September 11, 2023 • 22 mins
“To me, when you're writing anything with science fiction, the best way to present that is remembering your human foundation.”
In “Episode 62. Science Fiction Romance and AI Tools with Keri Kruspe,” host Beth Barany, creativity coach and teacher, and science fiction and fantasy novelist, talks to science fiction romance author Keri Kruspe about both the positives and negatives of using Chat GPT and about how Keri uses it and other AI tools inside her creative process. They also discuss Keri’s writing, her upcoming books, and how she found her brand with Beth.
ABOUT KERI KRUSPE
Keri Kruspe, author of Otherworldly Romantic Adventures, loves nothing more than to write about romances that feature “feisty heroines who aren’t afraid to take a chance on life… or love. Her writing career started when she became irritated that most SciFi romances had women kidnapped before they could find love. Determined to create something different, she turned “the alien kidnapping trope upside down” (Vine Voice) and the ALIEN EXCHANGE trilogy was born. Keri’s latest SciFi Romance series, ANCIENT ALIEN DESCENDANTS, is taking the Ancient Alien motif and mixes it with a sensual, romantic twist.
To be notified when Keri’s next book comes out, sign up for her mailing list: https://www.kerikruspe.com. And get a FREE copy of the novella, The Day Behind Tomorrow, a prologue to the ALIEN LEGACY series. Not to mention being kept updated on the life of a dedicated, obsessed author.
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/klkruspe15/
Twitter: https://twitter.com/keri_kruspe
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/kerikruspe/
Pinterest: https://www.pinterest.com/kerikruspe/
Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/18522573.Keri_Kruspe
BookBub: https://www.bookbub.com/profile/keri-kruspe
RESOURCES
The Midjourney Guy, Christian Heidorn: youtube.com/@TokenizedAI
Sudowrite: https://www.sudowrite.com/
Midjourney: https://docs.midjourney.com/
How AI Can Help Strengthen Your Writing by Keri Kruspe
https://writersfunzone.com/blog/2023/05/30/how-ai-can-help-strengthen-your-writing-by-keri-kruspe/
Free World Building Workbook for Fiction Writers
https://writersfunzone.com/blog/world-building-resources/
- SHOW PRODUCTION BY Beth Barany; SHOW NOTES by Kerry-Ann McDade
c. 2023 BETH BAR
Questions? Comments? Send us a text!
--
CONNECT
Contact Beth: https://writersfunzone.com/blog/podcast/#tve-jump-185b4422580
Email: beth@bethbarany.com
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/bethbarany/
CREDITS
EDITED WITH DESCRIPT: https://get.descript.com/0clwwvlf6e3j
MUSIC: Uppbeat.io
DISTRIBUTED BY BUZZSPROUT: https://www.buzzsprout.com/?referrer_id=199446
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
BETH BARANY (00:01):
Hey everyone.
Welcome back to another episodeof How to Write the Future.
I'm very excited to bring thisinterview to you today.
A little bit about our podcast.
This is a podcast for sciencefiction and fantasy writers who
want to write positive,optimistic futures and for
anyone who cares about thefuture because when we envision
(00:22):
what is possible, we help makeit so.
I'm Beth Barany, your host, andwith me today is a special
guest, Keri Kruspe, a sciencefiction author, science fiction
romance author.
And today we're gonna dig intoscience fiction writing AI, and
learning how to write fictionand who knows where else this
conversation will take us.
(00:43):
So welcome, Keri.
You and I have known each otherfor a long time, and please tell
us about yourself and anythingelse you'd like to do to
introduce yourself.
KERI KRUSPE (00:53):
Yeah, I'm so excited to be here with you
today, Beth I cannot tell you.
Like Beth mentioned, we've knowneach other for a little while.
As a matter of fact, withoutBeth, I would not be a published
author today.
I started doing this later in mylife, which is fine.
I started in my fifties to writeand I'd always known I was gonna
be a writer.
I wrote my first Star Trekepisode when I was 11.
(01:15):
And I still have it, believe itor not.
It's something that I just hadalways known in the back of my
mind that I was gonna become awriter.
I am an avid reader.
My first love was sciencefiction.
I got my first books when I wasin my mid-teens.
You know, everything from IsaacAsimov to Heinlein to, okay, I'm
gonna throw a Piers Anthony inthere.
I know he's not really sciencefiction, but he's so weird.
(01:36):
I love him anyway.
And then I found my second lovein my early twenties, and that's
romance.
And I loved romance.
I read romance all the time.
I even read romance when I wason my honeymoon, my poor
husband, which we've beenmarried for over 40 years, so
it's fine.
And then when Paranormal Romancecame along, I started reading a
lot of that with vampires andwerewolves and whatever.
(01:57):
Then science fiction romance wasborn.
Oh my god.
I thought, whew, life iswonderful.
And so I started reading a lotof those.
Some of my favorites is anauthor called Tracy St.
John.
Another one is Susan Grant's.
There's a couple things that Ikind of don't like.
I, I don't like some of theshorter stories that are just,
and I apologize if this is gonnasound snooty, but it's like just
(02:18):
an erotic fest.
Well, I like erotica too, butwhen I'm reading a story, I
wanna read a story, not just thesex scenes, which I do enjoy
those as well.
My first book is called An AlienExchange and what it was is I
got tired of all these earthwomen being kidnapped and
finding aliens and immediately,they all just bond and have sex
everywhere and blah, blah blah.
(02:39):
So I'm like, well, that's justkind of silly.
I'm gonna make it so that thesewomen who read science fiction
romance get offered to join anAlien exchange program to where
they can meet the alien mate oftheir dreams because everything
they read about was actual inreal life.
And so that some of the aliensin the exchange program- if you
read Science Fiction romance andshe would've recognized them.
(03:01):
But I have to tell you though,even though I was an avid reader
for decades, when I firststarted writing, no offense, it
was crap.
And without Beth and the schoolthat I was a part of for at
least a couple of years, I wouldnever have been able to get off
the ground because you getarrogant and you think, well, I
read all this and I know exactlywhat I'm doing.
No, you don't.
You don't know anything whatyou're doing.
(03:21):
You have to take it seriously.
And I love the way that her andthe group were able to not only,
give criticism, but it wasconstructive criticism given
with love.
So that it was crouched in waysto help and to give an ability
to find your way and to findyour own voice.
