Keep your writing voice when AI continues your novel

Oh Story · Updated 2026-10-15

Describe the dimensions of your voice, give a short sample you own or may use, and keep those choices separate from the current book’s facts. Oh Story’s documented workflow resolves the current request, book style and relevant active author preferences before generic writing advice; a sample only suggests possible habits, and a lasting preference needs your explicit confirmation. The goal is a continuation in fresh sentences that fits this narrator and scene, with sentence length set by your choices. The original comparison also shows a one-paragraph exception: keep extended observation, drop the semicolon pattern and the comic aside, and leave the book’s preferences as they are.

Method fromstory-long-write9 method files

Part of Oh StorySource on GitHub

Before you start

Use your own or authorized prose. Choose a representative passage and name the features you want to carry over; mark deliberate exceptions. Only the named features carry over.
Name the current book, viewpoint, established scene facts and unrevealed information. Keep these distinct from sentence rhythm, diction, punctuation, imagery and narrative distance.
Use a configured Oh Story agent host and the intended writing workspace. Existing author memory is optional; ordinary writing can continue when no memory state exists. For chapter-to-chapter facts, see long-novel continuity.

Steps

Ask what makes the sample yours Name a few useful tendencies: a long observational sentence followed by a brief exchange, understated humor, close third person, or a restrained vocabulary. Explain their function here. Let semicolons, metaphors and catchphrases appear where the scene calls for them, with no per-paragraph quota. The example below separates a reusable expressive purpose from a paragraph mold, then writes out a narrower local choice as actual prose.
Separate three kinds of input Sample observations are evidence to discuss; they become active memory only after you confirm them. The current book’s characters, objects, secrets and events belong to its settings and tracking. An explicit enduring preference can be recorded at the narrowest intended scope: book, genre, workflow or global. A request for this passage only is carried out for that passage, and author memory stays as it is.
Resolve conflicts by dimension Within safety, authorization and delivery constraints, the explicit current request outranks this book’s style, which outranks applicable author-memory preferences and generic references. Resolve viewpoint, rhythm, punctuation and other dimensions separately: keep the sample’s rhythm while using this book’s third person. Lower-priority guidance only fills gaps, so an intentional long sentence stays even when a default prefers short ones. When the book has 设定/文风.md, read all of it; an old summary falls short. When the file is absent, go ahead without creating a placeholder.
Carry the same decision through drafting and review Oh Story’s style_resolution is a working decision scoped to this task; it needs no new author profile. The documented workflow passes the same decision to downstream drafting, rewriting and review so a later pass does not restore a generic style. Intentional expression still needs readable syntax, supported character knowledge and sound causality. The query script filters stored active preferences; the writing agent interprets them and resolves each dimension.
Treat memory as an explicit scoped action Repeated corrections and patterns inferred from samples are discussed, not automatically recorded. Only an author statement that may be enduring but has unclear scope can become a pending item; pending items do not constrain writing. An explicit long-term request uses record and returns an Author Memory Receipt; a preference counts as remembered once that receipt comes back. A book-specific exception applies to that book and leaves the global habit in place; a one-off request applies once and leaves both untouched.
Revise the preference when your intention changes Use an explicit replacement for a changed rule, or ask to forget a preference so it is no longer loaded; forgetting keeps its historical evidence on record. The profile, pending list and change log are generated from _author-memory-state.json; change memory through record and leave their Markdown untouched.

Example

Original editorial example: The Last Button (written by an editor)

A short sample written for this guide, from a DIFFERENT story: “After lunch, Father turned his empty bowl halfway around, as though the other side might still hold some soup; when I offered the kettle, he left it in my hand and asked whether the mint by the window needed watering again.” Possible observations: an extended sentence, a semicolon turn, concrete observation and mild humor. These are tentative observations; an enduring preference needs the author’s confirmation. Father, soup, the first-person narrator and the mint plant stay in their own story.

Facts fixed for The Last Button: Third person, close to Tang He. Master Zhou puts a matching dark-green button in her palm and says the repair cannot be finished today, but will be ready tomorrow morning. Tang He holds the button against the gap on her coat and checks the color. Do not add a family history, a hidden relationship or another character’s thoughts.

A plain, shorter rendition, equally valid: “Master Zhou put the dark-green button in Tang He’s palm. ‘Not today. Come back tomorrow morning.’ She held it against the gap on her coat. The color matched.”

