Immortal Literature

“That eulogy was lovely Rahul,” Leah noted.

“I worked closely with him for the last decade. Kai Solaris Vance was the smartest man I ever met.”

“He was smart, but not very productive. He had been working on that next Whispers novel for five years.”

“Good art takes time. I don’t know what to tell you.”

“What are we supposed to tell his fans? They’ve been expecting a conclusion for a long time.”

“I never received a complete manuscript from him. All he’s ever sent me were the first few chapters and some assorted notes and ideas he had.”

“That’s perfect. What more do we need?”

“What do you mean?”

“Send over those materials to our data processing department. They can generate a language model which can complete the work.”

“Are you sure that’s a good idea?”

“We are still honoring his original vision. We can probably keep those few chapters. We can keep it in his original voice.”

“Are you sure this won’t be abused? I mean, we could churn out hundreds of stories and sell out.”

“That wouldn’t happen. Few people read books these days, so there’s no point in creating that many. The real money is in the video franchises.”

“But the series is already being produced.”

“Exactly. So we can keep to Vance’s artistry in the books. You are still his editor and still have the final say.”

“So if I say I want an eighth book, you’d be fine with that?”

“Hey I trust you. And he did give us permission in the contract he signed. Just don’t screw up the video division.”

“No I think I’ll be fine. The Whispers of Dust and Dawn will be safe with me.”

---

George R. R. Martin has found a lot of success as an author, but probably more success in television. As such, The Winds of Winter still isn’t finished. I worry it never will be. Still, I actually think it will be possible soon enough to use large language models to complete it for him.

Of course we have plenty of his writing in order to get the model to generate text in his style. And presumably he has an outline of how he wants the story to go. So what really is stopping this from happening?

Many things, I’m sure. Least of which is that models aren’t designed to handle novel-size projects. Although this does seem like a tempting prospect for any editor who is in charge of a big franchise.