So, I submitted Of Daggers and Ledgers to ZBookStore only to be rejected because it was "70% AI slop", and that was a serious blow to my confidence as a human being.
I have stated on my page and endnotes that I use AI-assisted writing for grammar and phrasing because I have difficulty processing language.
I am autistic, so the sentences in my head are either short spastic bursts or a long-ass jumble of nonsense. In which I use Grammarly to string those short sentences together and often rephrase them. And then I rewrite using my own limited vocabulary.
I look up words in search engines and how to use them properly in a sentence. I do use AI chat to compare sentences, and I choose which one to use, or toss everything entirely.
My rejection came within 2 hours of my submission, so ironically, it was AI that decided I wasn't human.
I'm not a good writer; I am well aware of that. I have not seriously written anything for nearly 2 decades, mostly due to a lack of confidence. Plot lines and scenes are either buried deep in my head or on discarded scraps of paper. I have 2 decades to catch up on, and, personally, it's an uphill battle.
It was only last year, after a very vivid dream, that I started writing again. Since last year, I have been writing non-stop in Google Docs, going back and forth before and after work. Sometimes I spend a whole day on one paragraph because it didn't sit right with me.
My confidence level is still shit, which is why I'm hiding behind a pen name. But I wanted to practice, to start sharing my stories, and I found SOL. It took me a while to post something, but I did. The anonymity helps, and so far no one has sent me any mean comments. In fact, I've had people voluntarily send me grammar corrections.
There are so many stories in my reserve; most of them have a solid presence at the back of my brain. I have characters sketched in my notebooks and journals, how both Aoba and Soren look in my head. Haruya and Kayo. And more characters waiting in line for their turn. Yes, they will be recycled through stories in their own respective universes, because I built their characters from scratch. Piece by piece.
When the rejection email popped up, I was devastated. Not because of the rejection itself, but because my story, my characters, my created world were called "AI-slop".
I haven't slept all night, questioning myself. Again, I am well aware of my lack of writing experience and technical issues. But am I really so bad that a machine filtered me as one of them?
For now, I'm going to forget about self-publishing for a while. My confidence has completely shattered in that regard, but I will keep writing and posting here on SOL.
Thanks for reading, and I am truly grateful for the community I have found here.