Introduction
Since the whole design of LLMs involves predicting the next word in a sequence, it makes sense that tools would be developed to help with creative writing.
I think it’s interesting to look at how LLMs can contribute to a creative writing process. I can see them being useful in side tasks such as coming up with ideas or listing things, but the fact that the generation tends to lean to the average because of what it’s doing makes me wonder if you’d end up with a lot of cliched, flat or boring text if you overuse them.
Writing a novel is normally an iterative process, and involves getting feedback from people like editors and beta readers. At least some of the work that gets done by those people could be automated, hopefully making the process more efficient.
Interesting tools are emerging though, at least one of which I find essential in my day-to-day work.
Tools
Grammarly
This is the most essential tool I’ve found, and I use it all the time. That might be because I’ve got mild dyslexia, and Grammarly is good at picking up some of the persistent mistakes I make. I use it with anything I’m writing now - emails, blog posts, documentation, etc.
Hemingway app
This is a tool that helps you write more clearly. It highlights sentences that are hard to read and suggests ways to simplify them. It also highlights adverbs, passive voice, and other things that can make your writing less clear.
SudoWrite
Sudowrite is an AI-powered writing assistant. You can provide character descriptions and plot outlines, and it will generate text for you. Sudowrite seems like a tool designed with the idea of the AI taking the lead in writing, rather than just helping you with it.
Novel AI
Novel AI is a tool that helps you write a novel. The tool has several fine-tuned models trained on fiction. There is a memory field to give setting context, then you can write a prompt and the model will generate text for you.
Novecrafter
Novelcrafter looks a lot more like a traditional writing tool. It has areas for acts, outlining, and a codex section for background information on places or characters. Integrated into this is a text-generation tool that helps you write.
Verb.ai
Verb allows you to add character descriptions and scene summaries and then it will help you to generate text for the scene. It also has a feature to help you generate ideas for your story.