren't enough typical light novel elements such as harems and magical abilities in there for it to be sure!
Oh no! I forget the harem as well. I’ll have to fix that next time.
Thanks for all the comments on AI tools everyone. It is a space I’ve spent no time in from a writing perspective.
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How are things going? It’s funny, I was sort of reluctant to join this thread because its name “JNC Writing Support Group” sounds so needy. But it turns out that I am so needy.
Someone talk to me!🤪 -
@jazzyjeoff I'm buried in original light novel competition entries. For every good one there are 5 bad ones....
At least there have been a couple pretty damn good ones, so I'm hopeful the winners are gonna be good.
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@admin Well, have fun crushing the hopes and dreams of 5 out of 6 folks on this forum! 😝
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@jazzyjeoff, the way not to have your hopes and dreams crushed is not to have any hopes and dreams in the first place. Now that might sound depressing, but it's like the old thing about how pessimists ought to be among the happiest people in the world because life usually turns out better than they thought it would.
After reading something captivating, book lovers simply need to talk about it with someone.
—Tearmoon Empire -
@Angelus said in JNC Writing Support Group:
@jazzyjeoff, the way not to have your hopes and dreams crushed is not to have any hopes and dreams in the first place. Now that might sound depressing, but it's like the old thing about how pessimists ought to be among the happiest people in the world because life usually turns out better than they thought it would.
Well, for now I am going to pretend that the 5 out of 6 bad entries are chatbot generated entries that have been spammed to the site. So, that means everyone on this forum made it past the first round. So congratulations everyone!
See, my coping mechanism is much more cheerful!(admitally, mine has a much shorter shelf-life than yours, but 40 days of relative happiness isn't so bad)
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@jazzyjeoff said in JNC Writing Support Group:
Well, for now I am going to pretend that the 5 out of 6 bad entries are chatbot generated entries that have been spammed to the site.
Seeing that Nvidia AI I was posting about wasn't sure my entry even qualified as a LN, maybe I ought to ask it if it thinks it could write a better one! Regardless, I'm pressing ahead with volume 2 of my entry now because that seems a lot easier than the weird sci-fi/isekai story I've mentioned before.
After reading something captivating, book lovers simply need to talk about it with someone.
—Tearmoon Empire -
@Angelus I just finished crushing my hopes and dreams, so I can confirm that this method works. I'll consider it a win if I get back some feedback.
Next year, though, I'll be sweeping the contest. I've only started greasing the pan, but I can tell I'm gonna cook.
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@Angelus said in JNC Writing Support Group:
@jazzyjeoff said in JNC Writing Support Group:
Well, for now I am going to pretend that the 5 out of 6 bad entries are chatbot generated entries that have been spammed to the site.
Seeing that Nvidia AI I was posting about wasn't sure my entry even qualified as a LN, maybe I ought to ask it if it thinks it could write a better one! Regardless, I'm pressing ahead with volume 2 of my entry now because that seems a lot easier than the weird sci-fi/isekai story I've mentioned before.
Well, the AI was just trying to intimidate you into quitting because it wanted one of its 400 entries to win. Don't trust the machines—they are all filthy cheaters!
I am working on my volume 2 also. One of the many things I have learned from this contest is for me to keep things in manageable chunks—I was sort of intimidated at the 50K word minimum threshold that I almost quit. When they lowered it to 35K it felt doable—and I just about hit 50K anyway. I think light novels lend themselves well to that sort of approach, since many of them tend to be very episodic.
Another funny thing about the contest was just how quickly that I came up with the general plot. I knew I would be pressed for time, so I just quickly made a decision that fit in with what I perceive to be my relative strengths—though I sort of regret not writing a comedy. I can be really indecisive sometimes, so having the structure of a contest was pretty helpful in getting me going. -
@Angelus @jazzyjeoff The place has been quiet so I got caught with work and haven’t been here for a few days. I’m always happy to chat about writing (even though it may take a while to reply).
I am also wondering if my entries were light novel enough so I am working on a sequel that feels much more light novelly. And in doing so come up with the plot for an isekai with an incredibly long title which might be much more the judges cup of tea.
That said, by the simple value of being in this group you are more likely to be in the 1 out of 5 group :)