I mean, I found my brand withBeth.
My brand is (03:40):
I'm a writer of other worldly romantic
adventures, cuz I wantadventures in my stories too.
So I wanna give a shout out toBeth for that.
And I want to say thank you verymuch from the bottom of my
heart.
BETH BARANY (03:53):
You're so, so welcome, Keri, and love hearing
your story and your trajectoryand how now, here you are, a
science fiction romance writerwho you've combined two of your
favorite loves, science, fictionand romance.
And I love too how this subgenre within romance has really
blossomed.
I've watched it blossom over thelast 20 years and also have
(04:14):
tried my hand at it.
Now I'm writing science fictionmysteries with a strong romantic
subplot.
I love pulling romance in.
I have some steamy scenes inthere.
But I've chosen and realizedthat I'm really a mystery
writer.
I'm really an adventure writer,but I also love mystery.
So we're using that as our plottrajectory.
now I've done a few episodes onChat GPT and I will definitely
(04:38):
link those in our show notes.
And you have been playing withAI.
That's one of the reasons why Iinstigated this interview
because I saw what you weredoing and I thought, This is
awesome.
I wanna show other writers theways that we can use AI as a
tool, or I should say Chat GPTand the other large language
models and the image modelingtools that are out there.
(05:00):
And so if you could tell us,walk us through a little bit of
the ways that you use thesetools inside of your creative
process so that readers, and whoare mostly writers actually, I
should say listeners or mostlywriters, can get a sense of how
these tools, and I hate to callthem AI because it's not
intelligence, it's really justreally, really smart tools.
(05:20):
It's like the way we useMicrosoft Word, but like on
steroids.
KERI KRUSPE (05:23):
I am very excited to talk about this.
I call it the stool, thethree-legged stool of AI right
now.
I use, Chat GPT and I useMidjourney for pictures, and I
use Sudowrite.
Sudowrite is similar to ChatGPT.
What I like best about it, itwas created by science fiction
writers, and it's mostly forscience fiction writers.
But let me go back and let metell you how I do this.
(05:45):
I initially when I'm writing,which I am in the middle of
creating a new series right now.
And I use Scrivener.
And what I like about Scriveneris every scene that I put in, I
can put a picture there.
Well, I can't draw a straightline to save my life, but I
discovered Midjourney.
Woohoo.
I love Midjourney.
It's so awesome, except for itdoesn't take all my prompts very
well, so I'm still learning howto do it.
(06:06):
I also use that for a couple ofreasons other than just for my
own pleasure.
I use it for my marketing.
And in the way that I use it formy marketing is in when I'm
sending something out on socialmedia, if I've created an image
in Midjourney about mycharacters or an alien planet or
whatever it is, I can put thatout on social media and say,
This is what I'm writing, or inmy newsletter.
(06:27):
Or whatever it is.
It gives me another tool toutilize that I just love to do
and I wanna get into going backinto Pinterest, but I haven't
had a chance to yet cuz I havetons of stuff that I want to do
there.
And what that does, because avisual person, is it gives me.
I don't know.
It lifts me up and says, ohyeah, that looks cool.
Now, Midjourney isn't perfectand I'm still learning how to do
(06:48):
the proper prompts and there isa cost for Midjourney.
Just so everybody knows that.
I think it's 10 or$20 a month.
I can't remember now.
Sudowrite is the same thing.
I'll tell you why I use allthree.
I use Chat GPT too, but rightnow I don't pay for it.
I just use the freebie.
I probably will eventually goand pay for it.
But let me tell you the reason.
The difference between Sudowriteand Chat GPT for me.
(07:11):
Sudo write-- they have a newprogram in there that can create
a whole new plot line for you.
I haven't been able to utilizethat yet.
So what I use it for is when Iam in the middle of a scene, for
instance, and I'm not exactlysure where I want it to go or
what I want it to look like, Iwill put in there,"Describe for
me..." and I'll type in what thescene is gonna look like and it
(07:32):
comes up with stuff.
Now is everything perfect?
No.
And I would never, ever tellsomebody to use either Chat GPT
or Sudowrite for a book becauseif you ever read some of this
stuff.
It's like a very foundation ofsomething that you're gonna have
to fix because you wanna putyour own voice into it.
You want to put your owninflections into it.
It can't do that.
Now, what I use Chat GPT formostly when I'm cheating, I do
(07:55):
it a lot for marketing.
Here's my blurb.
Give me five tweets for thisblurb," or I'll give it
something else that I've writtenand I'll say, What should my
email subject line be for this?"You can use Chat GPT.
Like sometimes I will say, okay,I have to come up with an alien
creature, which I did have themdo this and I love what they
came up with.
That is (08:15):
what would their motive be if they had a human woman?
And it gave me five differentTypes of what they would do with
humans.
What I'm going with right now inthe current book that I'm
writing is a very logicalspecies that wants to see how a
woman would react in certainsituations.
BETH BARANY (08:33):
Okay.
KERI KRUSPE (08:34):
And it gave me five different situations.
So I picked three of them and Isaid, how would she react in
this?
And it gives me more ideas.
BETH BARANY (08:40):
Mm-hmm.
KERI KRUSPE (08:41):
The best thing about having Chat GPT or
Sudowrite is like I have anassistant next to me.
I can say something like, well,how does this sound?
Or If I wanted it to look likethis, what should I do?
Or whatever.
It's like having somebodyhelping you.
It's like having a Beth.
Beth, read this.
Don't you think you could makeit better for me?
BETH BARANY (08:58):
And the tool will give you a version, right?
And then it sounds like you takewhat it offers you, either
Sudowrite or Chat G P T, youtake it, you massage it, it
gives you ideas, it inspiresyou, it gives you direction or
some things to try.
Is that right?
KERI KRUSPE (09:13):
That's correct.
Yeah.
And I would never, like if Isaid, and I know I've heard
people say this, well, I wantyou to write me a science
fiction romance book of 50,000words and go for it.
No, if you read the stuff thatthis thing gives you back.
No.
BETH BARANY (09:26):
Yeah.
It's so boring.
It lacks a lot.
It lacks a lot.
KERI KRUSPE (09:29):
Yes, it does.
It does.
I mean, I know it's gonna bemore sophisticated as time goes
on.
I'm still excited about that toobecause eventually you're gonna
be able to say, well, here's myvoice in this particular book.
