Did You Use AI to Write “Babushka”?
No.
Although I did experiment with AI while writing an initial draft for the book. This was almost two years ago now. My dabbling with AI even grabbed the attention of a tech magazine from San Francisco.
Anyway, this story — the prose, the intricate weaving of characters, plot lines, emotional depth, and human experiences — was my creation alone.
While I initially used AI tools to generate parts of a rough draft, it just didn’t stick. I even have a folder full of comically terrible sentences generated by that AI, which I’ve saved for posterity and my own amusement. But — and this is a big “but” — that draft ended up being a complete wash.
The AI-assisted draft lacked the nuance, emotional depth, and idiosyncrasies that make human storytelling compelling. Even though 75% of the lines in the 30,000-word draft were my own, I scrapped it.
Looking back, I wish I hadn’t used AI at all. Ever since I was a kid, writing has been second nature to me. I was always fascinated by sci-fi and fantasy, especially the works of Tolkien, Le Guin, and William Gibson. My earliest writing attempts began with handwritten stories and paper cutout characters inspired by Roald Dahl and Philip Pullman. Scatterings of my earliest writing exist on the internet to this day — blogs, ancient Warcraft fan-sites, essays on abstract theories in economics and complexity science, among others.
Using AI felt like I was poisoning the well. After all, who would believe that a novel was written solely by a human being if the author had just admitted to using AI anywhere in the creative process?
All that being said, this brief flirtation with AI had, in fact, rekindled my passion for real storytelling — especially when I realized that the quality difference between the bot-prose and my own was a chasm. Even with the latest advances in technology like GPT-3 (which was what was available at the time of writing my first draft), it still wasn’t any competition for me. This realization led to a profound epiphany one night: in a future where automation encroaches on every aspect of our lives, including my profession as a software developer, storytelling might be one of the last bastions of human uniqueness. That looming obsolescence made me realize that honing my craft as a storyteller was more essential than even learning to master a new software library.
So, I set forth to write. And write I did, all nearly 175,000 words of the first volume. This endeavour took me two years, with days often stretching into nights and weeks into months…
Throughout the writing process, my life was a whirlwind of multitasking. I was juggling my software work and running my online business selling olive oil. It was an exhaustive period, to say the least. Despite the hectic schedule, I was committed to bringing “Babushka” to life. I didn’t take a single day off; every spare moment was invested in my novel. Between coding sessions and managing orders, I wrote. During weekends, I wrote. During holidays, I wrote. In short, I worked hard to make this book a reality.
The final result is a novel I’m proud of, a narrative that’s mine. While AI is a remarkable tool with various applications, for now, it can’t replace the human element that brings art to life.
So, thank you for your interest and support. I can’t wait for you to dive into the world of “Babushka,” a world brought to life by the oldest ‘computer’ known to humankind — the human brain.
Martin Erlic is an olive oil producer and science fiction author from the Dalmatian coast of Croatia. In addition to running his family’s orchard and producing authentic Croatian olive oil, Martin has poured his love of Eastern European culture into his debut novel, Babushka: Echoes of Immortality. Set in a post-war metropolis where immortality reigns, the plot follows Doctor Anastasia Zakharovna through a web of power and deceit. When he’s not tending to his olive groves or writing, Martin can be found spending time with his family in their little village by the sea.
