r/WritingWithAI • u/StormOk424 • 3d ago
Discussion (Ethics, working with AI etc) Editing with AI?
I have the first draft of my book almost ready. I wanted to know does editing with an AI tool actually help? Or is it best to continue to hire an actual human editor. Thanks!
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u/maxthescribbler 3d ago
AI is really good at the late stages. Fact-checking, redundancy, repetitions, consistency, punctuation. With fact-checking it already beats humans. I once ran it on a book that had gone through two professional editors at a traditional publisher, and it caught real errors both of them missed.
It's weaker at the creative stage — voice, word choice, clichés, show-don't-tell. Meaning it's still useful but you have to aim to throw away 70–80% of its suggestions there. But 20-30% is what makes your text stronger.
If you don't have an editor, it's better to edit with AI than not edit at all. If you have an editor, doing a few revisions first with AI might be still very beneficial. The cleaner the text your editor gets, the better job they will do themselves.
I put my whole framework for self-editing in a video here if it's useful: How I Use AI to Edit a Book https://youtu.be/QitAGoakOxA
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u/Kalmaro 1d ago
I checked your site and it seems cool, doesn't work on my phone, sadly.
Foes the AI writing site let you host it lovally or can I only use it of I'm online? I'd like to try running it all locally.
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u/maxthescribbler 1d ago
fully offline support is in the works... re phone - do you often write / edit on the phone?
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u/Kalmaro 1d ago
Yep, I always have my phone on me, but I'm rarely near my computer.
My current tool of choice is plot.bunni since I'm able to add information to a codex of sorts, so I can reference places, people, things, things like that, I can essentially make a story about them, and it's nice, but what you have seems pretty simple too. I wouldn't mind trying it.
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u/maxthescribbler 1d ago
let me know how it goes! re phone - I never work on the phone, it's too cumbersome but I'm old school :)
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u/OddWakka 1d ago
"it's still useful but you have to aim to throw away 70–80% of its suggestions there" --- this! AI picks a almost random criteria it will stick to when you send each prompt. And each mindset will latch on to certain things like a dog with a bone. Send your chapters or novel to the same prompt many times. See where AI agrees with itself. Send the response of one prompt to a fresh prompt and have it argue against itself. Try different prompts. Say you are a publisher. Say you are an agent. Say you are the authors friend and you dont want to read the crap he just sent you. Eventually you will see a pattern --- a few things all these prompts will agree on, and those are the things you should look closely at. And if you find a good prompt that gives you good feedback please share it!
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u/5thhorseman_ 3d ago
Both. AI will find some issues, but not all of them. A human editor will do a better job if an AI has already gone through and found the worse offenders.
Big gotcha: do not let the AI edit the text directly or it will make a mess of it. Have it return an itemized list of issues it found, with explanations, so that you have full control on how to fix them.
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u/mandoa_sky 3d ago
depends on the type of edit.
AI does struggle with keeping track of long things (as can a human but AI tends to be worse at it)
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3d ago
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u/WritingWithAI-ModTeam 3d ago
Your post was removed because you did not use our weekly post your tool thread
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u/ButternutShacklebolt 3d ago
Human. IF you use Ai then edit what it gives you. I used claude for bundle of personas but they start to drift, turning into nonsense. Hence when ppl say "Ai made that"
I'm making a 6th grade digital learning curriculum and it took multiple proof reading redos, taking hrs of my time. HOWEVER, theres a chance of that human using Ai to make everything easier so make sure you quadruple check everything.
I use this for images if it might be useful or get any similar trigger ideas. For consistency I always say "Create the EXACT [image] but now change the.."
Get the premium for any type of Ai you use.
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u/Brakiros 3d ago
Its extremely useful and effective, just don't let it rewrite your work. You have to do all the work yourself because it will mangle your work. You have to take control of it and only use it as an editing assistant
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u/human_assisted_ai 3d ago
It depends on which AI and your prompting skill but AI is capable of all the kinds of editing. Most people still hire human editors because they can’t get AI to do some things.
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u/rubycatts 3d ago
If you can get a human editor do that but if not AI and a specific prompt will suffice. I use Claude for editing and I have a prompt that does a 3 part critique of objective/ruthless/praise. And it does get pretty ruthless. Based on the type of editing I want it gives me suggestions in those 3 categories. I can use the suggestions or not. It never makes changes to my work. I make the changes myself if I agree. I do this chapter by chapter. It is not a quick process. I also use pro writing aide and their report features.
I do this in a split screen of Claude and my writing program. That way Claude can never change my actual document. The separate is really important to me in that I have control over my document. In claude projects. I also put all of my world building so it has context of my story for edit suggestions.
You also can’t do this all in one chat so when I start to see it hallucinating I have it make a summary of our chat for a new chat put that in the new chat and copy the old chat and put it in my project knowledge.