Write this scene in my voice.
BETH BARANY (09:43):
Yeah.
KERI KRUSPE (09:43):
And see what it comes up with.
BETH BARANY (09:45):
I've played with that and that's what one of my
previous episodes is about--taking an action and writing it.
I played with writing it indifferent voices or having Chat
GPT write it in the voice ofLewis Carroll or in the voice of
Arthur C.
Clark or different voices,although I didn't choose him.
Or, you know, rhyme this likeDr.
Seuss or write Jim Butcher.
And then I had it write it likeme cuz I had in a previous time
(10:06):
had it analyze my style and Isaid,"write it in the style of
Beth and I quoted how itdescribed my style and it did a
pretty decent job.
Not full on, but it was helpfulbecause I was also investigating
it as a tool maybe for editing.
Like, here's a clunky scene,rewrite it in the style of, you
know, and trying to replicate myvoice just to help me, give me
(10:26):
ideas.
And not that I would use thefinal version of what it spits
out, obviously.
KERI KRUSPE (10:30):
Right.
And unfortunately I don't havethe knowledge to recommend
anything under copyright.
Everything that I've heard say,try to avoid.
even when I'm in Midjourney, Ican't say, Make so and so look
like Sean Connery or whatever itis that I want them to do but
there's a way around that, thatyou would just describe things
in a better atmosphere ratherthan you using somebody's name.
(10:53):
So I don't wanna get into thehabit of saying I want to write
like Beth Barany when I'm notBeth Branny, cuz I want my own
voice.
BETH BARANY (11:00):
Exactly.
KERI KRUSPE (11:01):
But some people out there are going to do that.
And I think we have to be awareas writers that there's always
bad actors out there, no matterwhat we do.
BETH BARANY (11:11):
Absolutely.
KERI KRUSPE (11:11):
I don't wanna be afraid of it.
My goal this year is to keep ontop of what's termed the AI.
I'm taking classes, I'm watchingpodcasts.
I, I do whatever I can to learnmore about the situation.
There is, when I do, Midjourney-I found a gentleman by the name
of- I don't know if you wantsomebody's name-
BETH BARANY (11:33):
Sure.
KERI KRUSPE (11:34):
His name is- he does a lot of podcasts and he's
just now starting to do classesand I'm considering taking his--
His name is Christian Harden orsomething like that.
BETH BARANY (11:42):
We'll put resources in the show notes, on how to
access Midjourney.
Any resource you wannarecommend.
You also wrote an article forour blog, Writer's Fun Zone.
We'll include a link to thatlink of course to Chat GPT and
to Sudowrite.
I love that you also touched onsome of the challenges or issues
that could come up, and to beaware of with these tools.
(12:05):
What, for you, have you noticedbesides wanting to stay away
from copyrighted references whenyou ask it to do images, is
there anything that you'retrying to stay away from, or any
pitfalls that you might havefallen into?
KERI KRUSPE (12:18):
I just know that some of the expectations that
folks may have could beunrealistic, like you and I
discussed.
We want it to be like a tool.
I look at it as a tool just likeI do Pro Writing Aid, you know,
when we do Grammarly orsomething to that effect, cuz
those are all AIs.
When you go into Google search,you're using an AI, whether you
realize it or not.
So you just have to be cautiousabout what it is that your
(12:41):
expectations are.
I'm experimenting more.
Like I told you before, I'll goin and say, well this is what I
want this scene to do.
And sometimes it'll give mesomething really good, but I
still have to go and correcteverything.
Or it'll give me an idea that Inever thought of, which it did
for me this morning, and now I'mgonna go in that little
direction, more so than Ithought.
I'm just open-minded about theAI.
(13:02):
I just have to keep track ofeverything that's going on too.
You don't wanna just fall intosome kind of, I dunno, rabbit
hole, I guess.
BETH BARANY (13:08):
I wanna underscore how cool it is that you're using
Chat GPT for, you know,"takethis blurb and now write some
tweets." It really can give us aleg up in our marketing.
And then do you massage thosetweets, change'em a little bit?
KERI KRUSPE (13:23):
Yeah, I've done that.
Very rarely do I take.
Exactly what it says.
One of the things I noticedthough, like when I was asking
for titles for my blogs, forinstance, it gives me a long
blog.
But when I put that blog on mywebsite, for instance, and I put
the same title on there, itlikes it.
But if I take some of the wordsoff, my website tells me that
(13:44):
it's too short.
So I guess that's just somethingI recently learned.
I didn't know that my blog titleshould be so long.
BETH BARANY (13:51):
Yeah, I mean that's SEO, a search engine
optimization thing.
KERI KRUSPE (13:54):
Mm-hmm.
Mm-hmm.
BETH BARANY (13:55):
Those rules are always changing too.
Yeah.
KERI KRUSPE (13:58):
Yep.
Yep.
Like the one article that you'retalking about is"How AI can help
strengthen your writing.
That was given to me by ChatGPT.
I did massage to touch, but Iliked it that way and it, even
though my website said it wastoo short, but I didn't care cuz
I liked it.
BETH BARANY (14:14):
Yeah.
Yeah, and there's something tobe aware of about the copyright
issues with Chat GPTspecifically in that anything it
spits out technically doesn'tbelong to us.
Have you heard that?
KERI KRUSPE (14:28):
I have heard that, but I've also heard that would
never have been created such aseven the images in Midjourney,
for instance, unless you hadgiven it that prompt.
So because we prompt that,that's the other part of the
argument, we've really createdthat or helped to create it or
bring it into being, because itnever would've happened if we
wouldn't have done that.
So that's why there's twothoughts about that.
BETH BARANY (14:50):
Yeah, I'll have to do some more research and also
bring on, I have a literarylawyer who writes for the blog.
I might see if she wants to be apart of the conversation too
about this.
Cuz I'm very curious and that'swhy I also always counsel people
to change it a little bit.
Never take it verbatim, alwaystweak it just a little, or a
lot.
KERI KRUSPE (15:10):
Well, and the other concern is just because it works
in America, does that mean it'sgonna work in Europe or Asia?
Or South America.
Don't know.
That's why the copyrightsituation is fluid right now.
America has no idea what they'regonna do just yet.
BETH BARANY (15:23):
Right, right.
Yeah.
Keep an eye on that.
