 AI can be wonderful; it can be morally corrupt. It can ease our lives; it can destroy our creativity.
Now, I use AI for research. I regard Gemini, ChatGPT, Vibe as LLMs (large language models) which cut hours, possibly days, off my research. It’s a quick fix. It points me towards genuine sources which I then consult directly. But it’s a passive mechanism – a huge library – despite all those chatty questions at the end. To manage them properly, you have to give them a specific, focused brief.
Here’s a recent example of using AI for research
“Tell me about defensive fortifications in south Noricum in the period AD 395 to AD 415. Use only academic, institutional or peer reviewed sources. May be in English, German or French.”
This led me to a wonderful article in the Geschichtsverein für Kärnten Bulletin and direct connection with the archaeologist from the regional museum for Carinthia, Austria (Landesmuseum für Kärnten), who wrote the article. She turned out to be the one who was heavily involved with the excavations at the Virunum amphitheatre that I visited in 2023! I would never have found that without Gemini. Well, I might possibly after months of scrabbling around. But Gemini found the article in seconds. When I contacted her directly, the archaeologist kindly sent me a copy of the full article she had written for the museum. Brilliant!
For me, this is where it stops.
AI and writing
Writing is hard work and actually quite weird. Sometimes you’re inspired and can dash off a thousand words in a hour; other times, you slog your lumpen way through the day to produce five hundred. You’re wrenching this vivid scene out of your imagination and trying to transfer it into the limitation of words. Your moods swing between elation and despair, between pride and an attack of imposter syndrome.
But somewhere, that creative spark is there. It may centre on a theme told multiple times – friends to lovers, a quest to save the world, the dissolution of a relationship, survival in a strange environment – but it will be your unique story told in your unique way.
Your writing process is up to you
You could outline every chapter first (planner) or write into the void (pantser/discovery writer). You could draft character descriptions, story arc notes, a grid to note down important events/agreements. Of course, you’ll scrutinise continuity, whether the story flows well, and whether you have chosen the right words to describe feelings, thoughts and reactions.
Now, juggling all this can be hard work and your brain may approach Fahrenheit 451 (apologies to Ray Bradbury), but it’s also one rewarding thing – pleasure. The process, despite all the sweat and hair-tearing, is so satisfying that writers tend to repeat it. Perhaps we’re all sado-masochists, but the pleasure outweighs the pain by a long streak.
Writing is fun – you are the master/mistress of the universe and every tweak you make is something you’ve decided. Every word in every sentence is your choice. And if your (human) editor and you differ on something, you are still the one who decides. You are the arbiter of your characters’ fates – the power of a god.
So why on earth would you hand over any part of it to a machine?
Good question. Ah, I see it now. It makes producing a book easier. Uh-huh. And then you can watch the cash roll in.
Let’s settle the second belief first. Apart from a few authors, writers do not make oodles of money. The last survey commissioned by ALCS in 2022 stated that the average primary-occupation (professional) authors’ income had dropped to £7,000 per annum. Only 19% of full-time authors now earn all of their income from writing, a major decline from 40% in 2006. Hardly the road to riches.
Making the book easier – possibly. But it’s not creative writing and its originator is not an author. They are a producer of content. Big difference.
In life, I’m a big fan of short cuts, of more efficient ways of doing things. And if it saves a few pennies, so much the better. Writing content using Gen AI may seem a short cut, but it’s neither literature nor creative fiction.
The other gift from writing is that it keeps your mind buzzing, alive and sharp. Reading goes along that road, but the mental load of creative writing makes us work harder and exercises our brain muscles constantly. Absorbing content done for you will eventually dull your intellectual reflexes, your ability to analyse and express cogent thoughts through words. Be warned.
AI from the publisher’s point of view
A friend who runs a small but very well regarded publishing company recently told me about a couple of submissions her company received.
Her company policy states:
[Her company] does not support the creation or publication of AI-written books. The books we publish are works of human authorship, and we expect the substantive creative content of a manuscript to originate with the author.
We do not accept manuscripts that have been substantially generated by artificial intelligence, including books produced wholly or predominantly through generative AI systems and subsequently edited or rewritten to appear human-authored.
