Mark Twain looked down upon those people who think it is possible for someone to learn how to write a novel. "A man who is not born with the novel-writing gift has troublesome time of it when he tries to build a novel", he said.
But now new technology is making a difference to help an author write a novel. Michael Green, a US data scientist-turned-novelist, felt that technology could help him.
He said that the process had become difficult to manage: "In the midst of editing, I got to the point where I started feeling like I had a lot of plots and characters" he said "I had all these documents on the deeper aspects of the world I was creating. I was worried about not being able to keep track of it all. That is when I switched into my more data science-minded approach to solving a complex problem with a lot of different places. "
Green went on to create Lynit
a digital platform to help authors plan and weave together the many elements that form a story, such as the themes, characters and major events.
"As the author gets a new idea that they want to bring into the story they are able to input it into a natural framework, " he said "piece by piece they are adding to the story. As new ideas come in, they change, maybe by creating new nodes (节点) new relationships. "
Once the book has been published, technology is also playing an ever-increasing role in publicity and connecting with readers. Websites and APPs from specialist firms allow authors to participate in live-question-and-answer sessions with their audience. Michael Green believes technology will become even more important as a new generation of tech savvy (精通技术的) writers becomes more well known.
"What I'm finding with the Generation Z and even younger writers is that they are looking for technology to give them guidance, " he said, "They see it as a tool to learn and grow with rather than extra work. "