One alternative after the author chooses a longer rhythm and mild humor for THIS BOOK: “Master Zhou put the dark-green button in Tang He’s palm and said the repair would have to wait until tomorrow morning; she held it against the gap on her coat, where the color matched so exactly that it was a pity buttons could not sew themselves back on.” Both versions preserve the same actions and deadline. The second changes cadence and commentary and leaves the plot alone. The sample’s bowl, mint, father and first-person viewpoint stay behind. This is one editorial option among several.

One voice, many paragraph shapes This sample can suggest tentative observations such as an unhurried pace and mild humor. Whether “every paragraph must have one long sentence, a semicolon and an object trying to do something impossible” is the author’s call. That rule is a paragraph mold the author never confirmed. An author can deliberately choose a recurring form and discuss its purpose; when you extract a pattern yourself, label it as your extraction.

A more useful choice than copying punctuation is to follow what the viewpoint character can actually see and hear, allowing observation room when it helps. Use humor when it contributes; a feature checklist is no reason to add it. In the button scene, Master Zhou's words supply the repair deadline and Tang He's action checks the color. The sample's sequence of a turned bowl and an offered kettle left in the narrator's hand does not belong here. A new passage can carry the selected expressive choices without replaying that sequence with different props.

An explicit request for this paragraph only: “Retain the longer observational rhythm here, but omit the humor and do not reuse the semicolon structure. Keep close third person with Tang He and the same facts. Give a text proposal only; do not change the book style or author memory.”

One original candidate for that local request, written as a standalone alternative to the earlier two: “Master Zhou put the matching dark-green button in Tang He's palm and said the repair could not be finished today, but the coat would be ready for collection tomorrow morning. Tang He held the button against the gap in her coat, looking from the small patch of green to the surrounding cloth and finding that the colors matched.”

The first full stop comes after the tomorrow-morning deadline, letting Master Zhou's answer settle before the next sentence follows Tang's color comparison. The attention stays between the button and fabric. This expands the existing color check into observation without importing the sample's first person or inventing the master's thoughts. It keeps a more extended sentence rhythm without tying both halves together with a semicolon, and it omits the joke about buttons sewing themselves back on.

Losing that mild comic aside is the cost of this request. Choose the earlier version if you want its warmer commentary; discuss this one if the passage should simply settle the color and deadline quietly. Neither version completes the repair early. Judge by what the paragraph should do.

Omitting humor here leaves the earlier book-level choice to allow useful mild humor in force. The next task follows its own explicit request and the book choices that still apply; this exception stays with this paragraph. This illustrates decisions by dimension and scope without creating a preference record; the enduring-memory request below is a separate action you ask for explicitly.

Copyable request for story-long-write in your configured host: Use the authorized sample only to discuss expression; do not copy sentences or transfer its story facts. Work only on the specified passage of The Last Button; preserve the fixed actions, tomorrow-morning deadline and close-third viewpoint. For this book, I want longer observational sentences and mild humor where they help; do not add them to every paragraph. First state the applicable style decisions, then return one proposed passage without changing project or memory files. Distinguish tentative sample observations from my explicit choices. Carry the same decisions into review; do not mechanically shorten the passage.

Optional SEPARATE enduring request, only if this is really your intention: “Remember for The Last Button: allow longer observational sentences and mild humor where they help. Scope it to this book only and leave the global rules unchanged.” This is an example request; the memory receipt comes from the tool once you actually submit it. A later ‘make this one paragraph brisk and factual’ request governs that paragraph and leaves the book preference in place.

Expected files

A short, task-specific account of style choices and their scope, separating explicit requests from tentative sample observations and protected story facts.
One proposed passage that preserves the specified events while making the selected cadence and narrative tone visible.
Only when explicitly requested: a scoped memory change and its actual tool receipt. Ordinary sample discussion or a one-off revision need not create author memory.

Check the result

Read for function: does the voice fit this narrator and scene, and does any stylistic feature repeat mechanically? Check that the sample’s names, objects and private history have not migrated into the book.
Check the scope of each decision. A current-passage exception stays with that passage while the long-term habit holds; a pending inference stays labeled pending, never shown as an active instruction or a successful write.
Review clarity, viewpoint and causality as well as preference; fix genuine craft problems even inside an intentional choice. For bounded wording edits, see prose revision; for missing scene movement, see outline to chapter.

Sources

All guides