If generative AI has been used to create any substantive portion of a manuscript—including prose, poetry, dialogue, scenes, descriptions, or other original creative material—the author must fully disclose that use to [her company] and identify the material concerned.
The use of tools for spelling, grammar, proofreading, transcription, research assistance, brainstorming, or similar support does not in itself make a manuscript “AI-written.” Our concern is with generative AI being used to produce substantive creative content that would otherwise be the work of the author.
Our distinction is therefore between AI as an assistive tool and AI as an author. [Her company] may support the former where used responsibly and transparently; we do not support the latter.
Pretty clear, I’d say. Here are snippets from three content producers who contacted her company:
————
“I have used AI substantially throughout the manuscript’s development, including historical research assistance, story planning, alternative prose drafting and editorial revisions. The creative direction, narrative decisions and final editorial approval have remained mine throughout.
I appreciate that your policy distinguishes between Al-assisted and AI-generated content, and I would not wish to submit a manuscript that falls outside your eligibility criteria.
Would this level of involvement make the novel ineligible for consideration?”
———–
and
———-
“During drafting and revision, I used ChatGPT for brainstorming, continuity feedback, editorial suggestions, and some scene and passage drafting. I don’t know how much generated wording remains in the current manuscript, and my records do not allow me to reliably identify every affected passage.”
———-
lastly,
———-
“The experiences are my own. Generative Al helped organise my accounts, structure the narrative, develop and revise prose from my material, and prepare submission materials. Its involvement therefore goes beyond proofreading; it did not invent the experiences.”
————
This is what publishers are dealing with behind the scenes. Needless to say, none of these proposals were accepted.
Final thoughts about writing fiction
The whole idea of writing a piece of fiction yourself is, er, creative. It sprints or lurches out of your imagination. The best sort is quirky, insightful, pacey and one that takes both reader and writer on an emotional journey, which may even make both sob or cry out with joy. It’s a message from one imperfect human mind to another.
And while that isn’t easy, it’s unique, whatever Gen AI may think.
Alison Morton is the author of Roma Nova thrillers – INCEPTIO, CARINA (novella), PERFIDITAS, SUCCESSIO, AURELIA, NEXUS (novella), INSURRECTIO and RETALIO, and ROMA NOVA EXTRA, a collection of short stories. JULIA PRIMA and EXSILIUM, set in the late 4th century, tell the story of Roma Nova’s foundation. Audiobooks are available for four of the series. Double Identity, Double Pursuit and Double Stakes form a new contemporary thriller series. A new collection of Roma Nova short stories, HEROICA, is now out.
Find out more about Roma Nova, its origins, stories and heroines and taste world the latest contemporary thriller Double Identity… Download ‘Welcome to Alison Morton’s Thriller Worlds’, a FREE eBook, as a thank you gift when you sign up to Alison’s monthly email update. As a result, you’ll be among the first to know about news and book progress before everybody else, and take part in giveaways.
If you enjoyed this post, do share it with your friends!
I’m delighted to welcome Elizabeth St John back to the writing blog on the occasion of the launch of her new book, The Queen’s Tears. Her acclaimed historical fiction brings to life her ancestors – remarkable women linked to England’s royalty – and offers unique insights into Medieval, Tudor and Stuart times. Her novels unfold not just as traditional series, but as an interlocking web of lives: The Lydiard Chronicles – including the celebrated The Lady of the Tower – The Godmother’s Secret, and The King’s Intelligencer explore everything from the English Civil War to the mystery of the Princes in the Tower. Her newest novel, The Queen’s Tears, a dual timeline pursuing a stolen crown jewel, reunites favourite characters from the seventeenth-century with a present-day bookstore owner heroine.
At the heart of her writing is the transformation of real ancestral histories into narratives of historical continuity. She follows threads of legacy through generations, guided as much by wills, letters, portraits, country churches, ruined castles, manor houses, and lost gardens as by imagination. Locations become constant companions through time, while characters whisper across centuries—their decisions resonating in the lives of their descendants to reveal how choices shape legacies. Grounded in historic sites like Lydiard Park and the Tower of London, her work creates a living archival flow that continues to flourish as the past yields its secrets.
Elizabeth divides her time between California, England, and the past, surrounded by books, gardens, and animals, with a slightly bewildered, ever-supportive husband beside her.