Yeah, we'll have to, we'll haveto check in about that later.
Cool.
Is there anything else, thatyou'd like to share with us
about these tools or even awishlist for what kind of tools
you wish-- how would you likethem to evolve to help you
better?
KERI KRUSPE (15:40):
Well, I would love if Midjourney would know when I
ask for a green lady with pinkhair and four arms that they
would give me that.
It has the hard I have aliensfor gosh sakes, and I'll even
put like an alien in there.
And I'll say, well, okay, youcan't give me a realistic
picture, so I'll try a comicbook picture.
Well, that doesn't work either.
It has yet to gimme four arms.
I'm really upset about that.
(16:00):
I have a couple of- they'recalled the Alliance of
Assassins, and they're two womenthat run it.
And I say that they have fourarms and two legs.
One of them is violet and haspurple hair, and she's a real
badass.
Her name is Suzuki.
And then there's her sister wholooks like an anime character.
She's still got the four arms,but she's all pink.
(16:21):
She wears a school girl dressand she looks like a Japanese
animation, but it won't do that.
It has a really hard time withdifferent types of skin tone.
You'd think with all of theromance novels out there cuz we
all have buff aliens on thecovers that if I say I want a
green alien, it gives me a green--no, it doesn't do that.
(16:41):
And you have to be reallycareful on how you word certain
things.
Like, I can't use the wordbreasts.
I have a thing called a sex bot.
Well, they have three breasts.
It didn't like that.
So my pictures of my sex botsonly have two.
BETH BARANY (16:53):
So Midjourney, get better.
Yeah, I haven't played with itat all, so I can't speak to
that, but I'm glad that you canbring that knowhow to everyone.
Cool.
And I understand you're workingon a new series.
Do you wanna tell the readers alittle bit about that?
KERI KRUSPE (17:05):
What I've done right now, I've actually
published my 10th book in July.
BETH BARANY (17:11):
Congratulations.
KERI KRUSPE (17:12):
I'm very excited.
So, for the first time, I didsomething different with this
one.
First of all, it's really anovella.
It's a short story, and it'staking three characters that
were introduced in my lastseries, and it's a spinoff to
them.
And it's my first writing of amale, male, and female, and
they're all aliens.
There's not a human in sight inthis book.
(17:35):
So that one's called Qhasheik'sPod, and I'm just very excited
about that.
And you know, of course,Midjourney didn't want to make
Qhasheik for me who is purpleand has horns.
What I've done with my series-like the first series that I
wrote, there was four books init.
The next series I wrote, whichhad now has the six.
I ended that series by tying itinto the first series.
So what I've done now, the newseries is called Alien Legacy
(17:57):
Brotherhood, and I'm taking someof the characters from the last
series and I'm mixing it withthe people from the first series
and the second series.
BETH BARANY (18:06):
Great.
I love how you're saying that inthis current series you're
working on, you've gotcharacters that you're mixing,
that you're taking from thefirst and the second series are
now showing up in the thirdseries.
Your current series soundswonderful and I'm so glad to
hear that your 10th just cameout this July.
That's awesome.
So congratulations with that.
Yeah.
And I love how you are creatingthese standalone series, but
(18:29):
then they're also tied in,sounds like globally it's in the
same world.
KERI KRUSPE (18:34):
Right.
And that's the main thing that Iwant to do, is I wanna keep it
in the same galaxy, so I don'thave to reinvent everything all
the time.
And with my genre, I know thatpeople like series.
I don't want to do a foreverseries, like a lot of series are
like 19, 20 books.
I don't want to do that.
Like I said, my first seriesreally ended in a trilogy, but
then I had another book that wasattached to it and this last
(18:57):
series had five books and Iactually had that short story
that just released.
I have two more short storiesthat are pertaining to the same
thing, and they will bereleased.
I'm spacing them out so that Ican have more bang for my buck
cuz they're completed.
And, then I'll hopefully be ableto release the new first book on
the first series in March.
So I have a year schedule thatI'm working on.
BETH BARANY (19:19):
That's awesome.
So, as we wrap up how can peoplefind your books and how can they
learn more about the otherworldly romantic adventures that
you're writing?
KERI KRUSPE (19:28):
Well, I appreciate that.
I just recently went wide.
I was in Kindle Unlimited forseveral years, and I would
suggest that to anybody who'sstarting out so that you can get
a feel for how things go.
But, I wanted to go wide.
And, the best place to look forme is on my website, which is
kerikruspe.com.
BETH BARANY (19:44):
That's great.
KERI KRUSPE (19:45):
I'm not selling direct yet.
I'm thinking about.
BETH BARANY (19:48):
So am I.
Actually, I have a portal.
So for people who are justthinking about publishing, when
Keri talks about going wide whatshe means is her books are
available on all the vendors,not just Amazon, but Barnes and
Noble, Apple, Kobo, Books aMillion, all the vendors.
Great.
And also libraries?
KERI KRUSPE (20:06):
Yes, yes, because I went on to draft2digital for
everything that's not on Amazon.
Of course, you can always findme on Amazon.
The other thing I want to crowabout really, cuz I I know
you'll be excited.
I'm actually in a bookstore now.
It's a local bookstore calledthe Owl Bookstore.
I'm so excited.
I just went there last week andgave her my book.
So we're gonna see how thatgoes.
And that's gonna be on acommission like basis because
(20:27):
she's local and I live in a verysmall town, so we'll see.
Stepping my foot in there.
BETH BARANY (20:33):
Yeah.
That's great.
Yeah.
So, so great.
Well,,Keri thank you so muchbeing a guest on my podcast on
How to Write The Future.
And just one more question I'dlike to ask everybody: if you
had any advice for anybody whowants to write futuristic
stories, what is the one pieceof advice that you would give
folks?
KERI KRUSPE (20:52):
To me, when you're writing anything with science
fiction, the best way to presentthat is remembering your human
foundation.
And I wanna give you just threeareas that I think are better to
create a believable aliensociety.
Know the nature of that aliencivilization.
Like are they hunter gatherers?
Are they a developed culture?
(21:14):
Also know the psychology ofthose aliens.
What type of folks are they?
I mean, there's a big differencebetween Vulcans and Klingons.
And then lastly, understand howdo they use their technology and
culture?
Let's look at Avatar.
They're technically don't appearto be advanced, but they really
are, but in a different way.