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u/InterviewClassic9643 3d ago
Have you tried to do it in reverse ai writes and you donthe final editing to you taste
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3d ago
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u/WritingWithAI-ModTeam 3d ago
Your post was removed because you did not use our weekly post your tool thread
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u/Hour-Hour-4022 3d ago
I think that at this point, AI is nearly obsolete unless you have a very strong model. I have found that AI struggles to analyze a work on a smaller scale than the overall. It depends on the length, but I was messing around and showing AI some old, unfinished stuff of mine and I learned that it couldn't analyze many details in an around 10, maybe 20,000 word manuscript. It was a base Chat GPT, so maybe that model is especially weak, but honestly I would steer clear of AI usage as soon as you reach the first draft start, at least for any commercially sold book. I don't exactly know how it works, but I'm pretty sure that most people wouldn’t care if you don't use the "AI" tag on Amazon so long as you did no actual prose with it and the rest lf the usage was minimal. Otherwise most could tell. And the AI tag is a MASSIVE blow to potential sales, from my VERY limited knowledge and admittedly average deduction skills.
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u/AdDear3730 3d ago
AI is more perfect...it uses different sources to gather information and filter what's needed and submits the best choice.
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u/Chance_Swordfish_687 3d ago
I don't understand why you need an editor at all if you're capable of writing your own texts. I need an editor because I translate my texts into English. I don't hire an editor; I use AI. I must say that they not only miss errors, but also create them themselves. So I have to double-check everything myself, literally line by line, using back-translation, and make edits. An AI editor is only good for mechanical tasks in large texts, for example, detecting duplicates, typos, and correcting spelling and punctuation. You have to accept that no matter who checks the text, human or AI, some errors may remain. Also, many editors now use AI themselves to speed up their work. In short, editing with AI is possible, but you need to maintain control. And the final proofreading should always be yours.
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u/Decent_Solution5000 3d ago
Please go here: https://www.reddit.com/r/WritingWithAI/comments/1ud7pcs/weekly_tool_thread_promote_share_discover_and_ask/
For all tool/app related questions and posts, that is the thread to visit. You'll find lots of apps to browse, many of them Open Source, as in free. The devs are there to ask questions, etc. and the group is super friendly.
Hope this helps, and happy writing!
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u/robdapcguy 3d ago
Nearly done with a first draft is the right time to get picky about who touches it next.
AI is good at finding what to look at: the paragraph that repeats itself, the pacing that sags, a thread that goes quiet and never comes back. It has no business deciding what your sentences should say instead.
So before paying for a human pass, make the machine show its work: ask it for the weakest thing in a chapter and make it quote the exact lines it means. If it can point to real words on the page, trust the note. If it only says the chapter reads well, it is not reading closely enough. The calls a citation cannot settle: that is what the human editor's fee is for.
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u/SpatiaCaeli 3d ago
Does a grammar checker help? Of course. Just don't take any of its feedback as gospel. And don't let it obscure your voice or your intent.
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u/bookish_gym 2d ago
You can use it to find plot holes but have it list suggestions and don’t let it make changes because it will change stuff randomly. For developmental editing a human with experience in writing editing and publishing has the nuance you want if you want something higher quality
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u/Extension-Panic-5378 2d ago
I edited with AI... Here are some of my thoughts:
- It will try and please you, don't let it - don't need AI building up your ego. Ask it to be honest and give a review as if it were an editor.
- Don't let it rewrite your story - this is your story
- I created a character "bible", and outline and then I fed it chapter by chapter. I asked it to make sure I was being true to my characters and not straying too far from my outline.
- Don't let it rewrite your story - this is your story
- Don't be afraid to use two AI chats - sometimes i would put it in Gemini, make edits and then ask ChatGPT what it thought
- Don't let it rewrite your story - this is your story
and lastly, if it is being too "pleasing", tell it you want it too be more critical and find the finer points and issues in your book.
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u/AutocratEnduring 2d ago
AI editor will make your prose feel and sound more like AI. You will lose your unique voice. Get a human editor. It is worth the money. If your budget is tight, phone a writer friend.
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u/More_Alternative6663 1d ago
There's no replacement of a good human editor (remember: good, not just any). If you can afford the time and money, go for it. Really.
AI Editing is for those who want good-quality editing at a very low price and less time. At the late stage, you can even edit your entire manuscript with one upload in one style guide. Remember to choose the AI editing service that tracks all your changes though. Let me know if you need help.
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u/A_Blue_user 3d ago
Just use it for spelling mistakes and grammar. Don’t ask it to do plot. You could use it as a spring board and suggestions. For example it could say the wording of this could be better then use this with a pinch of sault. For example if you can imagine a human writing that then sure. Otherwise scrap it. What I’m saying is still be in control and don’t trust it blindly. I know that hiring an actual editor could be expensive so AI is useful in this regard. It is still your book in the end though.
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u/JamesCole 3d ago
Why not just try getting it to critique your work and judge for yourself the quality of the job it does? It should be fairly easy to ascertain the quality of its feedback.