Full transcript
0:00Today we're going to be tackling a
0:02subject, a question that often gets
0:04asked to me, especially recently when
0:06I've been doing a lot of videos around
0:08genre guides and how to research certain
0:11genres, things like that. This is a
0:14crucial skill. I'm becoming more and
0:15more convinced that this is the thing
0:17that sets apart the people making money
0:20from their books and the people that are
0:21not because the people making money
0:24understand their readers really, really
0:26well, right? And the way we do this is
0:30by knowing what the readers want and
0:33that comes in the form of tropes, genre
0:36conventions, etc. That said, we as a
0:41society don't necessarily like to see
0:43the exact same formulaic thing over and
0:46over again. Actually, that's not
0:47entirely true. Just look at shows like
0:49Law and Order, which are literally the
0:52same plot with every single thing. We do
0:55actually like sameness, but we also want
0:59a little bit of something new and
1:01inventive and fresh. So, how can you
1:06work off of a template of something that
1:09you've identified? And I I classify a
1:12template as any any structure that
1:15you've developed based on observation of
1:16what readers like. How can you take that
1:19template and make it fresh? And I mean
1:22this in addition to simply you writing
1:25it. Because your voice, what you bring
1:27to the table is always going to add
1:30something that people have not seen
1:32before, even if you're writing
1:34practically the same story as someone
1:35else. But how can we take it even a
1:38little step further, but not too far?
1:41Because if we go too far, then we
1:42alienate the reader. And that's the
1:44quickest way to get a whole bunch of
1:45one-star reviews on your book is to
1:47write something that promises one genre
1:50but ends up delivering something that
1:52was not what the reader expected or
1:55wanted. It's the easiest way to get a
1:58bunch of negative reviews. So, in this
2:00video, we're going to talk a little bit
2:02about how to do that and my process for
2:03starting a book like this. And uh in the
2:07future, we might actually take what I
2:09build in this video and actually go
2:11through it the entire process of
2:13creating a book. So uh without further
2:15ado, let's talk about how to do this.
2:17First of all, I want to call your
2:19attention to these books that I've
2:21written called the story hacks. That's
2:23the name of the series. They are all
2:24available at no extra charge if you join
2:26my story hacker gold group. Um you can
2:30see them in here. I' I've actually got
2:3130 of them. They they haven't all been
2:33uploaded into the group yet, but will be
2:35within just the next few days after I
2:36film this. It might it'll probably be
2:38they'll probably be up there by the time
2:40this video goes out. I've got 30 of them
2:42so far with a goal to hit 100. Uh you
2:45can also buy these for $5 a piece on
2:48Amazon, but
2:51you know, if you were to buy all of
2:52them, that'd be $500 from the hundred
2:55that I'm hoping to do. And you can get
2:58them at no extra cost inside the group.
3:00So, just a little plug there. Um, but
3:02this is the one in particular that we're
3:04going to use for our example today. It's
3:06how to write a vigilante justice crime
3:07thriller. And this genre is essentially
3:09what you get in uh Jack Reacher is the
3:13quintessential example of the vigilante
3:15justice crime thriller. There's this
3:17like big super competent dude who comes
3:20in. There's like some problem, some kind
3:22of corruption, uh some authority figure
3:26that has issues. And he kind of comes in
3:30with a sort of bulldozer attitude, fixes
3:33everything barely, [snorts]
3:36but then uh kind of just goes off
3:39wandering back uh down the road at the
3:43end. And it's very episodic, right? Uh
3:46each thing stands on its own. There's
3:49very little of a through line. You some
3:52of these series can get massive. You can
3:54get into 20, 30, even more books in a
3:57series with one character, all having
3:59just isolated adventures here and there.
4:02And when I was going through this, uh I
4:05was finding it really engaging. But uh I
4:06am, of course, a fantasy writer. And I
4:09thought, well, it'd be really nice to
4:13uh create a series that's just vigilante
4:15justice crime thriller, but in a f
4:18fantasy setting. And this I've got two
4:21points to make here. The first point is
4:24that this is the quintessential way to
4:26make your books feel fresh. Have it be
4:29exactly like something that's already
4:31established and reader and you know for
4:33sure readers love, but then add a little
4:37twist. Blake Snyder in his book Save the
4:40Cat called this the same but different.
4:42Readers want the same but different. So
4:44what you do is you give them something
4:46that is 90% something that they're
4:48familiar with but then just add an
4:50additional something or other that makes
4:53it unique. Uh the perfect example of
4:56this is actually uh Jim Butcher who
4:58wrote the Dresden Files series. Before
5:01the Dresden Files, the idea of an urban
5:03fantasy genre didn't really exist. he
5:06sort of invented the genre. And this is
5:07how genres get invented by the way is
5:09somebody doing the same but different.
