Full transcript
0:00Welcome everybody to another video going
0:02over another N8 automation. And this is
0:04the big one. This is the one I've been
0:06building up to for a number of the last
0:08videos that I've done on automations.
0:10And this is the one that can essentially
0:13create an entire book in just minutes.
0:15Usually about an hour to actually go
0:17through the whole book depending on the
0:19length of your book. Now, I wouldn't
0:20necessarily recommend you do it that
0:23fast, uh, because usually there's some
0:25errors that come in and I tend to go a
0:27chapter at a time or maybe two or three
0:29chapters at a time at most. So,
0:31reviewing it as I go through this
0:33automation, but technically speaking,
0:35you can give it all of your info and
0:37just push a button and it will go
0:39through chapter by chapter and write the
0:41entire thing. If you trust it enough to
0:43be able to do that all the way through
0:45and then you go back through and edit
0:47it, that's fine. Uh, I personally don't
0:49do that. I just go through a couple of
0:50chapters at a time, but I still use this
0:52automation because it still saves me a
0:54huge amount of time. So, let's dive in.
0:56So, the automation in question here is
0:58this particular automation that I've
1:00built. I call it full book automation
1:02colon outline to chapters. And, uh, it's
1:05a great automation. Uh, I have mentioned
1:07it here on the channel before, but I
1:10have updated it a little bit so that it
1:12works a little better. Now, in the past,
1:14I have also shown you these automations.
1:17This one takes all of your brain dump
1:19information and constructs a more
1:21structured dossier for your story about
1:24all the different elements that you
1:25need. And it it's a fun one. I did a
1:28whole video about this one. I did also
1:30another video about this one where you
1:32take that dossier that was just created
1:34in the previous automation. And you run
1:36it through this and it creates some
1:38characters and fully fleshes those out
1:40as well as all of your world world
1:42building elements. Those get all fleshed
1:44out as well. And then you can create a
1:47full outline in this automation as well.
1:49So this is kind of like step one and
1:51step two, right? We go this far and by
1:53the end of this you have a dossier, you
1:55have a character sheet, a world building
1:57sheet and an outline. And for this
1:59automation, this is the natural
2:01continuation of this process where you
2:03take all of those documents and you
2:07create your full book. Okay, so let's
2:09walk through exactly how this works.
2:10First of all, it starts with a form
2:12submission where I just input the name
2:14of the book as well as any additional
2:16notes that I might have, which can be
2:18random. Uh, you know, I don't know
2:21exactly what your needs are going to be.
2:23So, it can be any number of things. So,
2:25I just have a space there for author
2:26notes. And then I have a couple of
2:29documents that we pull in. We get the
2:30pros style guide. And uh I've done
2:33videos about style guides before, but
2:35essentially this is just examples of
2:37your work and uh perhaps even a
2:39structured like you can take samples of
2:42your work and give it to AI and say
2:43develop a style guide based on this pros
2:46that you see and it'll do that. And so I
2:48usually put all of those things together
2:51in one document. And that's my pros
2:53style guide that I pull in here. I also
2:55have a list of forbidden words uh AISMs
2:58and things like that that I wanted to
2:59cut out. So, I have that list that I
3:01pull in. And then we have the three
3:04lists that were created in the previous
3:06step. The character sheet, the world
3:08building sheet, and the outline. And and
3:10so here you can actually see some of
3:12those documents right here. Uh I have uh
3:14for one book that I'm working on. Um
3:17this is my world building document. So
3:19it's uh this was created by AI with a
3:22lot of input from me. So it's basically
3:24just taking what I gave it and sort of
3:26structuring it in a little bit more
3:28organized fashion. and uh it gives me
3:30all of this information. And the same
3:32goes is true for the characters here. So
3:35here's like one character. This is my
3:36main character. This is all the
3:38information we need to know about this
3:39character. Quite a bit of information.
