How to Write Short Stories: How to use AI tools to help with your creative and business processes

I started writing for publication in 2005, seventeen years before the launch of ChatGPT in November 2022 which heralded the beginning of the generative AI era, so I have many years of experience in writing and publishing before AI was even an option.

I am also a techno-optimist and, having spent thirteen years implementing IT systems and then two decades building a career based on digital technology, I embrace the use of tools that enable me to be more creative, reach more readers, and earn more income as an author entrepreneur.

Of course, there is much controversy over the use of AI in the author community, but there is also much disinformation. It’s important to be informed and check your sources of information so you can make your own choices and draw your own lines in your creative, publishing, and marketing practices.

The AI-Assisted Artisan Author

In May 2023, I drew my line in the sand by posting an article and solo podcast episode on this topic. I am an AI-Assisted Artisan Author (A4), which means I absolutely use AI tools as part of my creative and business processes, but when I write and publish as J.F. Penn or Joanna Penn, the story ideas are from my story seeds, the experiences I share with you are from my human life, and the finished words are mine.

The publishing platforms are also drawing a line now between AI-generated and AI-assisted works. AI-generated describes a work that goes from prompt to publish with no human quality control. AI-assisted means the creator works with the tools to co-create a better product.

This distinction also impacts copyright, depending on jurisdiction. Under current US copyright law, AI-generated work can’t be registered for copyright, but AI-assisted work with human authorship and selection can be. In the UK, on the other hand, even AI-generated work can be copyrighted. Of course, AI never truly generates anything on its own, as there is always a human prompting it with a spark and a direction (at least, at the time of writing!).

I won’t rehash the controversies around AI here, but I will assume that if you are reading this section you want to use the AI tools as just that — as tools — to help you create and publish and market, rather than writing on your behalf.

AI-assistance with the creative process

I primarily use Claude.ai as a brainstorming partner, although you can use ChatGPT in the same way if that is your preferred AI tool.

As an example, I recently finished a Masters degree in Death, Religion and Culture, and I want to use my writing for the degree creatively, rather than having it trapped inside academic essays that no one other than my professor will ever read. I uploaded all my essays into a Claude project along with my file of story seeds that I mentioned in chapter 1.2 and asked:

“Please go through this material and give me 20 ideas for short stories that combine original elements of both that would resonate with my readers as J.F. Penn.”

This was a fun way to turn an extensive amount of raw material into new directions for my writing, and I now have lots of ideas to take forward when I’m ready to write.

If you have one element of a story and want help with brainstorming more, try something like this:

“I want to write a short story about [a theme or emotion or story seed]. Give me five character ideas and five inciting incidents.”

Or, to force the kind of juxtaposition that sparks the best shorts:

“Give me ten ‘what if’ premises that combine [a real place I find fascinating] with [a strange fact or idea I can’t stop thinking about].”

You’ll reject most of what comes back, and that’s fine, but every so often something will spark and you’ll discover a new angle to write about. It’s also a really fun way to start a writing session, in the same way that many writers use prompt books or other tools to spark ideas.

Another way I use Claude is as a beta reader for a draft.

I upload the story and then ask it to give me feedback as a horror reader, or as an expert short story editor, and then I improve it from there. Make sure you are happy with the terms and conditions of any service before you upload your work and check the settings if you don’t want future models to be trained on your words.

There are also some great AI-assisted editing tools. I use ProWritingAid as a line editor and they also have editorial reports now that will help improve your story.

I also used Claude to help me with the title for my collection. I was struggling as I couldn’t find the underlying thread, so I uploaded all the stories into a project and asked for twenty potential titles for a collection, and then another twenty after that. In amongst the abundance of options was The Buried and the Drowned, which I immediately felt was the perfect fit for what I was trying to create.

Importantly, if you are considering submission to any traditional short story market or contest, make sure to read their guidelines as some forbid the use of AI entirely, or require disclosure for usage.

AI-assistance with publishing

If you want to submit your short story to traditional markets, AI can help you find opportunities. You can generate an in-depth research report on the current state of the market for your genre, with timings for submission and guidelines for paying markets, fiction podcasts, or whatever you’re targeting.

