Just a short one today because I am agonisingly close to having Beastie ready for publication. Exciting times indeed and a feeling I’ve not had for a few years. Believe me, when you get that email confirmation that your book is live on KDP its one of the best feelings in the world.

So what I thought I’d do today is introduce you to the man himself – Joe Wilkie – the hero of the (soon to be 5) Blessham books.

Now, I’ve always been rather vocal about my disdain for A.I and I do honestly believe that it’s going to cause a lot of problems for mankind at a future date. I don‘t mean that in an apocalyptic way, although that’s a possibility, but more in a way that the time will come that we won’t know what’s real and what is A.I. Come to think of it, we’re almost there now.

However, a good friend of mine was tinkering around with Chat GPT or whatever its called the other day; he was taking photos of us all and then turning us into superheroes, and it seemed like a bit of harmless fun. So, I had a little go on Google Gemini and after a few false starts I managed to create an A.I generated image of Joe.

I wasn’t expecting much to be honest but I have to say that, after making a few tweaks here and there, what I ended up with is startlingly similar to how I view the little guy in my mind’s eye. And I think that anyone who has read any or all of the Blessham books will surely agree that I’ve pretty much captured our Mr Wilkie.

The books aren’t too descriptive of how he looks but the clues are there. He’s five feet seven inches tall, he has mousey, unkempt hair, he has a somewhat vacant (dare I say gormless) expression, and he’s not the tidiest bloke when it comes to appearance.

That’s pretty much the brief that I gave to Gemini.

And here, is what it came up with.

Ladies and Gentlemen, I give you (drum roll) Joe Wilkie!

Now, I don’t care what anyone else says because I have been writing the character’s life story for a lot of years now and to me that is him in a nutshell. Let me know what you think of it, please do.

I did have a go at doing a Lady Stark-Raven image but she ended up looking like some gentrified dominatrix. I shall try again, though, and maybe do one or two other characters from Blessham. I don’t want to get too carried away because as I mentioned earlier, I’m not the world’s biggest fan of A.I. I can see that it does have its uses, although writing literature shouldn’t be one of them, but I don’t want to get so involved with it beyond making images of my characters.

Don’t get me wrong, I am fairly I.T savvy, but I’m also a somewhat old-fashioned kind of chap and believe that some things, such as writing books, should be left to human beings.