When I received an advance copy of The Queen’s Tears, I was delighted with the dual timeline element. As you know, I love a bit of time twisting! When invited to host Elizabeth during her Coffee Pot Book Club tour, I had to ask her why she decided to write two timelines – a departure from her usual historical fiction!
Here she tells us why a jewel hunt and an enigmatic Van Dyck portrait evolved into a book with a theme of time.
I didn’t set out to write a book about time, but perhaps since this is my first dual timeline novel, it was inevitable it would become a preoccupation. In The Queen’s Tears, I set out to write about a mis-labelled Van Dyck portrait and a stolen crown jewel. But not long after I started, I realised that time was taking over and threading its way through the story as a recurring theme.
Although I wrote it after the historical, I had an outline for the modern story in my mind and that already laid the groundwork for the story. Julia and Oliver had parted in sorrow and neither of them are thrilled to find themselves thrown back together after thirty years. The only thing that has brought them back into the same room is the hunt for the Queen’s Tears, a remarkable lost royal jewel. They get on with it reluctantly, and the French proverb that sums up how they cope is Donner du temps au temps. Give time to time. Which is very good advice, but extremely hard to follow when you’re standing next to the last person in the world you want to see again.
 Barbara St John Villiers (Courtesy of the Lydiard Archives) In 1619, Barbara Villiers would have had no patience with the phrase. Time was her enemy. We forget that in the 1600s nobody checked their wristwatch. (Actually, they don’t again now, either!) Clocks were rare and expensive, so church bells and daylight and the seasons gave you a sense of time. A letter carrying terrible news moved at the gait of an exhausted horse. A queen could die in a locked bedchamber over a night, a day and another night, with no sense of when it would be over. And a week’s journey to a foreign land with stolen property could drag like a lifetime.
Barbara spends much of the book feeling betrayed by time. When she most wants to hurry, it dawdles like a disobedient child. When she’s waiting and not knowing, each day rolls the same, and she’s suddenly lost whole months while she’s busy getting through them. She wishes she could control time. Or at least she’d settle for not feeling so helpless about it.
The other challenge in writing this dual timeline was when I looked at the structure. The modern story takes place over months. The historical one runs for decades. I needed to weave both together, without confusing the reader, and keep the echoes and mirrors and reflective themes to knit the story together. Most critically, decisions made in the past cast a shadow over discoveries in the present. I spent a good while embroidering the threads between the stores, occasionally unpicking and restitching if time betrayed the characters or the story.
I started using the word liminal, and although my wonderful editor flagged a couple of occasions where I may have used it too often, it still for me described the sense I wanted to convey. A liminal space is neither here nor there, a threshold, a blurred horizon, when you’re neither in one place nor the other. I used it when the mechanical measuring of time fades and emotions take over: a deathbed flickering under a lightning storm, a discovery in a quiet archive in a foreign library, a portrait that reveals secrets after four hundred years of anonymity. In those scenes, the clock literally stops. Time is measured by what people felt and what it cost them, which if you think about it, it’s how we mostly look at time anyway. Think of your worst ever year. It went on forever. Think of your happiest. It was over in a flash.
In The Queen’s Tears, both women encounter time twisting, four centuries apart. Neither can control it. But they are aware of its pull on their lives. And what they can do is decide what to do with it and whether they get that right is, I hope, why you’ll keep turning the pages.
Thank you, Elizabeth. Time governs us all, but your description of the varied way we perceive it, resonates very well with me and I’m sure with the readers.
Connect with Elizabeth
Website: https://www.elizabethjstjohn.com/
Twitter / X: https://x.com/ElizStJohn
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/ElizabethJStJohn/
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/elizabethjstjohn/
Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/elizabethstjohn.bsky.social
Book Bub: https://www.bookbub.com/profile/elizabeth-st-john
Threads: https://www.threads.com/@elizabethjstjohn
Amazon Author Page: https://geni.us/AmazonElizabethStJohn
Goodreads: https://geni.us/GoodreadsElizStJohn
Linked In: https://www.linkedin.com/in/elizabethjstjohn/
————–
What’s The Queen’s Tears about?
 A stolen crown jewel and an enigmatic portrait force two women to confront the devastating choices they made for love – and summon the courage to live with the truth.