You can also use AI to help you track submissions. Keep a project that collates all the information and ask it to build you a tracker in Excel with markets, submission dates, as well as contract details if you are successful.

If you’re offered a contract, you can upload that into your favourite AI tool and ask it to check whether the terms are favourable and explain anything that might be confusing.

If you’re self-publishing, AI tools can also help with drafting your sales description, and help choose your categories and keywords. Just upload the story and then use a prompt like this one:

“Please draft three different Amazon sales descriptions for this story that emphasise different elements and make the reader want to buy. Make one emotionally evocative, and also include 10 taglines.”

While many authors use professional cover designers for full-length works, if you publish short stories regularly, that can be expensive and time-consuming. You are also unlikely to make the money back fast enough to justify the cost.

There are different options for ebook covers, including Canva templates, as well as pre-made covers that you can buy from designers, but you can also use AI tools like ChatGPT for images or Gemini Nano Banana or Ideogram, all of which can now generate text on the cover as well as the finished images.

Upload the story to ChatGPT and then ask:

“Please write 5 different image prompts for an ebook cover for the story attached with [title] and subtitle, A Short Story, and [author name].”

Then use those prompts in a new chat, selecting the image option and choosing the right dimensions. You can then upscale the image in Canva to make it the right size for publication.

You can also use AI in audiobook production by licensing an AI voice, or even creating your own voice clone using ElevenLabs or other AI voice tools. You can sell these on Spotify, Kobo, and your own site, as well as releasing to library systems. You can also publish them on YouTube, which can eventually lead to advertising revenue.

If you want to expand into other language markets, you can use AI translation as a first pass with sites like ScribeShadow before working with a human proofreader.

Once you have publishing sales data from the various platforms, you can use AI tools to analyse it all for you. Just upload your spreadsheets and ask for whatever analysis you need.

AI-assistance with marketing

While many authors and publishers remain strictly against AI tools for creative purposes, more and more are openly using AI to help with marketing, from metadata rewrites to social media hooks to pitch emails for selected media.

While it can be difficult to come up with hooks for your story, AI tools can give you countless versions and you can pick from the abundance of options. It works best if you upload the story, and then ask:

“Please write 10 hooks for this story that I can use on TikTok [or Instagram or whatever social media].”

I used AI image tool Midjourney to make the images for my book trailer for The Buried and the Drowned, and ChatGPT now does image generation for social media or book covers, while you can use ElevenLabs to generate custom music for your book trailer or social videos.

As ever, make sure to edit any draft copy into your own voice.

Disclosure of AI use

Many of the publishing platforms now require you to disclose AI usage. Amazon KDP has a series of checkboxes for the text, images, and translations on a sliding scale of generation and editing. IngramSpark has also introduced this, and Kickstarter has an AI usage section as part of their process.

I have been disclosing my use of AI since before it was required, and I see no reason to hide the ethical use of AI tools, especially as it becomes more common in the publishing industry. But in the end, disclosing your use of AI beyond what is required by the platforms is a personal choice.

Double down on being human

While I love having AI tools to help me with my creative and business processes, they remain in service to my vision and what I want to achieve with my body of work published under my name. My author’s notes are true, and my author voice is my own. You can hear my human voice in my self-narrated audiobooks, and you can feel the human heart of my stories in my marketing.

AI tools are the most powerful assistants that authors have ever had, but they are not the author. So, decide on your line in the sand, retain what you love about the writing process, and use AI tools to help with the rest.

Questions:

• Where’s your line in the sand around AI usage? What tasks can you happily hand over to an AI tool and which will you retain?
• How can you use AI tools more effectively in the areas you want to outsource?
• If you’re submitting to any professional paying market or contest, have you checked its guidelines on AI?
• Whether you use AI tools or not, how can you double down on being human?

Resources:

• “The AI-Assisted Artisan Author” on The Creative Penn podcast, May 2023: www.TheCreativePenn.com/a4
• The Alliance of Independent Authors (ALLi) Guidance on ethical AI use for authors: selfpublishingadvice.org/ai-for-authors-guidelines
• ElevenLabs for AI audio: www.TheCreativePenn.com/elevenlabs
• ScribeShadow for AI translation: app.scribeshadow.com