Establishing voice on the first page

Let’s try a real book, chosen basically at random — these are just all sitting up at the top of the downloaded books on my phone right this minute, that’s all — and compare each to Claude. My assumption is that the real book will have “voice,” that nebulous quality that brings the protagonist to life in the reader’s mind, and the AI generated story won’t. I’m not going to try concealing which is which. This is about voice, not really about AI at all.

***

Dinosaur Summer by Greg Bear

On the last day of school, after walking to the old brownstone building on 895th where they had an apartment, Peter’s father told him that they would be going away for a few months. Peter gave him a squint that said, What, again?

The mailbox in the lobby was empty. Peter had been hoping for a letter from his mother. She had not written in a month.

They walked up the three flights of stairs in the hallway that always smelled of old shoes and mice — the polite word was rats — and his father said, “You think I’m going to take you to North Dakota or Mississippi or someplace, don’t you?”

“It’s happened,” Peter said.

Anthony Belzoni gave his son a shocked look. “Would I do that to you — more than once?”

Sad that there had been no letter in the box and that school was over, Peter was in no mood for his father’s banter, but he tried to sound upbeat. “We could go to Florida,” he said hopefully. He loved Florida, especially the Everglades.

***

Claude, please begin a story in which Peter’s dad tells him they’re going to have to move again after just a year. Peter likes his current school.

“Peter, can you come in here for a minute?” his dad called from the living room. Peter dragged himself away from his video game, already dreading what his dad wanted to talk about. They had just moved to this new town a year ago after his dad’s job transferred them once again.

When Peter walked into the living room, his dad was sitting on the couch with a serious expression. “Have a seat, son. We need to talk.”

Peter’s heart sank. He knew that look and that tone. “What is it, Dad?” he asked, trying to keep the dismay out of his voice.

His dad let out a long sigh. “I’m really sorry, Peter, but we’re going to have to move again. My job is transferring me to their Louisville office at the end of the school year.”

The words hit Peter like a punch to the gut. Not again! He had finally started to settle in and make friends at his new school. The idea of having to start over yet again made his stomach churn.

“But Dad, I really like it here! Can’t you ask to stay or find a different job?” Peter pleaded, desperation creeping into his voice.

***

Okay, so, the real book by Bear is lively in a way that the generated opening just isn’t. The real book is lively, engaging, and Peter and his dad both immediately seem like they’re real people. The generated books lacks any of that. What is causing the difference?

A) Unexpectedness. The real story has it and the generated story does not.

B) Smooth use of dialogue tags and indications about emotions. The real story has it and the generated story does not.

C) Use of cliches. The real story basically avoids cliched phrases, while the generated story is packed with cliched phrases from top to bottom.

But what about voice? This is what makes the characters seem real.

***

Sixth of the Dusk by Brandon Sanderson

Death hunted beneath the waves. Dusk saw it approach, an enormous blackness within the deep blue, a shadowed form as wide as six narrowboats tied together. Dusk’s hands tensed on his paddle, his heartbeat racing as he immediately sought out Kokerlii.

Fortunately, the colorful bird sat in his customary place on the prow of the boat, idly biting at one clawed foot raised to his beak. Kokerlii lowered his foot and puffed out his feathers, as if completely unmindful of the danger beneath.

Dusk held his breath. He always dead, when unfortunate enough to run across one of these things in the open ocean. He did not know what they looked like beneath those waves. he hoped to never find out.

The shadow drew closer, almost to the boat now. A school of slimfish passing nearby jumped into the air in a silvery wave, spooked by the shadow’s approach. The terrified fish showered back to the water with a sound like rain. The shadow did not deviate. The slimfish were too small a meal to interest it.

A boat’s occupants, however …

It passed directly underneath. Sak chirped quietly from Dusk’s shoulder; the second bird seemed to have some sense of the danger. Creatures like the shadow did not hunt by smell or sight, but by sensing the minds of prey. Dusk glanced at Kokerlii again, his only protection against a danger that coudl swallow his ship whole. He had never clipped Kokerlii’s wings, but at times like this he understood why many sailors preferred Aviar that could not fly away.