So just keep in mind when you'recreating these alien societies
(21:36):
that you want it to be somethingthat looks at our society as a
whole and how we handle things.
And to me, those are the bestscience fiction stories ever.
BETH BARANY (21:47):
That's awesome.
That's awesome.
I love that.
Well, I just wanna say thank youagain Keri.
KERI KRUSPE (21:52):
Appreciate the opportunity.
Like I said, this is my firstpodcast and you've been so good
to me.
Thank you.
BETH BARANY (21:57):
You're so welcome.
You did great.
You did great.
And everybody please check outKeri's work at kerikruspe.com.
And thank you so much, Keri Ilook forward to having you back.
KERI KRUSPE (22:06):
Thanks, Beth.
BETH BARANY (22:09):
Thanks for listening everyone.
Please like, subscribe.
And you know please share withthe writers in your life where
writing science fiction andfantasy, and want to create
positive, optimistic futures,because when we vision what is
possible, we help make it so.
If you have any questions youwould like me to feature on an
upcoming episode of How To Writethe Future, please write me.
(22:31):
Let me know.
I'm on all the socials.
I have a contact form on mywebsite, how to write the
future.com.
Your question can be featured onan upcoming episode.
Thank you so much, everyone forlistening to my podcast.
Your interest and feedback is soinspiring to me and helps me
know that I'm helping you insome small way.
(22:51):
So, write long and prosper.
Hey everyone.
Welcome back to another episodeof How to Write the Future.
I'm very excited to bring thisinterview to you today.
A little bit about our podcast.
This is a podcast for sciencefiction and fantasy writers who
want to write positive,optimistic futures and for
anyone who cares about thefuture because when we envision
(00:22):
what is possible, we help makeit so.
I'm Beth Barany, your host, andwith me today is a special
guest, Keri Kruspe, a sciencefiction author, science fiction
romance author.
And today we're gonna dig intoscience fiction writing AI, and
learning how to write fictionand who knows where else this
conversation will take us.
(00:43):
So welcome, Keri.
You and I have known each otherfor a long time, and please tell
us about yourself and anythingelse you'd like to do to
introduce yourself.
KERI KRUSPE (00:53):
Yeah, I'm so excited to be here with you
today, Beth I cannot tell you.
Like Beth mentioned, we've knowneach other for a little while.
As a matter of fact, withoutBeth, I would not be a published
author today.
I started doing this later in mylife, which is fine.
I started in my fifties to writeand I'd always known I was gonna
be a writer.
I wrote my first Star Trekepisode when I was 11.
(01:15):
And I still have it, believe itor not.
It's something that I just hadalways known in the back of my
mind that I was gonna become awriter.
I am an avid reader.
My first love was sciencefiction.
I got my first books when I wasin my mid-teens.
You know, everything from IsaacAsimov to Heinlein to, okay, I'm
gonna throw a Piers Anthony inthere.
I know he's not really sciencefiction, but he's so weird.
(01:36):
I love him anyway.
And then I found my second lovein my early twenties, and that's
romance.
And I loved romance.
I read romance all the time.
I even read romance when I wason my honeymoon, my poor
husband, which we've beenmarried for over 40 years, so
it's fine.
And then when Paranormal Romancecame along, I started reading a
lot of that with vampires andwerewolves and whatever.
(01:57):
Then science fiction romance wasborn.
Oh my god.
I thought, whew, life iswonderful.
And so I started reading a lotof those.
Some of my favorites is anauthor called Tracy St.
John.
Another one is Susan Grant's.
There's a couple things that Ikind of don't like.
I, I don't like some of theshorter stories that are just,
and I apologize if this is gonnasound snooty, but it's like just
(02:18):
an erotic fest.
Well, I like erotica too, butwhen I'm reading a story, I
wanna read a story, not just thesex scenes, which I do enjoy
those as well.
My first book is called An AlienExchange and what it was is I
got tired of all these earthwomen being kidnapped and
finding aliens and immediately,they all just bond and have sex
everywhere and blah, blah blah.
(02:39):
So I'm like, well, that's justkind of silly.
I'm gonna make it so that thesewomen who read science fiction
romance get offered to join anAlien exchange program to where
they can meet the alien mate oftheir dreams because everything
they read about was actual inreal life.
And so that some of the aliensin the exchange program- if you
read Science Fiction romance andshe would've recognized them.
(03:01):
But I have to tell you though,even though I was an avid reader
for decades, when I firststarted writing, no offense, it
was crap.
And without Beth and the schoolthat I was a part of for at
least a couple of years, I wouldnever have been able to get off
the ground because you getarrogant and you think, well, I
read all this and I know exactlywhat I'm doing.
No, you don't.
You don't know anything whatyou're doing.
(03:21):
You have to take it seriously.
And I love the way that her andthe group were able to not only,
give criticism, but it wasconstructive criticism given
with love.
So that it was crouched in waysto help and to give an ability
to find your way and to findyour own voice.
I mean, I found my brand withBeth.
My brand is (03:40):
I'm a writer of other worldly romantic
adventures, cuz I wantadventures in my stories too.
So I wanna give a shout out toBeth for that.
And I want to say thank you verymuch from the bottom of my
heart.
BETH BARANY (03:53):
You're so, so welcome, Keri, and love hearing
your story and your trajectoryand how now, here you are, a
science fiction romance writerwho you've combined two of your
favorite loves, science, fictionand romance.
And I love too how this subgenre within romance has really
blossomed.
I've watched it blossom over thelast 20 years and also have
(04:14):
tried my hand at it.
Now I'm writing science fictionmysteries with a strong romantic
subplot.
I love pulling romance in.
I have some steamy scenes inthere.
But I've chosen and realizedthat I'm really a mystery
writer.
I'm really an adventure writer,but I also love mystery.
So we're using that as our plottrajectory.
now I've done a few episodes onChat GPT and I will definitely
(04:38):
link those in our show notes.
And you have been playing withAI.
That's one of the reasons why Iinstigated this interview
because I saw what you weredoing and I thought, This is
awesome.
I wanna show other writers theways that we can use AI as a
tool, or I should say Chat GPTand the other large language
models and the image modelingtools that are out there.
