Story rejected for AI: Now what?

[StillStunned]

That tool thinks I'm either a female novelist or a male blog commenter.

ahh yes, the Two Genders

For the most middle-class of gender-reveal parties.

 

[RocketGrunt]

Here's one that claims to be 60-70% accurate... https://www.hackerfactor.com/GenderGuesser.php

I fed it over twenty thousand words from multiple stories. I got the weak female (weak emphasis could indicate European), and considering that I was giving it BDSM Haremlit, that seems wildly inaccurate. Pretty sure that no human eyesballs would mistake those words to have been written by anything other than a man.

 

[StillStunned]

I fed it over twenty thousand words from multiple stories. I got the weak female (weak emphasis could indicate European), and considering that I was giving it BDSM Haremlit, that seems wildly inaccurate. Pretty sure that no human eyesballs would mistake those words to have been written by anything other than a man.

When I first started publishing here, I had a series of stories from the male POV, about his relationship with the Goddess of Love and all the kinky sex they had. Despite writing heterosexual male-voiced stories, I got several DMs from male posters who clearly thought I was female.

 

[Snekguy]

Just pitching in to say I'm having the same issue.
I just tried to publish my 69th story (nice) which has already been published on Amazon and other sites, and I've gotten an AI rejection for the first time on Literotica. Nothing about my writing process has changed, I do not allow Grammarly or Google Docs or any other tools access to my document and I write entirely in LibreOffice on my local machine. Nothing about my formatting or writing style or punctuation is different, I'm not using a ton of EM dashes or bullet points or any weird characters. I'm a four-time award winner on Literotica so I'm not cranking out AI slop. The last story I released was on 11/09/2025, so that was recent, and it didn't get flagged.
I haven't been in this situation before so I'm not sure what to do about it. My workflow does not afford me the time to completely re-edit the novel solely for Literotica, I've already moved on to my next project. Is there any specific change I should make before I resubmit and try to appeal?

 

[BuannaRa]

So I've been a fan of Literotica for some time, but just tried my hand at being an author. I have a story that I have been working on for almost a year. Drafting, reworking, going back and making changes for continuity, etc., etc. During that process I did use Copilot to check for spelling, punctuation, and grammar errors. And I did accept it's suggested changes. This was over a long period of time and across multiple chapters.

When I submitted my first chapter, it was rejected for AI. I was a little shocked because the plot, characters, dialogue, etc. was all mine. But I read the AI FAQ and figured "Ok, well, I did let Copilot change some words and even some sentence structure, so fair enough". Went back through the chapter and made some tweaks and it was accepted and published. YAY!

I went through the entire story again from start to finish and tried to make sure that everything there was my authentic voice. Probably didn't get every single possible instance where Copilot had assisted, but felt pretty good about it. Submitted Chapter 2. AI rejected. Went back and tried a few more tweaks and added a note. Pending. Pending. Pending.

I thought "maybe if I submit a couple more chapters, they'll see my style". Pending. Pending. Pending.

I ran a couple of chapters through some of the free AI-detection tools. Widely varying results with some saying 100% AI and others saying 100% human. Noted some commonalities in AI-flagged text. Much of it seemed to just be my writing style. I like a good metaphor, messing with sentence structure, and a little bit of alliteration. Particular words seemed to be a trigger. I tend to overuse "muttered", apparently. There was a whole other serious issue with the dialogue of one of my characters who speaks very technically. Her dialogue was getting flagged fairly consistently.

This morning I checked and all chapters Ai-rejected.

I'm not sure what to do next. I can go in and make some more tweaks but some of the issues the AI-detector test revealed can't be addressed (like being authentic to my character). I haven't seen anywhere in this thread HOW one appeals or contacts someone to ask them to take a real-person look at the submissions. So am I just done and should probably withdraw the opening chapter and just call it quits?

Thanks.

 

[Britva415]

So I've been a fan of Literotica for some time, but just tried my hand at being an author. I have a story that I have been working on for almost a year. Drafting, reworking, going back and making changes for continuity, etc., etc. During that process I did use Copilot to check for spelling, punctuation, and grammar errors. And I did accept it's suggested changes. This was over a long period of time and across multiple chapters.

When I submitted my first chapter, it was rejected for AI. I was a little shocked because the plot, characters, dialogue, etc. was all mine. But I read the AI FAQ and figured "Ok, well, I did let Copilot change some words and even some sentence structure, so fair enough". Went back through the chapter and made some tweaks and it was accepted and published. YAY!

I went through the entire story again from start to finish and tried to make sure that everything there was my authentic voice. Probably didn't get every single possible instance where Copilot had assisted, but felt pretty good about it. Submitted Chapter 2. AI rejected. Went back and tried a few more tweaks and added a note. Pending. Pending. Pending.

I thought "maybe if I submit a couple more chapters, they'll see my style". Pending. Pending. Pending.