3:41And then I also have an outline. So
3:42here's chapter 1, chapter 2, etc. So
3:47that's what the outline looks like. So
3:49those documents, all three of those are
3:50pulled into this automation via these
3:53nodes right here. And then I have this
3:55node that says get blank first draft
3:57doc. This means that before you start
4:00using this automation, you want to come
4:03in here and actually create a doc where
4:06the first draft is going to go. And it
4:09needs to be blank just to start with
4:11because, you know, obviously we haven't
4:12written the book yet, but we're going to
4:14actually have this one created here. So
4:17now we've got that. We are then ready to
4:19go into the very next step, which is to
4:22find the chapter names in the outline.
4:24So what this one does is it takes a
4:26really low inensity model, looks through
4:28your entire outline, and makes a list of
4:30all of the chapters. The prompt goes
4:33something like this. You are a parser.
4:34Given the above book outline text,
4:36return a JSON array named chapters
4:38containing each chapter title exactly as
4:41it appears, one element per title,
4:43including those without numbers like
4:44prologue and epilog. Make sure the
4:46chapter numbers are also present where
4:47listed, and do not include any
4:49additional keys. Only output valid JSON.
4:52And then you can just leave it at that
4:53if you wanted to do the entire book at
4:55once. But I also add this additional
4:58sentence if I only wanted to work on a
5:00couple of chapters at a time. So I say
5:03in this specific instance, I only want
5:04you to do chapters 1 through three.
5:06Okay. Uh you could also potentially put
5:09this in the initial form and then have
5:11it autopop populate here. That might be
5:13easier for some, but I I don't see that
5:15as being any easier than just coming in
5:17here and modifying this. So in this
5:19case, it will only return chapters one
5:22and through three. But if I remove the
5:24sentence, it would do everything for the
5:26entire book, uh, the entire outline. So
5:29once it has that list of chapters that
5:31it's going to be working on, it parses
5:32[clears throat] them out with this
5:33little code node and then starts a loop
5:36where the first thing that happens in
5:38the loop is it gets the last 2,000 words
5:41from the first draft document. Now, if
5:44we're writing chapter 1, there is no
5:47past 2,000 words. So, it'll just bring
5:50in nothing here. But assuming we're
5:52writing chapter 2 or chapter 3, I want
5:54it to have the context of the last 2,000
5:56words or so, so it knows where it left
5:59off and where to begin. I don't do more
6:02than 2,000 words because that
6:04overextends the AI a little bit. It
6:07already knows from the outline. it'll
6:09have access to the full outline so it
6:10knows what the story is that happened
6:12before. I really only want it to know
6:15the last 2,000 words or so. And even
6:16that might be generous just to pick up
6:19where it left off. And the reason I
6:21don't do more is because when you have
6:22too many words in a prompt, it sort of
6:25waters down the prompt and makes it less
6:27effective. And so I only put 2,000 words
6:29in there. AI models are getting better
6:30every day. There was a time when putting
6:322,000 words would have been too much.
6:34And now it can handle 2,000 words. So
6:36maybe at some point we'll get to a point
6:37where you can have it read your entire
6:39book and still be able to write a really
6:42good next chapter, but I don't think
6:44we're quite there yet. All right, so it
6:46analyzes those last 2,000 words.
6:48Actually, what this does, what this node
6:50does is it gets the entirety of your
6:52document, and then this code node just
6:54selects the last 2,000 words, the most
6:56recent 2,000 words. All right. Then we
6:59have these four steps, and these are
7:02where the majority of the work happens.
