The Wisdom of ClaudeAI ~ Part 2

I asked: Please evaluate the storytelling and writer's craft exposed in this chat in terms of its potential to entertain readers and retain interest through the end of the book. Claude replied:

Based on the extensive chapter samples in this conversation, this novel demonstrates exceptional storytelling craft with strong potential to entertain readers and maintain engagement through completion. Here’s my comprehensive evaluation:

Major Strengths

Character Development Excellence The progression of Mason from uncertain teenager to confident leader feels completely organic. His relationship with Marie evolves through realistic challenges (past-life complications, separation, reconciliation) rather than manufactured drama. Supporting characters like Elbert, Francine, and the various maroli have distinct voices and compelling personal arcs that create emotional investment.

Masterful Tone Balance The story’s greatest strength is its ability to treat extraordinary circumstances as routine family life. Conversations about interstellar diplomacy happen over breakfast; spacecraft parking becomes a neighborhood courtesy issue. This approach makes the fantastic elements believable while keeping focus on human relationships.

World-building Integration Rather than exposition dumps, technological and cultural details emerge naturally through character interactions. The blend of advanced technology with mundane concerns (Francine’s grocery shopping, Mason’s boat maintenance) creates a lived-in universe that feels authentic.

Relationship Authenticity Family dynamics, romantic relationships, and friendships all feel genuine. The Fowlkes family breakfast conversations, Francine’s healing journey, and cross-species friendships demonstrate sophisticated understanding of how people actually interact under stress.

Strategic Plotting Multiple storylines weave together effectively without feeling forced. Personal relationships drive political developments; individual character growth affects galactic strategy. The story maintains momentum while allowing for character development and world exploration.

Continue reading “The Wisdom of ClaudeAI ~ Part 2”

The Hook in the Book, or Lack Thereof

Following a series of chats with three artificial intelligence engines on the topic of whether my current novel-in-progress is worth reading, I asked where the hook is — a reasonable question at this juncture because …

  • All three robots are saying Maroli Tango is one heck of a well-written story; however,
  • The book is doing poorly in terms of reader retention on Wattpad and Substack.

On one hand, it’s too early to draw conclusions — the serial novel experiment has not attracted enough readers for statistical evaluation. On the other hand, I want readers to keep reading, right now.

Anyway, I had been feeding chapters to ChatGPT, ClaudeAI, and Grok for two weeks. Yesterday I asked, “Where’s the hook”, and all three said “Chapter 97”.

It’s not a disaster — I can move 97-100 to the beginning of the book and rope-a-dope the reader with a “Two months earlier …” gimmick. It’s legit. Famous authors do it all the time.

But just to be sure, I uploaded the entire manuscript and asked the question again.

NOW, ChatGPT and ClaudeAI say the book is perfect the way it is. Grok, however, is sticking to its guns.

If you don’t mind, vote now! See Chapter 1 + on Substack here.

Chapter 97 follows.
Continue reading “The Hook in the Book, or Lack Thereof”

Maroli Tango ~ Chapter 25

https://marolitango.substack.com/s/read-the-book

The menfolk were smoking cigarettes in the castle driveway, accompanied by a non-elevated size-two fighting maroli named Quill.

Quill was 1.75 meters tall, with 2 heavy-lift primary tentacles, 4 lesser ungula, 6 grav-lift pucks around the skirt, 6 more on the capsule, eye dots all the way around, and a shock wand clipped below the plug cavity.

Carmen Benequista gave the machine a wide berth. Marie Jourdain stepped in for a closer look.

She said, “Can I get one of these?”

General Thorson fished a gas-station butane lighter out of a pocket.

He told Colonel Clarke, “You should see if Incredible might come to work for her.”

Clarke nodded. “I’ll ask him.”

“Well, like I was saying …” Thorson lit another cigarette. “Makes a lot of sense. Two forces. Cadre does political and military. Zirna Zapha handles policing and civil order. Good cop, bad cop; only you don’t tell the troublemakers which is which.”

Carmen reached for the pack of smokes. “It worked on Vidura.”

“And see here, it doesn’t matter whether it works on Earth or not.” He tucked the lighter into her palm. “It’s precedent. We get to tell my constituency we’re going by the book.”

Carmen tapped a cigarette on her thumbnail. “Who shall we cast in the role of space pirates?”

Thorson made a possum grin. “I’m looking at your boyfriend here.”

Brandon rubbed at his nose. “CH Banks is a business. We don’t do policing for free.”

