Which tool to choose
The tool is a document of your own, the story bible, with four parts: characters (name, personality, how they speak), world (places and rules), tone (the style you want), and a summary of what has happened so far. If the assistant offers a space to keep a project's chats together, use it for the story. Automatic memory is too vague for fiction: a character whose eye color changes from one chapter to the next is born right there. The document, which you control line by line, won't do that.
How to do it
- Create the bible with characters, world, tone, and "what has happened so far".
- At the start of a session paste it in and write "continue the story from here, respecting these elements".
- Write the new piece together with the AI, staying within the rules you have set.
- At the end of the session update the summary of events and, if new characters or places have emerged, add them to the bible.
A concrete example
Elena is writing a fantasy novel one chapter a week. Her bible says the protagonist is reserved and speaks little, that magic in that world costs physical effort, and it summarizes the seven chapters already written. Every time she reopens a chat she pastes it in, and the AI continues, keeping the protagonist taciturn and magic exhausting, without suddenly turning him into a chatterbox or making spells free. The story stays a single one, even though it grows out of twenty different conversations.
When it DOESN'T work (and how to fix it)
If a character "goes out of character"
Almost always their profile is too thin. Add a couple of concrete lines about how they think and how they speak, maybe with a typical phrase. The more alive the profile, the better the AI can keep them consistent instead of letting them slide into a generic tone.
If the plot gets tangled
Keep the summary of events short and in chronological order: what happened, in which chapter. If it becomes a tangle, ask the AI to reorder it into a clean timeline and replace that in the document. A plot can only be followed if it's readable at a glance.
If you want to change the direction of the story
Update the bible with the new course and tell the AI explicitly. Without that step, the assistant will keep pulling toward the old plot. The bible isn't a cage: it's the map, and you rewrite the map when you change your destination.
A tip from someone who really uses it
Tend to the tone more than anything else. Plot and characters the AI keeps reasonably well if they're written down; the tone, on the other hand, is the first thing that slips away from it, and it's exactly what makes a story yours. In the bible don't just say "dark style": paste two or three lines of your own text as a sample of voice. The AI imitates a concrete sample far better than an adjective. The plot holds the facts together; the tone holds the soul of the story together.
Frequently asked questions
Can the AI write the novel for me?
It can write page after page, but without your guidance they turn generic and voiceless. The beauty is using it as a co-author: you decide the course, the tone, and the characters in the bible, and it proposes and develops. The story stays yours.
How long should the bible be?
As long as it takes to maintain consistency, no more. For characters, a few lines each; for events, a tight summary. A hundred-page bible is as unmanageable as no bible at all.
Can I use different assistants to write?
Yes, and it's one of the advantages of the method: the bible is a document of your own, you paste it wherever you want. Maybe you use one assistant for ideas and another to polish the style: consistency is guaranteed by the document, not by the platform.
If I stay in the same chat, does the story stay consistent on its own?
No, and that's the trap that sinks long stories. The longer the conversation grows, the more the AI loses the early details: the name of a minor character, a rule of the world, a promise made three chapters ago. Consistency doesn't live in the chat, it lives in the bible that you update. Relying on the "memory" of the conversation is the surest way to find yourself, halfway through a novel, with plot holes and characters that no longer recognize themselves.