5:11Uh we slowly get more and more granular
5:15different types of genres this way. Uh
5:18what he did is he essentially said I'm
5:20going to write a hardboiled detective
5:22novel which has been a genre that's been
5:25around for a long time but it's going to
5:27be it's going to have magic in it. And
5:29he was the first one I mean he probably
5:31wasn't the first one to do this but he
5:33was definitely the first one to
5:34popularize it. um where he just created
5:38a hard-boiled detective novel with magic
5:40and that became the urban fantasy genre.
5:42Now, today the urban fantasy genre has
5:44evolved a little bit more. So, it's
5:46usually a little bit more uh there's
5:48usually more women main characters and
5:51um there's often a lot more romance and
5:54stuff like that in them these days, but
5:55there's still a really solid male
5:58focused urban fantasy genre that still
6:02has that main trope of the hard-boiled
6:03detective. uh combined with magic. And I
6:08was actually just reading another book
6:09recently called To Kill a Unicorn. And
6:12it was almost a blowby-blow
6:16similar type book to the Dresden Files.
6:19Like if you like the Dresden Files, you
6:21would absolutely adore this book. It
6:24perfectly targeted the reader.
6:28But the change in this case was that it
6:29involved Cthulhu and the whole like HP
6:32Lovecraft mythos.
6:34as part of it. And that was the unique
6:37thing that kind of set it apart from
6:38just another Dresden Files knockoff. And
6:41it's a very successful book, too, by the
6:43way. So, that's the idea of taking an
6:46established genre and just adding
6:47something to it. So, in the case of a
6:50Vigilante Justice crime thriller, I the
6:52thing I'm going to add to it is just a
6:54little bit of fantasy. This is going to
6:55be a fantasy setting. I can do this
6:57because fantasy and science fiction are
6:59a little bit different from other
7:00genres. This is the second point I
7:02wanted to make is that uh there's what I
7:06call structural genres and costume
7:10genres. A structural genre is a genre
7:13that kind of has to hit certain beats.
7:16And like it's it the genre is part of
7:19the actual structure of the story. And
7:21so you get romance books like this, you
7:24get thrillers and mysteries all kind of
7:27fall into this structural genre. But
7:30then you get certain genres that aren't
7:32actually re um focused on the actual
7:36plot. They're more about the trappings
7:39around the plot. And this is why I call
7:41them costume genres because they can be
7:43uh you can have any number of structural
7:46genres that are given this costume. And
7:49fantasy and science fiction all work
7:50that way. That's why you can have a
7:52fantasy mystery, a fantasy romance, a
7:54fantasy thriller like we're going to do
7:56here. There are some elements of science
7:59fiction and fantasy, certain subg genres
8:01that don't really work elsewhere, but
8:03the nice thing about fantasy is that you
8:05can really incorporate all kinds of
8:07different plots inside of just these uh
8:10fantasy settings. So, that's what I'm
8:12hoping to do with this. I want to create
8:14a a kind of serialized
8:17uh episodic series about a character
8:20who's a very like Jack Reacher type
8:22character but in a fantasy setting and
8:25give it that setting to to make it fresh
8:28and unique. And I have a character that
8:31this really works for in one of my
8:33fantasy worlds. So I thought I would do
8:35this whole process for that. So let me
8:37show you a little bit of what that looks
8:38like because we're still going to use
8:40templates. I actually really like
8:42templates and if you use AI to help you
8:43in your writing, templates are going to
8:45be your godsend because uh AI loves
8:49structure. Um so the more structure we
8:51can give AI, the better. Thankfully, if
8:54you are part of my my story hacker
8:56group, you get all of these different
8:58templates that are related to the this
9:00particular genre. Now, these are also
9:03included in the book itself, but they're
9:06more conveniently sectioned out here for
9:08members and written and marked down. so
9:10the AI can understand it a little bit
9:12better. So for instance, we go here to
9:14the trope doc and like I said it's
9:17written in markdown. So you'll see some
9:18of that here. Um where okay the main
9:22trope is the vigilante anti-hero, right?
9:24So that's that's a that's a trope.
9:26Another trope is the corrupt or
9:28ineffective authority. Another major
9:30trope of this particular genre. Uh
9:33another trope is personal loss as
9:35motivation. So, these are the kind of
9:37things that we're putting in here that
9:39now we just need to adapt it to work in
9:41more of a fantasy setting because a lot
9:43of the language around this template is
9:45going to be all about um uh like a
9:49modern setting, right? So, the way I did
9:52this is I took this into I just used
9:55open router because I could, but you can
9:57do this in any chatbot really. Um
10:00and I picked my model. In this case, I
10:02used Claude Sonnet 4.5. And in the
10:05system prompt, I wrote, "You are a word
10:08worldclass genre expert. I want you to
10:10take the documents I will give you,
10:11which are templates for writing vigilant
10:13justice crime thrillers, and tweak them
10:14so that they could apply to a genre with
10:16the same tropes and structure of the
10:18crime thriller, but in a traditional
10:19fantasy setting, not a modern-day
10:22setting." That was my uh my system
10:24prompt there. And then I just pasted in
10:26that trope stock, as you can see here.