7:04to give you a highle overview. What it
7:06does is it creates a scene brief of
7:09based on your outline. It'll create a
7:11more fleshed out outline essentially of
7:13what that specific scene should look
7:14like and then it moves on to a first
7:17draft and writes that first draft. Then
7:20it looks at the that first draft and
7:22says, "Okay, there are a couple of
7:23things wrong with this. I have it make
7:24some critiques." Uh but it doesn't
7:27rewrite anything. It just goes through
7:28and makes the critiques and then it
7:30rewrites. And all of these are using uh
7:33I believe most of them at the moment are
7:35using Gemini 3 except for this last one
7:37which is actually I believe it's Gemini
7:402.5 Flash. I can actually update that
7:42now to Gemini 3 Flash. It'll be a little
7:45bit better because the the rewrite
7:47doesn't actually need to be that
7:49intensive oddly because the work has
7:52already been done in writing the first
7:54draft and creating the improvement plan.
7:56All that needs to happen is it needs to
7:58rewrite and implement that improvement
8:00plan, but it's not really making any
8:02decisions, which is why I'm able to have
8:04it be a lower model and save a little
8:07bit of money that way. All right, so
8:08let's actually look at the prompts for
8:10this. Uh, they're very lengthy prompts,
8:12so I'm not going to read out the whole
8:13thing, but just to give you an idea,
8:15this is the prompt for the for the scene
8:18brief. I have it pulling the outline,
8:20the characters, the world building, and
8:21the previous chapter text. This is the
8:23last 2,000 words here. Uh, and it's all
8:25contained in these little XML boxes to
8:29sort of help the AI be able to parse
8:31through all of that data. And then in an
8:34instruction XML box, I say given the
8:36above outline and
8:37characters/worldbuilding information,
8:39your task is to flesh out a scene brief
8:41for. And then it pulls in the name of
8:44the chapter that it's working on in this
8:46specific loop. Make sure that the
8:47chapter is clearly labeled with the
8:49words, you know, name of the chapter. Do
8:51not name the chapter anything besides
8:52this. The scene brief should include the
8:54following. Uh I have it pull in the POV.
8:57So in this case, I uh give it specific
9:00instructions because sometimes it gives
9:03me the wrong thing. So in this case, I
9:05wanted first person past tense from the
9:07perspective of Elaine. So I added this
9:09in myself because this is the the story
9:11that we're doing right now. U but you
9:13could in theory change this to whoever
9:16your character is. But I know for this
9:18book that I'm writing, I always wanted
9:19to be first person past tense from the
9:21perspective of Elaine. Okay. [snorts]
9:23Then I pull in the genre, which it pulls
9:25in. Uh, here's the plot verbatim where I
9:28ask it to extract the exact section of
9:31the outline that it's doing. And then it
9:34fleshes that out with additional beats
9:37and blocking. And then I have it
9:39describe what the scene function is, as
9:42well as make sure the plot for this
9:43scene picks up appropriately after the
9:45end of the previous chapter text.
9:47Disregard if this is the first chapter
9:48and there is no data for the previous
9:49chapter text. uh characters, list all
9:52the characters appearing in this
9:53chapter. For each provide their name and
9:55role, physical appearance, etc. And I
9:58make sure it lists all of these things
9:59because their physical appearance might
10:01be different in this scene versus other
10:04like more general scenes, right? I
10:06already have the character sheet, but
10:08that character sheet is going to be
10:10different depending on what scene we're
10:12in. So, I have it kind of create all of
10:14that. Uh it does the same for tone and
10:17style and setting and uh main source of
10:20conflict. It basically goes through and
10:21lists quite a few things to be able to
10:23effectively write a good scene. And then
10:26we move on to the next step which is the
10:29first draft. And this one is also a
10:32fairly complicated one. I have it pull
10:33in the stylesheet, the list of forbidden
10:36words, as well as the outline
10:37characters, world building, and the
10:39previous chapter text and the scene
10:40brief that it had in the last chapter.
10:42So, this is by far the step with the
10:45most context being handled. Um, but most
10:48of the the beefier models like Claude
10:514.5 Opus and Gemini 3 can handle it.