(05:00):
And so if you could tell us,walk us through a little bit of
the ways that you use thesetools inside of your creative
process so that readers, and whoare mostly writers actually, I
should say listeners or mostlywriters, can get a sense of how
these tools, and I hate to callthem AI because it's not
intelligence, it's really justreally, really smart tools.
(05:20):
It's like the way we useMicrosoft Word, but like on
steroids.
KERI KRUSPE (05:23):
I am very excited to talk about this.
I call it the stool, thethree-legged stool of AI right
now.
I use, Chat GPT and I useMidjourney for pictures, and I
use Sudowrite.
Sudowrite is similar to ChatGPT.
What I like best about it, itwas created by science fiction
writers, and it's mostly forscience fiction writers.
But let me go back and let metell you how I do this.
(05:45):
I initially when I'm writing,which I am in the middle of
creating a new series right now.
And I use Scrivener.
And what I like about Scriveneris every scene that I put in, I
can put a picture there.
Well, I can't draw a straightline to save my life, but I
discovered Midjourney.
Woohoo.
I love Midjourney.
It's so awesome, except for itdoesn't take all my prompts very
well, so I'm still learning howto do it.
(06:06):
I also use that for a couple ofreasons other than just for my
own pleasure.
I use it for my marketing.
And in the way that I use it formy marketing is in when I'm
sending something out on socialmedia, if I've created an image
in Midjourney about mycharacters or an alien planet or
whatever it is, I can put thatout on social media and say,
This is what I'm writing, or inmy newsletter.
(06:27):
Or whatever it is.
It gives me another tool toutilize that I just love to do
and I wanna get into going backinto Pinterest, but I haven't
had a chance to yet cuz I havetons of stuff that I want to do
there.
And what that does, because avisual person, is it gives me.
I don't know.
It lifts me up and says, ohyeah, that looks cool.
Now, Midjourney isn't perfectand I'm still learning how to do
(06:48):
the proper prompts and there isa cost for Midjourney.
Just so everybody knows that.
I think it's 10 or$20 a month.
I can't remember now.
Sudowrite is the same thing.
I'll tell you why I use allthree.
I use Chat GPT too, but rightnow I don't pay for it.
I just use the freebie.
I probably will eventually goand pay for it.
But let me tell you the reason.
The difference between Sudowriteand Chat GPT for me.
(07:11):
Sudo write-- they have a newprogram in there that can create
a whole new plot line for you.
I haven't been able to utilizethat yet.
So what I use it for is when Iam in the middle of a scene, for
instance, and I'm not exactlysure where I want it to go or
what I want it to look like, Iwill put in there,"Describe for
me..." and I'll type in what thescene is gonna look like and it
(07:32):
comes up with stuff.
Now is everything perfect?
No.
And I would never, ever tellsomebody to use either Chat GPT
or Sudowrite for a book becauseif you ever read some of this
stuff.
It's like a very foundation ofsomething that you're gonna have
to fix because you wanna putyour own voice into it.
You want to put your owninflections into it.
It can't do that.
Now, what I use Chat GPT formostly when I'm cheating, I do
(07:55):
it a lot for marketing.
Here's my blurb.
Give me five tweets for thisblurb," or I'll give it
something else that I've writtenand I'll say, What should my
email subject line be for this?"You can use Chat GPT.
Like sometimes I will say, okay,I have to come up with an alien
creature, which I did have themdo this and I love what they
came up with.
That is (08:15):
what would their motive be if they had a human woman?
And it gave me five differentTypes of what they would do with
humans.
What I'm going with right now inthe current book that I'm
writing is a very logicalspecies that wants to see how a
woman would react in certainsituations.
BETH BARANY (08:33):
Okay.
KERI KRUSPE (08:34):
And it gave me five different situations.
So I picked three of them and Isaid, how would she react in
this?
And it gives me more ideas.
BETH BARANY (08:40):
Mm-hmm.
KERI KRUSPE (08:41):
The best thing about having Chat GPT or
Sudowrite is like I have anassistant next to me.
I can say something like, well,how does this sound?
Or If I wanted it to look likethis, what should I do?
Or whatever.
It's like having somebodyhelping you.
It's like having a Beth.
Beth, read this.
Don't you think you could makeit better for me?
BETH BARANY (08:58):
And the tool will give you a version, right?
And then it sounds like you takewhat it offers you, either
Sudowrite or Chat G P T, youtake it, you massage it, it
gives you ideas, it inspiresyou, it gives you direction or
some things to try.
Is that right?
KERI KRUSPE (09:13):
That's correct.
Yeah.
And I would never, like if Isaid, and I know I've heard
people say this, well, I wantyou to write me a science
fiction romance book of 50,000words and go for it.
No, if you read the stuff thatthis thing gives you back.
No.
BETH BARANY (09:26):
Yeah.
It's so boring.
It lacks a lot.
It lacks a lot.
KERI KRUSPE (09:29):
Yes, it does.
It does.
I mean, I know it's gonna bemore sophisticated as time goes
on.
I'm still excited about that toobecause eventually you're gonna
be able to say, well, here's myvoice in this particular book.
Write this scene in my voice.
BETH BARANY (09:43):
Yeah.
KERI KRUSPE (09:43):
And see what it comes up with.
BETH BARANY (09:45):
I've played with that and that's what one of my
previous episodes is about--taking an action and writing it.
I played with writing it indifferent voices or having Chat
GPT write it in the voice ofLewis Carroll or in the voice of
Arthur C.
Clark or different voices,although I didn't choose him.
Or, you know, rhyme this likeDr.
Seuss or write Jim Butcher.
And then I had it write it likeme cuz I had in a previous time
(10:06):
had it analyze my style and Isaid,"write it in the style of
Beth and I quoted how itdescribed my style and it did a
pretty decent job.
Not full on, but it was helpfulbecause I was also investigating
it as a tool maybe for editing.
Like, here's a clunky scene,rewrite it in the style of, you
know, and trying to replicate myvoice just to help me, give me
(10:26):
ideas.
And not that I would use thefinal version of what it spits
out, obviously.
KERI KRUSPE (10:30):
Right.
And unfortunately I don't havethe knowledge to recommend
anything under copyright.
Everything that I've heard say,try to avoid.
even when I'm in Midjourney, Ican't say, Make so and so look
like Sean Connery or whatever itis that I want them to do but
there's a way around that, thatyou would just describe things
in a better atmosphere ratherthan you using somebody's name.