10:29And it's a long document here. And then
10:33it spit out what is almost the exact
10:35same thing, but they added just a few
10:37word changes here and there just to make
10:39it a little bit more conducive to a
10:41fantasy setting, especially like a older
10:44medieval fantasy setting. So for
10:46instance here, this line here says you
10:48have to establish early on that the
10:50official systems, the police, the
10:51courts, the government are barriers to
10:53justice, not facilitators of it. In uh
10:57this version, it says something slightly
10:59different. You have to establish early
11:00on that the official systems, the city
11:02watch, the courts, the nobility are
11:04barriers to justice, not facilitators of
11:06it. So just little tweaks like that that
11:09kind of make make it make more sense for
11:12the fantasy genre. And this is what I
11:14would do. is I would take your templates
11:15of the genre that's the primary genre
11:18genre that you're trying to hit and then
11:21ask AI to tweak your templates so that
11:24they can apply to whatever change you're
11:27making to it, whatever fresh ingredient
11:29you're adding to this. And I would just
11:31do that with all of your templates that
11:33you have, assuming you even have
11:35templates. If you don't have templates,
11:36you can get some. Um, it can be as easy
11:40as just asking AI for a list of tropes
11:42for a certain genre and then you adapt
11:44it from there or you know whatever it
11:46looks like. Uh, I have created these
11:48templates from a rigorous analysis of
11:50actual bestsellers in the genre. Um, and
11:54uh, where I actually broke each one down
11:56chapter by chapter and then compared all
11:57of the tropes that each one had, which
12:00remarkably a lot of these books really
12:03had a ton of similarities
12:06uh, between all of them. Even though
12:07they're all bestsellers, they're all
12:09doing quite well. They're all very
12:10different from each other, different
12:12authors, it's remarkable how many
12:14similarities these things have when you
12:16correctly target the right books. Uh, so
12:19you can create those templates however
12:20you want. uh but then just modify them
12:23this way. And then what I do is I take
12:25it into a sort of AI project of some
12:28kind. This could be uh Perplexity
12:31spaces, which is what I would have used,
12:32but there's been some controversy with
12:34Perplexity's terms of service lately, so
12:36I didn't use it in this case. Uh and
12:38what I did in this case is I actually
12:40went to Notebook LM.
12:43And as you can see here, I created a
12:46notebook LM and I brought in all of
12:49those different modified documents for
12:51this vigilante justice fantasy thriller
12:54and um and then I also brought in a
12:57document with a bunch of world building
12:59from the world that this book uh should
13:01take place in and started brainstorming.
13:04I just said I want to brainstorm a
13:05fantasy setting for this vigilante crime
13:07thriller genre. My main character is
13:09named Cole and I don't have the last
13:10name for him so you can brainstorm that.
13:12He's either an assassin or a mercenary
13:14or someone with a high set of skills in
13:15combat and other things. He should be a
13:17morally gray character and the series
13:18should involve him doing a lot of really
13:20cool things in this fantasy setting.
13:22Please help me brainstorm what the first
13:24book should be about. And we went back
13:26and forth quite a lot. I was giving it a
13:28whole lot of feedback. I asked it to ask
13:30me questions, which is a great way to
13:32brainstorm, by the way. You get it to
13:34ask you the questions and then you can
13:36kind of just go back and forth until you
13:37have some really solid things. And
13:39because it has all of your templates
13:41here, it's going to make sure that we
13:44are touching on all of the right tropes
13:46and character archetypes, all of these
13:48puzzle pieces that we need to know in
13:51this entire process. So, I just kind of
13:53kept going back and forth until finally
13:56at the end, I asked it to summarize
13:57everything that we talked about into uh
14:01into one document, especially for the
14:04world building and everything. and it
14:06created this sort of minieries bible um
14:10that I just now then copied and pasted
14:12into a different document that which I
14:14will use to create my story dossier and
14:16I'll do that in a future video. But what
14:19this process allowed me to do is
14:21essentially brainstorm a really tight
14:24cohesive novel ideas and put them
14:28together and with the knowledge that
14:31they hit all of the tropes, they hit all
14:34of the archetypes, the plot follows a
14:37particular structure that's typical of
14:38the genre. And now I've only the only
14:41thing I've done is I've added my own
14:42story and my own unique element, which
14:45in this case is just a fantasy setting.
14:47So, I'm actually really excited for this
14:48particular book series. Um, I I think
14:52anything that's episodic like this has
14:54has really great potential to go on and
14:56on and on. Um, and so I have the full
15:01intention right now at least to actually
15:04go through the whole process of creating
15:06this book with AI, uh, fixing it up
15:09myself, editing it, making it my own,
15:11and and then publishing it and, uh, so
15:13you guys can read it if you want to. So
15:16that's a something I have in the works.
15:19We'll see how it goes. But uh this is
15:22the first step is to figure out how are
15:24we like what's the genre that we're
15:25targeting and how can we make it a
15:27little bit unique. The next step will be
15:29creating the story dossier which I'll do
15:31in a updated and newly improved
15:34automation that I've recently put
15:35together that you'll see in a future
15:37video. So I will see you then.