Installment Eight With ChatGPT
Note to readers: This article contains content created by LLMs ChatGPT and Claude.ai. The story portion is the product of my prompt and ChatGPT’s response. Some parts of the rest of the article are Claude.ai output adulterated by my comments, thunk up out of my own brain. These mostly appear as italic text. Please, contact me with questions related to this article or the series of articles.
Week eight. The journey with “Shadows in the Smoke” revealed layers I never anticipated when I first asked ChatGPT for a story. Week seven wanted to be an ending, but turned out to be a pivot point – a moment to fall forward on my face and wonder what the hell happened during this experiment. What true knowledge came from analyzing AI’s role in creative writing.
Collaboration between human and machine stills fascinates me. ChatGPT’s ability to generate a facsimile of noir-style prose, with its clichéd atmospheric descriptions and commonplace dialogue phrases, initially exceeded my expectations. More review revealed its limitations and the necessity for human intervention. The AI excelled at mimicking the genre’s style but failed at the deeper nuances of character development and consistent plot threads. It’s like having a writing partner who’s read every noir novel ever written but has no imagination of their own to create an original story.
It started as a desperate grasp for newsletter content and evolved into an impromptu exploration of AI’s capabilities and limitations in creative writing. AI can be a powerful tool for brainstorming and generating ideas, best when guided by human creativity and emotional intelligence. Perhaps the most important lesson is that AI isn’t here to replace human writers. It can only augment our creative process. The real mystery isn’t whether AI can write fiction – it’s how we can best harness its capabilities while maintaining the authentic human voice that makes stories resonate.
AI’s take on Comprehending the Large Language Model Artificial Intelligence and its Hirelings.
The relationship between AI and human creativity is evolving, but not quite in the way early predictions suggested. Rather than replacing authors, AI seems to be carving out a role as a sophisticated creative assistant. Think of it as having a tireless apprentice who’s studied every book ever written but lacks the life experiences to innovate. As these tools become more sophisticated, the author’s role may shift toward becoming a skilled curator – selecting, refining, and breathing life into AI-generated content. The art will lie in knowing when to lean on AI’s strengths and when to trust our uniquely human creative instincts.
The prompt finishes.
Tell me a story, scene eight.
Shadows in the Smoke
The days following The Widow’s capture were a blur of police reports, media attention, and long, sleepless nights. Harland found himself pulled in a dozen different directions, dealing with the fallout from the case while trying to protect Eleanor from the relentless scrutiny that came with it. Reporters hounded them, desperate for a glimpse into the lives of the couple who had brought down one of the city’s most notorious criminals.
But for Harland and Eleanor, the real challenge wasn’t dealing with the outside world—it was dealing with what had happened to them, to their marriage.
Eleanor was quieter than usual, her once vibrant spirit dulled by the trauma of what she had endured. She tried to put on a brave face, but Harland could see the cracks. She would flinch at sudden noises, her eyes constantly darting around as if expecting The Widow to return at any moment. The nights were the worst; she often woke up from nightmares, trembling and disoriented, and Harland would hold her until she calmed down, whispering reassurances that they were safe now.
But Harland knew that words alone wouldn’t be enough to heal the wounds The Widow had inflicted.
One evening, a few weeks after the incident, Harland came home to find Eleanor sitting on the porch, staring out at the street with a distant look in her eyes. He sat down beside her, wrapping an arm around her shoulders.
“What’s on your mind?” he asked gently.
Eleanor sighed, leaning into him. “I’ve been thinking… about everything that’s happened. About us.”
Harland’s heart tightened. He had been dreading this conversation, fearing that the ordeal had left a mark on their marriage that couldn’t be erased. “Eleanor, I—”
She shook her head, cutting him off. “John, I’m not angry at you. I know you did everything you could to protect me, to keep us safe. But I can’t pretend that everything is okay. That woman—The Widow—she got inside my head. She made me question everything, even… even us.”
Harland felt a lump form in his throat. “Eleanor, I’m so sorry. I never wanted to put you in danger, to make you feel like this.”
Eleanor turned to look at him, her eyes filled with a mixture of pain and determination. “I know that, John. But we can’t just sweep this under the rug and pretend it didn’t happen. We need to talk about it, to face it together. If we don’t, it’s going to keep eating away at us.”
Harland nodded, knowing she was right. “You’re right. We need to be honest with each other, even if it’s hard.”
They sat in silence for a moment, the weight of their unspoken fears hanging between them. Finally, Eleanor broke the silence.
“Do you remember when we first got married?” she asked, her voice soft. “We promised each other that no matter what happened, we would always face it together. That we wouldn’t keep secrets.”
Harland nodded, his chest tightening with emotion. “I remember.”
