My Evolution of Storytelling by Rusty Rushfeldt

Little did I know that my evolution of storytelling started in my early childhood years.

Reading wasn’t a strong component of my upbringing.

I was a latch-key kid before that designation was even established.

My daily companion was our transistor radio.

My favorite radio shows were the ones that were mystery/sci-fi/horror, created using multi-characters, with sound effects and background music that would instill fear and dread into every story.

The shows were produced so well you felt like you were in the story.

In those early years, I was convinced these stories were based on actual events.  I had many sleepless nights. Mom was not impressed.

These shows opened my imagination of creativity and started my reading, writing, and storytelling journey.

As I aged, Life got in the way of Life, leaving me little to no time to develop my writing and storytelling passions.

But here we are now, my final draft done and submitted, reviewed several competitors’ entries, and the contest is closed.

Sigh of relief.

When Chris J. posted the text-speech audiobook of Sasha Robert’s, ‘Darkness, My Friend’, I was excited to hear how Sasha’s story would present itself.

It was awesome, enlightening, and engaging.

After hearing the AI text-speech, with background music, I realized that I had failed to get the true sense of Sasha’s story when I initially read it.  But that’s one of my reading challenges.

I am an audio and visual kind of guy.

My comments and reviews for ‘Darkness, My Friend’, would have been more constructive and structured.

How could the AI text-speech help me with my writing?

I created a text-speech project for my story, ‘Anatomy of Crime’, which included sound effects and background music to set the mood (below).

I was trying to recreate a story that was reminiscent of my childhood. 

I quickly discovered that my final draft of the story had portions that looked good on paper, and sounded OK when I read it out loud but did not translate well when using the AI text-speech conversion.

I re-wrote those portions to read more like I would talk, and then the AI text-speech had a much better flow to it.

So, hearing someone else tell my story, although from an AI-generated voice, helped me to refine it to the point of being a rewarding storytelling project.

The AI text-speech is not going to be the end-all right now, but for me, it allows a form of editing that will hopefully make my stories better, and the process of producing my audio creation was extremely satisfying.

Have a listen, hope you enjoy it.

Rusty