10:54I've seen people do even larger prompts
10:57than this. Uh, I tend to keep it by
11:00comparison on the lean side, but it's
11:02still quite a bit of information. And
11:03here I say your task is to write the
11:05entire chapter name based on the scene
11:08brief and to cover it thoroughly from
11:09deep point of view. Writing the scene as
11:11if it's written by a bestselling
11:12novelist and not rushing through the
11:13scene. Use the pro style examples
11:15samples to know what the pro style of
11:17your chapter should be. Chapter should
11:19be as long as it is needed to properly
11:20properly flesh everything out. Pay
11:22special care to show deep point of view
11:24and showing not telling in order to
11:26fully flesh out the scene without
11:27skipping over important details. The
11:29reader should feel like they are fully
11:30immersed in the scene, seeing the events
11:32through the lens of the viewpoint
11:33character rather than being simply told
11:34what happened. Always keep the follow
11:37following rules in mind. And then I've
11:39over the years added a couple of things
11:41here, taken away some, added more. I ask
11:44it not to use m dashes, you know, and
11:46say tell it to use commas or an ellipses
11:49instead, stuff like that. This section
11:52is probably the section I am tweaking
11:54the most. And I often tweak it on a per
11:56model basis because some models do like
11:59I'll catch something it's doing that I
12:01don't want it to do and I'll just add
12:03that in here. But in general, that's the
12:06essentially what the prompt looks like.
12:08All right. And then the next one is a
12:11little bit simpler. It's the improvement
12:12plan. So for this, I bring in the
12:14previous chapter text, the chapters, the
12:15scene brief, uh the so the first draft
12:18of the chapter, the scene brief, the pro
12:20style example, and the prohibited words.
12:22and I say, "Given the above chapter, I
12:24want you to critique the chapter on a
12:26lineby-line basis and find ways to
12:27improve the chapter. Give specific
12:29examples. Here are a few things to look
12:30out for." And then I give it a big long
12:33list of all of the things that I want it
12:35to look for. I actually think that I may
12:38be rethinking this in the future and
12:39actually creating some automations that
12:40are specific for editing where I have a
12:44different AI agent that is specifically
12:47focused on one specific thing and it
12:50gives you recommendations. Um, that way
12:52I could probably use a less powerful
12:54model because it's only focusing on one
12:56thing, but for now I'm just using this
12:58and uh I will refine those editing
13:01automations in the future. And then from
13:03there, it creates an improvement plan
13:04and then it goes to rewrite the chapter.
13:06This one's really simple. I give it the
13:08original chapter that was written and
13:09the improvement plan and say using the
13:11text of the original chapter and the
13:12improvement plan, I want you to
13:13implement the suggestions in the
13:14improvement plan. Only implement the
13:16suggested changes and do not change
13:18anything else about the original
13:19chapter. reproduce the entire chapter
13:21with the suggestions made. A chapter
13:23should begin with a chapter header
13:24written and markdown as an H2 heading
13:26like this. And then I just give it the
13:28name of the chapter. All right. And
13:31that's essentially it. And once it
13:32finishes that for the chapter it's
13:34working on, it will loop back. Well,
13:37first it'll add that chapter to your
13:39document, your blank [snorts] document.
13:40And then it'll loop back around and
13:43start on the next chapter. So why don't
13:45we go ahead and run this automation?
13:49remember here in where I ask it to find
13:51the names of all the chapters. I'm
13:53asking it specifically to do just
13:54chapters one through three. So, I'm
13:56going to go ahead and run that for you
13:58right now so you can see what that looks
13:59like. And um yeah, let's go. So, I'll go
14:02ahead and hit execute workflow. And then
14:05it'll have this little popup come come
14:07up and I'll say this the name is of the
14:09book is The Chosen of Avalon. And I
14:13don't really have any author notes. So,
14:15I'm just going to hit submit. And now
14:16it's going through grabbing all of those
14:18documents and it selected the chapter
14:21names. If we go through and actually
14:22look at the output for that node where
14:24it selected the chapter names, we can
14:27see that it successfully selected just
14:29the first three chapters here in this
14:31output. And it's outputting in JSON like
14:33I asked it to. And if I had removed that
14:36one line in the prompt, it would have
14:38actually gone through and given me all
14:39the chapters that are in the outline.