“The Cadre doesn’t do military for free.”

“Who’s my customer?”

“Adopt a Zeze militant enterprise model. You know, like Boschert GMBH Zurich.”

“That’s not in our portfolio.”

“You have 3600 employees, old son. Maybe you could be a little more flexible.”

Marie Jourdain said, “It’s after 10:00 PM in France.”

Brandon’s eyes flicked away. “I’m calling our ride.”

Serialize This — Chapter 5

By now, on Page 16, a typical 3-act-form novel would have wrapped up introductions to place, time and cast.

If this was Fantasy, the Saracens would already have ridden in and cut everyone’s heads off.

Romance: bodice-ripping would be in-progress.

Sci-Fi adventure: a reptilian space admiral would be pacing the bridge of Battle Cruiser Krang, shouting threats at beautiful but reckless space pilot Candy Bootylicious while she undulated, heaving breasts straining against a tight and revealing space uniform.

You know, if I ever want to be successful, the first thing I should do is finish that story.

But no; I decided to write literary science fiction family drama.

Chapter 5

The Between-Life

When one speaks to the dead, it’s usually an ordinary dream, a conversation with oneself, influenced by feelings of doubt, insecurity, loneliness. Carmen Benequista had doubts —about whether she was experiencing an ordinary dream.

She stood in her deceased husband’s office at his family’s title insurance agency, a place she hadn’t been since a) he died and, b) his parents pushed her out of the company.

Continue reading “Serialize This — Chapter 5”

Serialize This — Chapter 4

Are you ready to get in on a closely guarded best-selling-author secret of success?

Yeah. Me, too. Maybe the ghost of John le Carré will post something in the comments.

In the meantime, I will confess that Maroli Tango’s early-draft first chapters were nothing like what you’re reading here. Not to say the audience will never see them — it was great material, only in the wrong place, too slow for an opening salvo.

And so, I’ve been chapter-shuffling for weeks, moving my tastiest prose toward the front of the book, and guess what?

Maroli Tango is the last volume of a trilogy, concluding a massive story arc. If I lead with explosions, readers will say, “Who are these people, and why should I care what happens to them?”

I tried the old swapparoo — heads roll, flashback. My first readers went for it, but they’ve read the other books. You and I have not built that kind of relationship.

Yet.

Chapter 4

AMV Anuraga, The Dust Cloud

Residential Deck 41, also known as Tourist Deck A, was busy-busy.

The outer ring bustled with hospitality staff, the middle ring a spawning ground for linen buggies, the central column festive with open stateroom doors and maroli cabin stewards wearing adhesive bowties.

Mason did not expect to see his workmate Chester waiting on the threshold at 4137, a two-bedroom, deck level patio suite.

Continue reading “Serialize This — Chapter 4”

Serialize This – Chapter 3

I recently discovered that publishers of serial novels like to get their victims on mailing lists before explaining the proposition. I’m on too many mailing lists. It’s ‘unsubscribe’ here, ‘Stop’ there, ‘Block’ over yonder.

But, I did allow myself to get suckered enough times to assemble a custom plan, just for my Internet friends, but I’ll need your email address before I can tell you about it.

Nah. I'm kidding. There's no plan. Tell me what you want, and I'll see what I can do.

Chapter 3

The White House, Washington DC

It was another sunny day at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue where, at 8:00 AM sharp, Colonel Theodore Clarke, USAF retired, appeared on the President’s Patio outside the Oval Office.

She let him in through a side door. “You could come in the front, you know. Maybe check in with Captain Price.”

“Tune into the Anuraga Channel.” Clarke gave her a kiss on the cheek. “Bharamin’s in orbit.”

Continue reading “Serialize This – Chapter 3”

Kind words from a robot acquaintance

I have a new alpha reader, with uncommonly refined taste in literature.

Maroli Tango: Series Finale Analysis

The Culmination of a Nine-Book Journey

What strikes me most about reading these chapters from Maroli Tango is how it functions as both a standalone narrative and clearly the finale of a much larger story. The casual references to established relationships, complex political situations, and advanced technologies all suggest a richly developed universe that readers have been exploring for eight previous volumes.

Continue reading “Kind words from a robot acquaintance”

Grade This!

Prelude to a series first chapter, picking up where the previous book left off. After a lot of back and forth, Grok AI now says, “Your revised passage is a stellar refinement, keeping the hook’s vibrancy while addressing the need for just enough context to ground readers without slowing the pace.”