***

Claude, please begin a story about a man named Dusk, who is in a small boat, watching a frightening sea monster pass below the boat. There is a bird perched on the prow of the boat. The bird keeps the monster from noticing the boat.

Dusk gripped the sides of his tiny rowboat, his knuckles white. His heart pounded in his ears as the massive shadowy form slowly undulated beneath the shallow waters around him. He didn’t dare move or even breathe too loudly, praying the nightmarish sea creature wouldn’t notice his meager vessel.

A small seabird was perched on the prow, casually preening its feathers. Dusk envied how calm and oblivious the bird seemed in the face of such a terrifying leviathan brushing up against the bottom of the boat. Somehow, the bird’s nonchalant presence seemed to be masking Dusk’s own fear and the boat from the monster’s senses.

The beast’s bulk blocked out the sunlight, leaving Dusk in its dark, cold shadow. He could vaguely make out the rough, scaly texture of its hide and the occasional jutting spine or barnacled ridge as it propelled its titanic form forward. The monster’s mouth was an abyssal black pit that could easily swallow the tiny boat in one bite.

Dusk couldn’t tell if the creature was simply too large and dim-witted to detect his tiny speck of a boat, or if it was intelligent enough to know he was there but unbothered by his insignificant presence. He didn’t want to find out the answer.

After what felt like an eternity, the sea monster’s massive tail finally slipped past, allowing the sunlight to return. Dusk let out the breath he had been holding as the last ripples faded. The seabird took to the air with a dismissive squawk, perhaps annoyed that its perch was moving again.

Dusk fell back against the boat’s hull, drenched in cold sweat. He knew he should turn around and head back to shore while he could.

***

Again, the real thing has unexpectedness, better setting details, more smoothly integrated into the narrative, and many fewer cliched phrases.

Also, the real character has a specific personality trait that is important. What is that trait? Reluctance to infringe upon the freedom of the bird. This is a remarkable reluctance. Given this situation, I would almost certainly clip the feathers of the bird. Dusk in unusually committed to not clipping the feathers OR that is not just a bird, but a person, so that clipping the feathers would be morally much iffier.

***

A Matter of Profit by Hilari Bell

He would have to tell his father. He couldn’t tell his father.

Ahvren hoisted his three overstuffed gear bags and tried not to let his reluctance slow his feet as he boarded the shuttle that would take the spaceline’s passengers down to T’Chin. The voyage from Mirmanidan had lasted five interminable weeks. Ahvren was probably the only one aboard who wished it had lasted longer.

He might not even have a choice about telling his father, the the bizarre compulsion that had seized his tongue so often during the last few months overcame him, he’d blurt out the truth to Viv Saiden the moment he opened his mouth — whether he wanted to or not.

Hello, Father, I realize this will disgrace our family, perhaps even end our line if I’m declared unfit, but I just can’t help them conquer anyone else …

When had his own people become them?

***

Claude, please begin a story about a young man who dreads telling his father that he wants to quit the space fleet, that he cannot stand the thought of engaging in missions of conquest.

Jarik stared out the viewscreen at the vast inky blackness of space. The dim pinpricks of distant stars provided little comfort as his stomach churned with dread. He knew he had to tell his father soon, but he feared his father’s reaction.

Ever since Jarik was a child, his father had groomed him for a life of military service in the space fleet. It was a proud family tradition going back generations, serving the Planetary Alliance through galaxy-spanning campaigns of conquest and domination over new worlds.

Jarik had excelled at the military academy, completing the rigorous training at the top of his class. Part of him had reveled in the glory and honor of carrying on his ancestral legacy. But another part of him had grown increasingly uneasy with the fleet’s brutal tactics and oppressive goals of subjugation.

On his first few missions, seeing the devastation wrought on colonies that dared to resist the Alliance had shaken Jarik to his core. He began to question the righteous motivations he had been taught to blindly believe in. The more he witnessed, the more his soul recoiled at the cruelty and injustice of the fleet’s actions.