14:41But for now, it's just doing chapters 1
14:42through three. And now it's working on
14:45the first step, which is the scene
14:47brief. And from there, it'll continue on
14:50and I'll get back to you when this is
14:52finished. Quick pause. If you're an
14:54author who wants to start writing more
14:56books, I put together my complete AI
14:58prompt pack that helped me and many
15:00others in my community write a book in a
15:02month, often more. It's completely free.
15:04Hit the link in the description, join
15:06the free weight list for Story Hacker
15:07Gold. Then you just answer a couple
15:09quick questions and I'll send you the
15:11full prompt list plus a few extra free
15:13goodies. I'll also email you when I open
15:16the paid Story Hacker Gold group so you
15:18can join if it feels right. There's no
15:20commitment to join though and you'll
15:21still be able to get all of the freebies
15:22you signed up for either way. All right,
15:24back to the video. All right, so it's
15:26gone ahead. It's already finished
15:28chapter 1 and has started work on
15:30chapter 2. But since we've got chapter 1
15:33already, we can go ahead and go into our
15:35first draft. And you can see that it has
15:37successfully pasted chapter 1 in here.
15:40Now it's pasted in in markdown. There's
15:42a simple way that you can convert that
15:44either through an a free online tool or
15:47something like that. I believe there's a
15:49way to do it inside of Google Docs as
15:50well. But regardless, we can take this
15:53and actually start to go through it and
15:55modify it to our heart's content. So
15:57this is what I would do if I were going
15:58through and doing a couple chapters at a
16:00time. I'd say. All right. Dirt packed
16:02under my fingernails, cool and gritty,
16:04kneeling in the lom felt right, far
16:06better than the stiff wooden chair back
16:07at the cottage. Hello there, Mr. Moss.
16:10The patch of green clinging to the
16:12limestone didn't answer, but it looked
16:14particularly fluffy. I poked it. It
16:15sprang back, spongy and damp. You look
16:18very dashing today, I told it. Mrs.
16:20Fungus is just over that rotting log.
16:21You know, it's not a long trip if you
16:23stretch. A squirrel chattered from high
16:25in the canopy, dropping a chewed acorn
16:27shell inches from my knee. I glanced up
16:29at the shaking branch. Rude. I am having
16:32a conversation down here. Pine needles
16:34and damp earth filled the air a scent
16:35that always settled my stomach. Sunlight
16:37cut through the leaves, warming the back
16:38of my neck. The basket beside me sat
16:40half full with wild garlic nettles and a
16:43few precious roots I'd pried from the
16:44soil without snapping them. I shifted my
16:46weight to stand. My foot slid on the
16:48slip pack on a slick patch of mud. My
16:51boot came down heavy. A wet snap sounded
16:53under my soul. I froze. Um, so a couple
16:56of things here. Um, this might be more
16:58of an a problem with the outline, but
17:00I'm realizing we're kind of not really
17:02getting into the action very quickly.
17:05Um, there's very little hook in this
17:08first page. So, I I might go back to the
17:11drawing board actually and make sure I
17:12have something that happens right away.
17:15Or I could go f further and find a place
17:19where it would make sense to start the
17:21chapter uh a little bit more in medius
17:23res. Also, a couple of things. I liked
17:26the pros overall. This last bit though
17:28needed some work. Uh, lots of very short
17:31sentences. So, I would modify this a
17:34little bit. I'd say my shifting my
17:35weight to stand just as my foot slid on
17:39a slid on a slick patch of mud. That's a
17:42little bit of a what we call that
17:45redundant right there. My foot slid on a
17:50patch of mud. Right. Um, my boot came
17:55down heavy. See the See the the foot
17:58already slipped on the patch of mud. So,
17:59the boot doesn't really make sense. So,
18:03I'd say I just delete that entirely. A
18:05wet snap sounded under my soul. So, I
18:07changed this to say, "And I froze."
