In our quest to cover the mind-blowing benefits AND the nightmare scenarios that AI chatbots are unleashing on the writing world, we called in friend-of-the-podcast and editor Kristen Tate to find out if she's using AI in her work.

The answer? It depends entirely on her clients' wishes—and a few hard lines she refuses to cross. But this isn't just about ethics (though we go there). Kristen gets into the nitty-gritty technical stuff: what chatbots absolutely nail, what they're garbage at, and her brilliant hack for wrangling conference notes that'll make you wonder why you didn't think of it first. Plus, she's got some hard truths for authors who are way too eager to let AI do their editing dirty work.

If you're an indie writer or just need some tips to polish your work, this is the episode for you.

Remember, we have a Writers Process meetup every Wednesday. Check us out.

We've been putting AI chatbots through creative writing challenges, but what are these systems actually doing when they write?

In this episode, we bring in AI expert Bill Moore. Bill works with AI on the coding side, so we had him apply his technical know-how to literary prompts - including crafting the opening of a bestselling fantasy novel. Along the way, we dive into the thorny ethics of building and using AI systems.

Perfect for non-tech folks who want to understand what's happening under the hood.

Remember, we have a Writers Process meetup every Wednesday. Check us out.

Is nothing sacred? After exploring how AI might steal our writing jobs, we're now testing whether these digital usurpers can replicate our podcasting chemistry too. Google's NotebookLM claims to transform documents into conversations between virtual "hosts," setting up the perfect showdown with our human-led book discussion format.

For this AI vs. human battle royale, we revisit our podcast roots with James Gardner's "The Art of Fiction," specifically tackling that mind-exploding (and not in a good way) final chapter on plot. With words like “profluence” and “picaresque” not to mentions some painfully retrograde sexual politics, this chapter is a doozy.

Listen as we compare the artificial hosts' takes with our own snarky comments (er…insights) and decide for yourself: can cold, calculating algorithms somehow make Gardner's impenetrable prose not just comprehensible, but actually entertaining? (Spoiler: the results will surprise you.)

Remember, we have a Writers Process meetup every Wednesday. Check us out.