1619: Barbara, Lady Villiers, at the bidding of her brother-in-law, the Duke of Buckingham, has stolen the dying Queen Anna’s jewels – and kept the greatest prize for herself. The Queen’s Tears, a brooch of extraordinary value, torments her: too dangerous to sell, too priceless to discard, and possibly her only means of securing her children’s future.
When the family fortunes are shattered, Barbara faces an impossible choice: remain loyal to Buckingham—or betray him by confessing the theft to King Charles.
Present Day: Julia Darke opens her Cotswolds bookshop to start life over peacefully. Instead, a Van Dyck portrait of Barbara’s daughter, with tantalising signs of the missing Queen’s Tears hidden in plain sight, brings her face-to-face with Oliver Villiers, the Oxford art conservator she once loved and walked away from.
Reluctantly drawn together to uncover Barbara’s secret, Julia and Oliver follow the trail of the Queen’s Tears—and the closer Julia comes to Barbara’s truth, the harder it becomes to hide from her own.
Inspired by the true stories of Queen Anna of Denmark’s stolen jewels and a missing Van Dyck painting, The Queen’s Tears weaves history, fiction, and family research across the centuries. Readers of The Lydiard Chronicles will find old favourites—and a new heroine following in their footsteps.
Buy The Queen’s Tears here: https://geni.us/TheQueensTears
You can also read it on #KindleUnlimited.
My thoughts
I confess I’m a fussy reader, but I know that I am safe in Elizabeth St John’s hands. In a departure from her pure historical fiction she has taken a gamble in writing a dual timeline story. My goodness, she has suceeded brilliantly!
Every single character is vivid, whether as the determined and ambitious 17th century Barbara, the emotionally fragile Julia or the sensitive but shielding Oliver. Even her side characters such as Oliver’s son, Alexander, or the spiteful rival Vivienne, are beautifully drawn.
As in any St John novel, the rich period detail is obviously well-researched, but so deftly woven into the story that you are immersed effortlessly in the atmosphere of a royal reception room, Oliver’s art gallery or home, or in Julia’s bookshop.
But one of the most intriguing aspects of this story is that just when you think you have solved the mystery, another challenge appears, another twist in the search. If you think it’s going to glide along an easy predictable path, think again. And that’s one of the aspects that keeps you gripped to the end. Highly recommended!
Alison Morton is the author of Roma Nova thrillers – INCEPTIO, CARINA (novella), PERFIDITAS, SUCCESSIO, AURELIA, NEXUS (novella), INSURRECTIO and RETALIO, and ROMA NOVA EXTRA, a collection of short stories. JULIA PRIMA and EXSILIUM, set in the late 4th century, tell the story of Roma Nova’s foundation. Audiobooks are available for four of the series. Double Identity, Double Pursuit and Double Stakes form a new contemporary thriller series. A new collection of Roma Nova short stories, HEROICA, is now out.
Find out more about Roma Nova, its origins, stories and heroines and taste world the latest contemporary thriller Double Identity… Download ‘Welcome to Alison Morton’s Thriller Worlds’, a FREE eBook, as a thank you gift when you sign up to Alison’s monthly email update. As a result, you’ll be among the first to know about news and book progress before everybody else, and take part in giveaways.
If you enjoyed this post, do share it with your friends!
Facebook/Meta has decided to limit organic links in posts or in comments on Pages to two per month. So, if I post on my Facebook AlisonMortonAuthor Page with a link to a new blogpost on either my main blog or here, or if I link to an article from an outside source, I can only do this twice a month. Currently, I post nearly every day on my Page, so potentially 30 links.
Now, I like to post lots of interesting things for my readers about history, Romans, publishing, books, events, authors along with letting them know about my books, so this is a major blow.
Just a quick explainer…
Pages are used by businesses, including authors, who wish to market their goods and services, in my case, books. Profiles are where I put personal stuff – photos, weather, France, travel, opinions and observations. It used to be strictly verboten to use your personal profile for commercial purposes – that was why you had to have a Page. Then FB changed the rules and now allow you to change your personal profile into professional mode. My suspicious self asks if FB would like to flood everywhere with commercial stuff and kill off Pages…
Moving on…
Facebook will let you post links on your Page if you pay. (Quelle surprise!)
