Author uses AI for novel writing

Coral Hart, a South African novelist, has been publishing more than one romance novel every two days since February 2025, using multiple AI systems to assist in the initial writing of her novels. She has announced 371 titles and defends her method, despite a recent break with the Quebec publisher Thélyson Orélien, which accused her of using AI in her writing, a claim she denies.

Publisher stops reprinting disputed novel

The publisher Boréal Editions will not reprint C’était ça ou mourir and has decided to stop publishing Thélyson Orélien. After analyzing draft versions of the novel, the publisher found "traces of AI markers" in the metadata of several files but did not determine the AI's role in the final product. Hart responded to Libération stating that the book was written by her and that she used AI only for historical research.

Author explains her AI-assisted process

Hart did not wait for an editor to investigate her files before explaining her process. She says these discussions need to happen and that she chose to be the one to show her method. Her process involves using several AI systems for writing, with a human proofreader to finish. She spent fourteen years in publishing and wrote several dozen books without AI before changing her method.

Step-by-step AI-assisted writing method

Each novel begins with human work, where she sets the concept of the story, the style, precisely described characters, and a list of chapters, each accompanied by a summary. She warns that simply asking ChatGPT or Claude "write me a book" results in a catastrophic outcome. She then moves between different models, using ChatGPT for dialogues, Claude for prose, and Grok for erotic scenes.

Sales and revenue claims

One of her 371 titles has entered the top 100 bestsellers on Amazon, but she designed most of them on niches identified after a market analysis. She estimates that she has sold over a million copies in digital, print, and audio formats and more than a million dollars in revenue just in 2026. In February, she mentioned approximately 50,000 sales for more than 200 novels published in 2025, in an interview with the New York Times.

Controversy over AI use in publishing

Amazon requires self-published authors on Kindle Direct Publishing to declare texts generated by AI, even if they are significantly revised afterward, and exempts those who only entrust the AI with proofreading or idea research. Hart's novels fall under generation, but only Amazon receives this declaration, and buyers see no mention of AI on the book's page. Hart says she receives "tens of thousands" of hate messages and several death threats for her methods.

Industry concerns and AI detection

At Editis, these books worry more than the Orélien affair. Juliane Charlebois, legal director of the group, laments in Libération that the real problem is self-published books by Amazon, behind which there is no author, no publisher. In traditional publishing, groups are advancing in a scattered order. The day after Boréal's announcement, Gallimard and Madrigall warned internally that all their manuscripts would go through an AI detector starting in January.

Publisher reactions and ethical debates

Frédéric Boyer, director of P.O.L, a subsidiary of the group, says he is "shocked that the publisher's decision can be suspended based on a machine's judgment." Tests of Pangram and GPTZero give him partial support, as their verdicts differ as soon as a human and ChatGPT write together. Editis refuses any monitoring tool and limits itself to a code of conduct, while Média-Participations has added clauses to its contracts that prohibit AI for authors and translators.

Author questions the role of AI in publishing

The editions of the Observatory place a "100% human" logo on their Sanctuary collection but tolerate AI for research, precisely the use that Thélyson Orélien acknowledges. "If the AI label makes you dislike a book, are you rejecting the book or the AI?" asks Hart. As long as Amazon does not display any mention on its listings, her readers will know no more than what she chooses to tell them.