(10:53):
So I don't wanna get into thehabit of saying I want to write
like Beth Barany when I'm notBeth Branny, cuz I want my own
voice.
BETH BARANY (11:00):
Exactly.
KERI KRUSPE (11:01):
But some people out there are going to do that.
And I think we have to be awareas writers that there's always
bad actors out there, no matterwhat we do.
BETH BARANY (11:11):
Absolutely.
KERI KRUSPE (11:11):
I don't wanna be afraid of it.
My goal this year is to keep ontop of what's termed the AI.
I'm taking classes, I'm watchingpodcasts.
I, I do whatever I can to learnmore about the situation.
There is, when I do, Midjourney-I found a gentleman by the name
of- I don't know if you wantsomebody's name-
BETH BARANY (11:33):
Sure.
KERI KRUSPE (11:34):
His name is- he does a lot of podcasts and he's
just now starting to do classesand I'm considering taking his--
His name is Christian Harden orsomething like that.
BETH BARANY (11:42):
We'll put resources in the show notes, on how to
access Midjourney.
Any resource you wannarecommend.
You also wrote an article forour blog, Writer's Fun Zone.
We'll include a link to thatlink of course to Chat GPT and
to Sudowrite.
I love that you also touched onsome of the challenges or issues
that could come up, and to beaware of with these tools.
(12:05):
What, for you, have you noticedbesides wanting to stay away
from copyrighted references whenyou ask it to do images, is
there anything that you'retrying to stay away from, or any
pitfalls that you might havefallen into?
KERI KRUSPE (12:18):
I just know that some of the expectations that
folks may have could beunrealistic, like you and I
discussed.
We want it to be like a tool.
I look at it as a tool just likeI do Pro Writing Aid, you know,
when we do Grammarly orsomething to that effect, cuz
those are all AIs.
When you go into Google search,you're using an AI, whether you
realize it or not.
So you just have to be cautiousabout what it is that your
(12:41):
expectations are.
I'm experimenting more.
Like I told you before, I'll goin and say, well this is what I
want this scene to do.
And sometimes it'll give mesomething really good, but I
still have to go and correcteverything.
Or it'll give me an idea that Inever thought of, which it did
for me this morning, and now I'mgonna go in that little
direction, more so than Ithought.
I'm just open-minded about theAI.
(13:02):
I just have to keep track ofeverything that's going on too.
You don't wanna just fall intosome kind of, I dunno, rabbit
hole, I guess.
BETH BARANY (13:08):
I wanna underscore how cool it is that you're using
Chat GPT for, you know,"takethis blurb and now write some
tweets." It really can give us aleg up in our marketing.
And then do you massage thosetweets, change'em a little bit?
KERI KRUSPE (13:23):
Yeah, I've done that.
Very rarely do I take.
Exactly what it says.
One of the things I noticedthough, like when I was asking
for titles for my blogs, forinstance, it gives me a long
blog.
But when I put that blog on mywebsite, for instance, and I put
the same title on there, itlikes it.
But if I take some of the wordsoff, my website tells me that
(13:44):
it's too short.
So I guess that's just somethingI recently learned.
I didn't know that my blog titleshould be so long.
BETH BARANY (13:51):
Yeah, I mean that's SEO, a search engine
optimization thing.
KERI KRUSPE (13:54):
Mm-hmm.
Mm-hmm.
BETH BARANY (13:55):
Those rules are always changing too.
Yeah.
KERI KRUSPE (13:58):
Yep.
Yep.
Like the one article that you'retalking about is"How AI can help
strengthen your writing.
That was given to me by ChatGPT.
I did massage to touch, but Iliked it that way and it, even
though my website said it wastoo short, but I didn't care cuz
I liked it.
BETH BARANY (14:14):
Yeah.
Yeah, and there's something tobe aware of about the copyright
issues with Chat GPTspecifically in that anything it
spits out technically doesn'tbelong to us.
Have you heard that?
KERI KRUSPE (14:28):
I have heard that, but I've also heard that would
never have been created such aseven the images in Midjourney,
for instance, unless you hadgiven it that prompt.
So because we prompt that,that's the other part of the
argument, we've really createdthat or helped to create it or
bring it into being, because itnever would've happened if we
wouldn't have done that.
So that's why there's twothoughts about that.
BETH BARANY (14:50):
Yeah, I'll have to do some more research and also
bring on, I have a literarylawyer who writes for the blog.
I might see if she wants to be apart of the conversation too
about this.
Cuz I'm very curious and that'swhy I also always counsel people
to change it a little bit.
Never take it verbatim, alwaystweak it just a little, or a
lot.
KERI KRUSPE (15:10):
Well, and the other concern is just because it works
in America, does that mean it'sgonna work in Europe or Asia?
Or South America.
Don't know.
That's why the copyrightsituation is fluid right now.
America has no idea what they'regonna do just yet.
BETH BARANY (15:23):
Right, right.
Yeah.
Keep an eye on that.
Yeah, we'll have to, we'll haveto check in about that later.
Cool.
Is there anything else, thatyou'd like to share with us
about these tools or even awishlist for what kind of tools
you wish-- how would you likethem to evolve to help you
better?
KERI KRUSPE (15:40):
Well, I would love if Midjourney would know when I
ask for a green lady with pinkhair and four arms that they
would give me that.
It has the hard I have aliensfor gosh sakes, and I'll even
put like an alien in there.
And I'll say, well, okay, youcan't give me a realistic
picture, so I'll try a comicbook picture.
Well, that doesn't work either.
It has yet to gimme four arms.
I'm really upset about that.
(16:00):
I have a couple of- they'recalled the Alliance of
Assassins, and they're two womenthat run it.
And I say that they have fourarms and two legs.
One of them is violet and haspurple hair, and she's a real
badass.
Her name is Suzuki.
And then there's her sister wholooks like an anime character.
She's still got the four arms,but she's all pink.
(16:21):
She wears a school girl dressand she looks like a Japanese
animation, but it won't do that.
It has a really hard time withdifferent types of skin tone.
You'd think with all of theromance novels out there cuz we
all have buff aliens on thecovers that if I say I want a
green alien, it gives me a green--no, it doesn't do that.
(16:41):
And you have to be reallycareful on how you word certain
things.
Like, I can't use the wordbreasts.
I have a thing called a sex bot.
Well, they have three breasts.