Their site states:
To add links in more than 2 posts or comments per month, you can subscribe to a Meta One Advanced, Expert or Max plan.
Meta One plan Posts or comments with links per month
Free (no subscription) 2
Essential plan (USD 14.99/mo) 2 (How is this different from the free account?)
Advanced plan (USD 49.99/mo) 8
Expert plan (USD 149.99/mo) 20
Max plan (USD 499.99/mo) Unlimited
Prices shown in USD. Prices may vary by region.
I love you all, but I can’t afford to pay $149.99 a month which would give me the absolute lowest level my FB page readers are used to.
I’m not going to change the nature of my personal profile and turn it into a commercial one. That would be rude. Many friends there come for the chat, not to be sold to. Many of those friends do read my books, which is very gratifying, but that’s not what a personal profile is for.
Solutions
The Internet is alive with all sorts of ways to resolve this. but many seem like patches designed to cover the cracks. I’ve come up with a neater, smoother one which I think will be easier for my readers and followers.
A few years ago, I experimented with a Facebook group for Roma Nova enthusiasts, but archived it after a while as I didn’t have enough time to devote to the Page and the group and write my books.
Now, I’ve reactivated it and renamed it Alison Morton’s World of Thrillers. And the good news is that in that group I can still link and bring you all the types of posts you’re used to. Hooray!
The other/additional solution is that you could also join my newsletter where you’ll get exclusive content and be the first to hear about things. A bonus is that when you sign up you’ll get a free ebook with excerpts from INCEPTIO (Roma Nova) and Double Identity (the Mélisende thrillers).
So… Now I have the task of inviting my page followers (nearly 2,500 of them) to transfer to the new/refreshed group. Wish me luck!
Alison Morton is the author of Roma Nova thrillers – INCEPTIO, CARINA (novella), PERFIDITAS, SUCCESSIO, AURELIA, NEXUS (novella), INSURRECTIO and RETALIO, and ROMA NOVA EXTRA, a collection of short stories. JULIA PRIMA and EXSILIUM, set in the late 4th century, tell the story of Roma Nova’s foundation. Audiobooks are available for four of the series. Double Identity, Double Pursuit and Double Stakes form a new contemporary thriller series. A new collection of Roma Nova short stories, HEROICA, is now out.
Find out more about Roma Nova, its origins, stories and heroines and taste world the latest contemporary thriller Double Identity… Download ‘Welcome to Alison Morton’s Thriller Worlds’, a FREE eBook, as a thank you gift when you sign up to Alison’s monthly email update. As a result, you’ll be among the first to know about news and book progress before everybody else, and take part in giveaways.
If you enjoyed this post, do share it with your friends!
No, not Inspector Morse, but the St Hilda’s Crime Fiction Writing Weekend with the theme of Bad Apples – Crime fiction’s enemies and anti-heroes.
In all my sixteen plus years of writing thrillers, this was my first time at this high quality and fun weekend. It’s been going for 33 years!
The original Victorian building was impressive and the modern additions carefully blended in. Not too sure about the imposing block of the Garden Room, though. The gardens are magnificent and overlook the River Cherwell.
Our conference took place in the airy and modern Jacqueline du Pré Music Building where Blackwells ran the conference bookshop. I bagged a copy of Slow Horses Mick Herron’s latest, Clown Town, and he signed it for me.
 The Jacqueline du Pré Music Building (and me) The dramatic opening featured a reconstruction of James Bond and his antagonists by Vaseem Khan as Blofeld and Abir Mukherjee as Bond. Obviously fast friends, they exchanged hilarious, occasionally risqué banter while giving us insights into Bond-age (my term!) over the years.
What makes anti-heroes and villains?
Over the weekend, we learnt that they are not all they seem to be. Sometimes, they redeem themselves, other times they are good turned bad. Many are a blend, sometimes acting in a heroic way, other times leaving chaos behind them and walking away uncaring.
Writing ambiguous characters is more fun than straight good or bad ones. Often the ‘goodie’ such as John le Carré’s Smiley and his antagonist, Karla, display common characteristics. their morals and ethics are not always straightforward.
