My Thoughts on GenAI

by benmweilert Comment Closed
When Generative Artificial Intelligence (GenAI) started becoming popular a few years ago, I stood at the sidelines and eyed it with skepticism. It was a neat trick that used neural networks to create pictures of people who didn’t exist, funny lyrics for songs based on a keyword, and (allegedly) scripts for TV show episodes that bordered on absurdist humor. I incorporated some of these ideas into my writing, like the main character in “The Last Immortal” using something akin to thispersondoesnotexist.com for dating profile pictures, or my month of writing 10 short stories being based on the outputs of a “neural network”—which was just a clever way of saying my own brain (which is a neural network) created these stories. Then there are the more controversial applications of GenAI. Thinking about all the propaganda, misinformation, and damage that can be done with deepfakes was one of the sub-plots in Buried Colony (the novel I wrote in 2017 and published in 2022...
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2026: 10 Year Anniversary and Beyond

by benmweilertNo Comments
In 2016, I started my websites as a place to store my thoughts, ideas, and experiences for photography and writing. Since then, the writing is the only thing that has continued to stick. Sure, I still write reviews over on BMW the Critic (and will continue to do so this year)—but that's mostly to catalog my thoughts about books, movies, and video games. The true creative space that I keep coming back to is here with the stories I produce each year. I've occasionally gone back and looked at my long-term plans for my writing. Some predictions came true, while others were pushed out further in favor of ideas that came fully formed to the front of my mind that screamed to be let out. While 2026 will be lighter than some of my busier years, I'm also looking out into the future and making near-term plans that will influence what I work on this year. If anything, these aren't...
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Barely Alive After 2025

by benmweilertNo Comments
If there's one tweak to a famous quote I love it's, "We do this not because it is easy, but because we thought it would be easy." If this doesn't describe this year's creative efforts, then I hope I don't give myself nearly as much to do next year. I figured I was due a break after a few years of recording and publishing audiobooks for The Fluxion Trilogy. Instead, a project I thought would take a month ended up sucking me in for several. The emotional burden of many things this year forced myself to give my creativity some grace to let a few things drop from the plan I set forth in January. Still, I managed to be quite productive on the few things that mattered most. Here's the summary... 2025 YEAR IN REVIEW The $1,300 Alphabet While I started The $1,300 Alphabet last year, there was plenty of activity with my illustrator, Nancy Anderson, to get this alphabet book containing...
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Striving for 2025-ing

by benmweilert1 Comment
Now that 2024 is over, I'm glad to see my creative calendar lighten up significantly. Last year, I had something to work on for every single month. While many of the tasks were easy and only took a couple days to complete, others expanded and took more time than I expected. Having sat down and worked through what I want to accomplish this year, I'm glad to see it's slower than usual. Of course, there's a lot of moving parts in multiple projects, so here are the broad strokes of what I want to accomplish in 2025. The $1,300 Alphabet With last year's release of Bountiful Bunnies, I'm on a bit of a children's picture book kick as I continue to work with artist Nancy Anderson to illustrate this year's release, The $1,300 Alphabet. I am convinced that if kids can memorize the Latin names of dinosaurs, then they can also learn "$50 words" like "Akimbo" or "Defenestrate." This book has been...
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Systems Simplify

by benmweilertNo Comments
How long does it take you to write 100 words? I'm sure most of us have never sat down and figured this out, even if we've done it many times. Still, if I asked you to write 100 words in 100 minutes, you'd likely say you can easily do that. 10 minutes? Probably more of a challenge, but not impossible. 1 minute? Unlikely—unless you really work at achieving it. As with most things in our lives, we develop an innate understanding of how long something takes the more we do it. We feel frustrated if it takes too long but accomplished if we can do it faster than normal. The routine becomes subconscious. A tenet of writerly advice is usually "develop a daily writing habit." Why is this? First, it's practicing something that then becomes easier with each iteration. Whether it's a set number of minutes or words each day, the more times you practice this routine, the better you'll get at...
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The “Black Box” Approach to Editing

by benmweilertNo Comments
A piece of editing advice often given to writers is "Kill your darlings." The feedback we receive from readers is important to identify these sections that don't work. Even if we think it's the greatest bit of prose we've ever written, these "darlings" have to go. If you're lucky, these portions of your story added nothing to the overarching plot and can be easy to write around. However, what happens when the darlings you just killed leave tremendous gaps in your story? Chances are, you've probably written the entire story before you gave it to someone to critique (at least, that's how you should do it). You've likely spent a bit of time figuring out the logic of the plot, ensuring that actions result in your intended consequences. But if a key event in your plot isn't landing correctly and you need to cut it, how do you stitch together what you have? How do you make it so you don't...
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The Stages of Handling Criticism

by benmweilertNo Comments
Nobody's perfect. As writers, all of us are on journeys to improve our writing. The best way to do so is to have our current writing criticized. Knowing what works and what doesn't is best achieved through the lens of other people—your readers. While we can't please everyone with our writing, we can at least try to take relevant and constructive criticism to make more readers happy. Ultimately, there are two stages of criticism: before you release a book and after you publish this book. Knowing how to handle both is key to improving your writing. Use beta reading criticism to make changes. I've written about the four things I like my beta readers to provide for my drafts, but I'll admit that it stings a little when a trusted source comes back and gives some harsh criticism of my story. Your first reaction might be to get mad. "These beta readers don't understand what I'm trying to do!" you may tell...
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Writing shouldn’t be solitary

by benmweilertNo Comments
When people say "writing is a solitary activity," they do not refer to the entire process. Yes, nobody but you will sit down and put the words in your head onto the page. I know I've written a lot about how a self-published author can "do it all," but it's important to know the value of community as an author. The best-written works of all time hardly existed in a vacuum. Even if the actual process of writing can be solitary, it can become isolating if we don't connect with others who have this same experience. Writing should be an experience. Not everyone has the same process or hangups, but there are enough similar highs and lows that you can empathize with when you talk about your craft with fellow authors. We understand the highs of selling our work or getting a glowing review as much as we know the pain of writer's block or critical feedback. Sometimes a close group...
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Audiobooks by the Author

by benmweilertNo Comments
Since audiobooks are all the rage for potential readers to encounter your work, I recommend getting an audiobook version into the world as soon as you can—after the paperback or eBook drops, that is. In my three-part series about creating my first audiobook, I discussed how the process isn't too intimidating once you get into it. With minimal equipment and an abundance of time in the evenings, I recorded, produced, and distributed the audiobook for First Name Basis by myself. I did it mostly as a test so that when it came time to narrate my memoir, I could get my most personal story out to the world in my voice. It helped that I had enough experience in these three aspects of making an audiobook due to hobbies I had while in high school and college. You can still hire narrators, producers, and distributors for your audiobook, but these costs add up quickly. During my panel on audiobooks at COSine...
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2022: More of the Same

2022: More of the Same

by benmweilertNo Comments
Accountability has always been key for me. I feel obligated to finish projects when other people know that I'm working on them. 2022 will be the fourth year that I have posted in January about my writing goals for the year. Many of them may appear similar to the ones in 2021, but that's just part of long-term planning and short-term setbacks. Buried Colony Yes, I realize this is the third year in a row I've had this book on my "to complete" list. I have planned out solutions to fix these issues with the critical beta-reader and advanced reader feedback I received last year. Fortunately, I can still keep what I want to accomplish with this book intact. After I fix it up, I'll be sending the manuscript to a sensitivity reader for a final run-through to ensure I'm not unintentionally offending anyone with my character depictions. Buried Colony will be my primary project for this year, so—if all goes as...
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