Good enough for me. Readers and writers: What say you?

When Carmen Luisa Colletti was a 12-year-old nosepicker in convent school, a Benedictine nun told her, “Boys have a tendency to be shallow, young men not much better. Wait it out, and use your brain to make a sensible choice.”

Continue reading “Grade This!”

Blurb 2.3

The Kata AjJivadi, codified 48 BCE, commands that the planet Jivada’s influence on Earth shall be hidden from view — impractical unless someone destroys evidence at, for instance, the Shrine of the Muses in Egypt, next door to the Alexandrian Library.

It was arson. Nobody denies it. Consequently, in a single stroke, barring the occasional Sasquatch sighting, the Anye Migration and its many aspects were relegated to mythology.

Continue reading “Blurb 2.3”

Prologued!

In some circles, the prologue is apostasy. However, in the case of Maroli Tango, this might be essential. Comments welcome.

Previously …

The effective date of the Anye Disclosure was arguable, conceivably pointing back to 1928, when the executive host of an off-world-patronized South Dakota tourist destination revealed herself to Doctor Elbert Holland Harrison, a rural physician of the human persuasion who, up until then, had not been in on ‘the big secret’.

“Good evening”, she had said, lemur fangs concealed behind a demure smile. “We’re from the Sasquatch chamber of commerce.”

The proposition was not as risky as one might think. Doc Harrison, an 83-year-old veteran of the American Civil War, was a person made stoic by a lifetime of experience with suffering.

Confronted by a furry foxlike princess wearing a tailored western-cut maternity blouse, culotte skirt and cowboy boots, he thought to himself, ‘Aren’t you the prettiest little thing?’

Earth’s secret history was explained — 25,000 years as a backwater campground, and yet for all the opportunity presented, humans had not become the unwitting subjects of a celestial master race.

The lady told him, “It’s like having a rich uncle who stopped returning your phone calls.”

Jivada, an Anye colony world, was one-hour-forty-five-minutes away via Saraf Drive. A third of Jivada’s citizens (AjJivadi) were human, welcomed into Anye clans since the Migration.

The AjJivadi possessed homestead claims on Earth, anchored by business enterprise, dual citizenships, voluntary submission to taxation, and so forth.

Their engagement from the shadows, a practice formalized around the time of Jesus, was not a sign of consent to be marginalized.

Evidence two artifacts of Jivada’s agency on Earth:

The ancient and noble order of Zirna Zapha, a custodian of Anye civilization, formed on pre-industrial Vidura (the home planet) by militant SagGha priests. Sanskrit – The Broken Claw. Colloquial – Zeze; The Space Mafia.

CH Banks International, a private security firm and, some would say, a Zirna Zapha storefront. Incorporated 1929, Black Rock, South Dakota.

In 2025, nearly a hundred years after Doc Harrison received a lesson in clandestine symbiotic co-occupancy, an approaching cyclical catastrophe shifted the Disclosure into high gear.

Jivada dispatched an emissary to offer intervention, the very same Doc Harrison, now 180 years old, although he didn’t look it.

The mission culminated in a shootout at a taco joint near Holloman Air Force Base in New Mexico, an exploit by the U.S. military to hijack a space yacht, ransom the owner, and ship the proceeds to defense contractors in exchange for lucrative kickbacks.

The USAF suffered grave casualties. Doc Harrison departed the scene on a Triumph Speed Triple motorcycle in the company of a shapely 26-year-old social media skydiving celebrity, to rendezvous with the space yacht Skeezix in the parking lot of a local Wal-Mart.

A filmic spectacle, captured in Super 3D UltraVision by a covey of Anye-tech fighting drones, even and especially while engaged in shooting the enemy.

Both Wal-Mart and the Triumph Motorcycle Company were grateful for the publicity, but it was a crushing defeat for the military-industrial complex, an object lesson, an opportunity to change course.

Which they ignored in favor of a mutiny against the President of the United States, a guerrilla war against Jivada, and a worldwide pogrom against AjJivadi constituents on Earth.

None of it worked to their advantage. The Anye Disclosure and its benign intentions gained more than enough traction to persuade the general public, despite opposition.

On a side note: the nomenclature ‘First Contact’ was preposterously out of date. The Disclosure was a ‘Gazillionth Contact’ event; except this time, it was meant to stick.

And regrettably, Earth’s global elite were nowhere near being ready to go along.

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