It didn't like that.
So my pictures of my sex botsonly have two.
BETH BARANY (16:53):
So Midjourney, get better.
Yeah, I haven't played with itat all, so I can't speak to
that, but I'm glad that you canbring that knowhow to everyone.
Cool.
And I understand you're workingon a new series.
Do you wanna tell the readers alittle bit about that?
KERI KRUSPE (17:05):
What I've done right now, I've actually
published my 10th book in July.
BETH BARANY (17:11):
Congratulations.
KERI KRUSPE (17:12):
I'm very excited.
So, for the first time, I didsomething different with this
one.
First of all, it's really anovella.
It's a short story, and it'staking three characters that
were introduced in my lastseries, and it's a spinoff to
them.
And it's my first writing of amale, male, and female, and
they're all aliens.
There's not a human in sight inthis book.
(17:35):
So that one's called Qhasheik'sPod, and I'm just very excited
about that.
And you know, of course,Midjourney didn't want to make
Qhasheik for me who is purpleand has horns.
What I've done with my series-like the first series that I
wrote, there was four books init.
The next series I wrote, whichhad now has the six.
I ended that series by tying itinto the first series.
So what I've done now, the newseries is called Alien Legacy
(17:57):
Brotherhood, and I'm taking someof the characters from the last
series and I'm mixing it withthe people from the first series
and the second series.
BETH BARANY (18:06):
Great.
I love how you're saying that inthis current series you're
working on, you've gotcharacters that you're mixing,
that you're taking from thefirst and the second series are
now showing up in the thirdseries.
Your current series soundswonderful and I'm so glad to
hear that your 10th just cameout this July.
That's awesome.
So congratulations with that.
Yeah.
And I love how you are creatingthese standalone series, but
(18:29):
then they're also tied in,sounds like globally it's in the
same world.
KERI KRUSPE (18:34):
Right.
And that's the main thing that Iwant to do, is I wanna keep it
in the same galaxy, so I don'thave to reinvent everything all
the time.
And with my genre, I know thatpeople like series.
I don't want to do a foreverseries, like a lot of series are
like 19, 20 books.
I don't want to do that.
Like I said, my first seriesreally ended in a trilogy, but
then I had another book that wasattached to it and this last
(18:57):
series had five books and Iactually had that short story
that just released.
I have two more short storiesthat are pertaining to the same
thing, and they will bereleased.
I'm spacing them out so that Ican have more bang for my buck
cuz they're completed.
And, then I'll hopefully be ableto release the new first book on
the first series in March.
So I have a year schedule thatI'm working on.
BETH BARANY (19:19):
That's awesome.
So, as we wrap up how can peoplefind your books and how can they
learn more about the otherworldly romantic adventures that
you're writing?
KERI KRUSPE (19:28):
Well, I appreciate that.
I just recently went wide.
I was in Kindle Unlimited forseveral years, and I would
suggest that to anybody who'sstarting out so that you can get
a feel for how things go.
But, I wanted to go wide.
And, the best place to look forme is on my website, which is
kerikruspe.com.
BETH BARANY (19:44):
That's great.
KERI KRUSPE (19:45):
I'm not selling direct yet.
I'm thinking about.
BETH BARANY (19:48):
So am I.
Actually, I have a portal.
So for people who are justthinking about publishing, when
Keri talks about going wide whatshe means is her books are
available on all the vendors,not just Amazon, but Barnes and
Noble, Apple, Kobo, Books aMillion, all the vendors.
Great.
And also libraries?
KERI KRUSPE (20:06):
Yes, yes, because I went on to draft2digital for
everything that's not on Amazon.
Of course, you can always findme on Amazon.
The other thing I want to crowabout really, cuz I I know
you'll be excited.
I'm actually in a bookstore now.
It's a local bookstore calledthe Owl Bookstore.
I'm so excited.
I just went there last week andgave her my book.
So we're gonna see how thatgoes.
And that's gonna be on acommission like basis because
(20:27):
she's local and I live in a verysmall town, so we'll see.
Stepping my foot in there.
BETH BARANY (20:33):
Yeah.
That's great.
Yeah.
So, so great.
Well,,Keri thank you so muchbeing a guest on my podcast on
How to Write The Future.
And just one more question I'dlike to ask everybody: if you
had any advice for anybody whowants to write futuristic
stories, what is the one pieceof advice that you would give
folks?
KERI KRUSPE (20:52):
To me, when you're writing anything with science
fiction, the best way to presentthat is remembering your human
foundation.
And I wanna give you just threeareas that I think are better to
create a believable aliensociety.
Know the nature of that aliencivilization.
Like are they hunter gatherers?
Are they a developed culture?
(21:14):
Also know the psychology ofthose aliens.
What type of folks are they?
I mean, there's a big differencebetween Vulcans and Klingons.
And then lastly, understand howdo they use their technology and
culture?
Let's look at Avatar.
They're technically don't appearto be advanced, but they really
are, but in a different way.
So just keep in mind when you'recreating these alien societies
(21:36):
that you want it to be somethingthat looks at our society as a
whole and how we handle things.
And to me, those are the bestscience fiction stories ever.
BETH BARANY (21:47):
That's awesome.
That's awesome.
I love that.
Well, I just wanna say thank youagain Keri.
KERI KRUSPE (21:52):
Appreciate the opportunity.
Like I said, this is my firstpodcast and you've been so good
to me.
Thank you.
BETH BARANY (21:57):
You're so welcome.
You did great.
You did great.
And everybody please check outKeri's work at kerikruspe.com.
And thank you so much, Keri Ilook forward to having you back.
KERI KRUSPE (22:06):
Thanks, Beth.
BETH BARANY (22:09):
Thanks for listening everyone.
Please like, subscribe.
And you know please share withthe writers in your life where
writing science fiction andfantasy, and want to create
positive, optimistic futures,because when we vision what is
possible, we help make it so.
If you have any questions youwould like me to feature on an
upcoming episode of How To Writethe Future, please write me.
(22:31):
Let me know.
I'm on all the socials.
I have a contact form on mywebsite, how to write the
future.com.
Your question can be featured onan upcoming episode.
Thank you so much, everyone forlistening to my podcast.
Your interest and feedback is soinspiring to me and helps me
know that I'm helping you insome small way.
(22:51):
So, write long and prosper.
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