Are we not entertained? (Apologies to Maximus Decimus Meridius)
Then there’s the business of whether or not we root for anti-heroes and villains. Does the talented Mr Ripley engage or repel us? And does he do it all the time? Should we want him to win? One theme emerged – whether villains or anti-heroes, they are often charming, manipulative and intelligent. And we’re fascinated by them.
(Reminds me of Caius Tellus in my Aurelia Roma Nova thrillers or Apollodorus in the Carina strand.)
Guest of honour was Andrew Taylor who told us the gory story of the Moat Farm Murder in 1903, with a sinister villain in the shape of sexual predator, swindler and murderer Samuel Herbert Dougal. Apparently, he was a charmer…
Hosted by St Hilda’s, the conference was put together by Sarah Hilary and talented team: Jean Buchanan, Mick Herron, Jane Casey, Jake Kerridge, Carolyn Kirby and Abir Mukherjee.
 Alison with programme chair Sarah Hilary And I must mention the food…
I love an English breakfast – that goes almost without saying – but the two evening dinners, especially Saturday were delicious. And all within excellent company and a joyous atmosphere.
 Andrew Taylor in character during the Murder Mystery St Hilda’s College
Part of the University of Oxford and founded in 1893, it remained a women’s only college until 2008. Now, St Hilda’s has almost equal numbers of men and women at both undergraduate and postgraduate level. More here: https://www.st-hildas.ox.ac.uk/
Alison Morton is the author of Roma Nova thrillers – INCEPTIO, CARINA (novella), PERFIDITAS, SUCCESSIO, AURELIA, NEXUS (novella), INSURRECTIO and RETALIO, and ROMA NOVA EXTRA, a collection of short stories. JULIA PRIMA and EXSILIUM, set in the late 4th century, tell the story of Roma Nova’s foundation. Audiobooks are available for four of the series. Double Identity, Double Pursuit and Double Stakes form a new contemporary thriller series. A new collection of Roma Nova short stories, HEROICA, is now out.
Find out more about Roma Nova, its origins, stories and heroines and taste world the latest contemporary thriller Double Identity… Download ‘Welcome to Alison Morton’s Thriller Worlds’, a FREE eBook, as a thank you gift when you sign up to Alison’s monthly email update. As a result, you’ll be among the first to know about news and book progress before everybody else, and take part in giveaways.
If you enjoyed this post, do share it with your friends!
 Pick up a fabulous holiday read!
Ten stories to lose yourself in.
Whether your thing is medieval, Roman, Stuarts, Vikings, cosy crime, thriller, crime on the run or an alternative view of history, we have the perfect read for you.
Click the pictures that intrigue you and plunge straight in.
(Some even have special offers. 😉 )
Find the perfect read to match your holiday!
Reading is when you can take time to relax.
Reading is for you alone.
Reading is your door into new worlds.
What does reading do for you personally?
1. It keeps you sharp. It promotes thinking as well as enhancing your general knowledge.
2. Reading reduces stress. It gives you a quiet switch-off time from real life. Fiction especially enables you to escape into somebody else’s world. Sitting or lying still absorbed in a book is very soothing for both body and mind…
3. As well as improving your written and spoken vocabulary, it trains the brain to remember things better.
4. For writers, not just those who make their living from writing, but for anybody who has to tap out some words in their job, it improves writing skills.
5. Reading gives you something interesting to say and helps make connections with other people.
Alison Morton is the author of Roma Nova thrillers – INCEPTIO, CARINA (novella), PERFIDITAS, SUCCESSIO, AURELIA, NEXUS (novella), INSURRECTIO and RETALIO, and ROMA NOVA EXTRA, a collection of short stories. JULIA PRIMA and EXSILIUM, set in the late 4th century, tell the story of Roma Nova’s foundation. Audiobooks are available for four of the series. Double Identity, Double Pursuit and Double Stakes form a new contemporary thriller series. A new collection of Roma Nova short stories, HEROICA, is now out.
Find out more about Roma Nova, its origins, stories and heroines and taste world the latest contemporary thriller Double Identity… Download ‘Welcome to Alison Morton’s Thriller Worlds’, a FREE eBook, as a thank you gift when you sign up to Alison’s monthly email update. As a result, you’ll be among the first to know about news and book progress before everybody else, and take part in giveaways.
If you enjoyed this post, do share it with your friends!
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