“Somewhere along the way, we lost sight of that,” Eleanor continued. “You started keeping things from me—not because you wanted to hurt me, but because you thought you were protecting me. And I let it happen because I didn’t want to burden you with my fears.”
Harland felt a pang of guilt. “I thought I was doing the right thing, keeping you safe from all the darkness I deal with. But I see now that I was wrong. I should have trusted you more, let you in.”
Eleanor reached out, taking his hand in hers. “We both made mistakes, John. But we’re still here, and that means something. I want to rebuild what we had, to make it stronger. But we have to do it together.”
Harland squeezed her hand, feeling a glimmer of hope. “We can do that. We will do that. No more secrets, no more shutting each other out.”
Eleanor nodded, her eyes bright with resolve. “I’m with you, John. We’ll get through this, just like we always have.”
Over the next few weeks, Harland and Eleanor worked together to rebuild their lives and their relationship. They started by making small changes—spending more time together, talking openly about their fears and anxieties, and finding ways to reconnect after the trauma they had endured.
Harland also made a point of being more transparent with Eleanor about his work. He wanted her to know that she was a part of his life, not just someone he was trying to shield from it. He began sharing more details about his cases, the challenges he faced, and the toll it took on him. In turn, Eleanor opened up about her own struggles, the lingering fears that haunted her after The Widow’s attack.
They sought help from a therapist, someone who could guide them through the process of healing and rebuilding their trust. It wasn’t easy—there were moments of anger, of tears, of frustration—but they faced it all together, determined to come out stronger on the other side.
One night, as they sat by the fire in their living room, Harland reached into his pocket and pulled out a small, worn photograph. It was the picture of him and Eleanor on their wedding day, a moment frozen in time when everything seemed perfect and uncomplicated.
“I’ve been carrying this with me,” Harland said, handing her the photograph. “It’s a reminder of what we’re fighting for.”
Eleanor smiled softly, taking the photo and holding it close. “We’ve come a long way since then, haven’t we?”
“We have,” Harland agreed, pulling her into his arms. “And no matter what comes next, we’ll face it together. Just like we promised.”
Eleanor rested her head against his chest, the warmth of the fire casting a soft glow around them. For the first time in weeks, they both felt a sense of peace, of hope for the future.
The scars left by The Widow would take time to heal, but Harland knew that as long as they had each other, they could overcome anything. They had faced the darkness and survived. Now, it was time to embrace the light.
What does Claude.ai think about ChatGPT’s ability to tell a strong tale?
As a long-time critic of noir fiction, I find this epilogue both adheres to and deviates from classic noir conventions in interesting ways. Let me break down the key elements:
The opening effectively captures the noir tradition of aftermath and consequences, with its “blur of police reports” and media circus. However, the scene quickly pivots away from typical noir cynicism toward something more emotionally redemptive – a choice that challenges genre conventions. (I totally agree with this.)
The psychological aftermath is well-rendered, particularly Eleanor’s trauma symptoms. (Literally speaking, this is true. What is absent here is the uniqueness of character. Eleanor sounds like any other person on the planet having a moment.) The writing shows restraint in these passages, avoiding melodrama while effectively conveying her damaged psychological state through concrete details like “flinching at sudden noises” and “eyes constantly darting around.” (The lack of specific personal elements does reduce potential melodrama. It also minimizes real connection with the characters and comes off as flat.)
Where this epilogue most significantly breaks from noir tradition is in its therapeutic resolution. Classic noir typically ends in ambiguity or tragedy, with psychological wounds festering rather than healing. This scene opts for a more contemporary approach, embracing vulnerability and emotional healing through dialogue and professional help – concepts almost alien to traditional noir. (I believe we can find numerous examples of contemporary noir style fiction that disqualify this statement. Dystopian fiction is one example. Claude.ai suggests these as well: “psychological noir” or “domestic noir” or “grit lit” as contemporary versions of classic noir.)
The symbolism of the wedding photograph feels somewhat on-the-nose for noir, which typically employs more oblique imagery. However, it works within this modified framework where the story deliberately subverts noir’s typical fatalism in favor of hope. (A point that effectively sidesteps the critique of ChatGPT’s attempt at noir fiction.)
Most interesting is how the scene maintains noir’s preoccupation with truth and deception (“No more secrets”) while redirecting it from external mysteries to internal emotional honesty. It’s a clever adaptation of noir themes for a more psychologically nuanced contemporary audience. (I found the beat of dialogue trite and cheap. To me, it does the opposite of represent emotional honesty. This story lost its emotional honesty much earlier, with repeated claims by Harland to keep Eleanor’s best interests at the forefront while simultaneously putting her in the greatest danger.)
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