18:10Dread curled in my stomach. I lifted my
18:12foot. A single blue bell lay crushed
18:13against the dark earth. Its delicate
18:15stem bent as a sharp unnatural angle.
18:17Oh, no. I dropped it back to my knees,
18:19discarding the back the basket. No, no,
18:21no. I'm so sorry. All right. So, you get
18:23the idea. Little edits like that
18:25throughout. Probably a lot for some
18:27people uh depending on how much you uh
18:31like the pros and how close it is to
18:32your vision. There's always going to be
18:34a fair amount of editing needed even as
18:37these large language models get better
18:39and better. And you can also try
18:41experimenting with different models. Um
18:44for instance, this was written with
18:46Gemini 3. I find that Claude 4.5 Opus is
18:49also very good. slightly different, a
18:51little bit more dramatic, which it would
18:53not be appropriate for this scene, I
18:55think, but for like a climactic end of
18:59the book kind of scene, it would be very
19:02appropriate. Uh, so that those are just
19:04my thoughts there. And that is
19:06essentially what we've got for this full
19:08thing. It's continuing on with chapter 3
19:10now. Looks like it finished. If we go
19:13down, scroll down and we can get to
19:15chapter two. And here it is, chapter 2.
19:18And then chapter 3 will stop here. Then
19:22chapter 3 will start here at the end
19:24there. And if we look at the word count,
19:27the words for these first two chapters
19:28is 5600 words. So that's a very good
19:30good length for a full chapter. So I'm
19:34happy with that. And yeah, so that's
19:36been this full book automation process.
19:40You may have noticed that uh if we were
19:43to somehow combine the brain dump to
19:45dossier and the dossier to full outline
19:48and the outline to chapters automations,
19:52you might be able to actually create a
19:53whole system that creates a book in one
19:55click. Now, it's not necessarily
19:56something I recommend, but I do have
19:59this tradition now of every year I will
20:02try to write a sci-fi beach romance
20:05book. Don't ask. using automations,
20:09using prompts completely with no human
20:11input, just to kind of get a sense and a
20:14measure of how much these tools are
20:17improving and how much like our
20:19prompting methods and and all of that
20:21are improving year-over-year.
20:24And we're getting close to the time of
20:27year to do that again. And I plan on
20:31essentially putting these three
20:32automations together and being able to
20:33do it with one click. Now again, I don't
20:35recommend that for most people if you're
20:38doing that for your own book because
20:39you're going to end up with a lot of
20:41logical issues. But we are moving to an
20:45age where that might be possible. Uh
20:47although I do think and I will I have
20:50said this a lot, but an AI doesn't
20:53matter how good the AI gets, it will
20:55always be better when paired with a
20:56human and having a human guiding it. And
20:59even if it can create a cohesive story
21:01that actually works, it won't
21:03necessarily be your story. So making
21:06sure that you actually spend the time to
21:08do the thinking and let AI do the doing
21:11is absolutely crucially important as we
21:13move forward into this very AI saturated
21:15world. All right, those are just my two
21:17cents. If you want to get your hands on
21:19this specific automation, it is
21:20available in my story hacker gold group.
21:23The link for that is down below. And
21:24again, if you sign up for the waiting
21:27list, assuming that the uh that it's not
21:30open at the time that this video goes
21:32out, then you'll get my prompts for free
21:34when you join the waiting list. You
21:36obviously get a whole lot more if you
21:38actually join. Uh but if you join the
21:42waiting list, you'll get those free
21:44prompts as well, regardless of whether
21:46you actually want to join the group or
21:48not. So check that out and I'll see you
21:49in the next