Now, as Jarik prepared for another massive assault, he knew he had reached his breaking point. He could no longer be a party to such wanton destruction and tyranny, no matter what sacred oaths or family traditions were at stake. But how could he make his father understand?

Jarik’s father was the embodiment of the space fleet’s merciless spirit. He had led many of the most ruinous campaigns, celebrated as a ruthless scourge of the Alliance’s enemies. In his eyes, any refusal to comply with the fleet’s doctrine would be an act of treacherous cowardice.

Taking a steadying breath, Jarik turned and headed to the officers’ quarters to request an audience with his father.

***

The real story has a great first line — really great. Just my cup of tea, in fact. No wonder I picked up a sample. The real one also has better details, more setting, the protagonist is far better integrated into the setting, and again there are many fewer cliched phrases. If I never again see “his stomach churned with dread” or “shaken to his core,” that would be great.

***

Now, let’s think about this really boring opening page of a real book, where I pulled out the first page in a post last year:

On the anniversary of his wife’s death, Sam Anderson visited her grave.

It was a crisp spring morning in Nevada, with dew on the grass and fog rolling through the cemetery. In one hand, Sam carried a bouquet of flowers. In the other, he gripped his son’s hand. Ryan was eleven and strong-willed and introverted, like his mother. After her death, he had withdrawn, spending even more time alone, playing with LEGOs, reading, and generally avoiding life.

Counselling had yielded little help for Ryan. At home, Sam had searched for a way to get through to his only son, but he had to admit: he wasn’t half the parent his wife had been. Most days, he felt like he was simply reacting to his children, making it up as he went, working on a mystery without any clues.

He hoped the visit to Sarah’s grave this morning would be the start of turning that around.

Same’s daughter, Adeline, gripped Ryan’s other hand. She was nineteen years old, and to all outward appearances seemed to have coped better with her mother’s passing. but Sam wondered if Adeline was just a better actor than Ryan or himself. He worried about that too, about her bottling it all up and carrying the burden of unaddressed grief.

Last night, he had seen a glimpse of her hidden rage. Adeline was still furious with him over the evening’s argument. So angry she wouldn’t even hold his hand or look at him. Hence, Ryan walking between them.

But she had agreed to be there that morning, and Sam was thankful for that.

They walked in silence through the cemetery much like they had floated through life since Sara’s death: hand-in-hand, trying to find their way through it all.

Fog drifted in front of the headstones like a curtain being drawn and opened. Across the cemetery, sprinkler heads rose and began deploying water. The cemetery likely cost a fortune to irrigate out in the Nevada desert, but of all the problems Absolom City had, money wasn’t one.

At the edge of the grass, Sam thought he saw a figure watching them. He turned his head, and yes, there was a man there. He wore a dark uniform, though Sam couldn’t make it out from this distance. Fog floated in front of the man, and when Sam looked again, he was gone.

***

Is this better than Claude’s generated story openings? A lot better or a little bit better? I think — and I’m not super happy to come to this conclusion — but I fear I’m coming down on the “it’s at most a little bit better” side of the spectrum.

This real, actual opening from a (bestselling) novel is boring. It’s all telling — which can be fine if the telling is massively more artistic and effective than this, but this really is boring, imo. In the previous post, I bolded all the telling and pointed out other elements of this opening that I disliked. The fundamental problem is boringness. The generated beginning for the Sixth of Dusk clone is less boring than this, because while it’s also all telling, plus filled with cliched phrases, it’s also a far (far!) more interesting situation.

I think it’s a shame that the opening of ANY novel, far less a bestselling novel, has little if any more “voice” than a generated opening. I think … it seems likely to me … that any author who is struggling with liveliness, wit, catchiness, or any other quality that is “voice” or contributes to “voice” might want to try something like I’ve done at this post — read the first five pages of a dozen real novels. (Good novels. Not boring novels.) Then generate the first bit of a handful of stories with prompt that match those novels. Compare. THEN try to write the opening of their own novel.

Not sure that would help. But maybe it would? Attentively reading the opening five pages of a dozen good novels ought to be a fun and interesting thing to do anyway.

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