I ran a couple of chapters through some of the free AI-detection tools. Widely varying results with some saying 100% AI and others saying 100% human. Noted some commonalities in AI-flagged text. Much of it seemed to just be my writing style. I like a good metaphor, messing with sentence structure, and a little bit of alliteration. Particular words seemed to be a trigger. I tend to overuse "muttered", apparently. There was a whole other serious issue with the dialogue of one of my characters who speaks very technically. Her dialogue was getting flagged fairly consistently.

This morning I checked and all chapters Ai-rejected.

I'm not sure what to do next. I can go in and make some more tweaks but some of the issues the AI-detector test revealed can't be addressed (like being authentic to my character). I haven't seen anywhere in this thread HOW one appeals or contacts someone to ask them to take a real-person look at the submissions. So am I just done and should probably withdraw the opening chapter and just call it quits?

Thanks.

Don't alter your work. Re-submit the next chapter for publishing, and put a statement in the Notes field on the publishing form saying they hit you with a false positive for AI and asking for a real live person to do the review and approval.

 

[MillieDynamite]

I can't keep up with the threads on this subject.

 

[Cafanathaw]

If your fiction writing is mistaken for AI slop, that might be a sign that your style isn't suited to fiction writing. People have had their stories rejected for "not the style we're looking for" forever, here and by trad publishing houses. If Lit decides your story isn't up to the site's standards, it's their right not to publish it.

Fiction writing is a skill. Not everyone possesses it. But if you want to be a fiction writer, it's a skill you need to master. Just being able to kick a ball around doesn't make you a footballer. Having a paintbrush and a canvas doesn't make you a painter. Being able to type words into a word processor doesn't make you a writer.

The good thing about Lit is that the standards are very basic, and writers have every opportunity to improve. There are plenty of discussions in the AH about writing skills. Anyone can learn the bare minimum to get a story published, as long as they're willing to put in a bit of effort to be able to call themselves a writer.

Have you read some of the submissions on here recently ? I have pulled out of about twenty stories in the past week because they are almost unreadible, the sentances dont even make sense, and its clear that for some English is a new concept to them !

So I suggest you wind your neck in, because if some of this work is published, then everyone has the right to be published. I am a published author, and all my work gets rejected on here, and I have to dumb it down, sometimes three or four times before it passes, and god I hate the end result.

The problem here is that when people write well it looks like AI, because there are no mistakes, and adding mistakes is not the answer. Is it ?

And in regards your comments about people not being good enough to write fiction, I took the text from Lee childs first "Jack reacher" novel, and asked Fusion if this was AI. It came back as 74% probable AI...and that was written a decade before AI was available. Lee has around 30 novels on the best seller lists, so I figure he can write a note or two.

Anyway I hope everyones work gets published, as everyone deserves to have their work read by someone.

I wrote this note with AI, but put in my own mistakes so it would pass bull filter.

 

[Cafanathaw]

I spent a month working on a new story and I'm really proud of it. I was so excited to post it, but it was rejected for AI. I resubmitted with a note explaining that I didn't use AI (only the basic spellcheck in MS Word), but it is still rejected. What's the next step?

Since Literotica doesn't actually give any explanation about what it thinks is AI, I have no idea what part of the story needs to be rewritten. I put the story in two free online AI detection tools and neither one flagged anything.

So I'm essentially stuck. Did I just waste all that time writing a story that I can't even post? What am I supposed to do?

I have been a reader on this site for years, and finally decided to dip my toe into the water and submit the book I am working on. Currently at around 14 chapters.

I pubished the first two chapters to see if they landed well, and then the following chapters would follow through on a schedule, as well as all future chapters. I can see this being an endless series if people continue to like it.

Now after a while, in which I managed to write two more chapters, they were rejected, with a note saying I had used Grammerly or AI.

So a bit about me, I am a professional writer, I have two published books, and articles in countless journals and magazines. I dont use Grammerly because I see no need, I never used it 20 years ago, so I dont need it now. And I assume most AI's would not be that comfortable with my content. I simply rough draft, then polish it regards grammer, sentence structure, flow, add lots of description and imagery, in the end hopefully you have something thats easy to read and flows well, and retains continuity through a long story.

But that aside, I resubmitted and put a note in saying it was not AI. This was sat for days ignored. As there is no way to communicate with anyone, I deleted them and went through the thankless task of deconstructing my work, taking out descriptive sections, distrupting fluidity, making grammer mistakes etc. Bascially I ruined my work and it was heartbreaking. But it was accepted, even though it was now crap.

I did this again with chapter 2, a second pile of crap ready to submit, nope this was AI too, amazing.

So what do we do, it takes me more time to make my work bad in the hope it gets accepted. We have no way of interacting with the moderators, no matter how busy they are. And it has not gone unnoticed that for all these posts there is not a single reply from a moderator ?

And for those of you that say you have no problems, that may be more to do with your work being below par, than we are doing something wrong, because I can see the quality of work has started to drop over the past four months.

We should be able to share our work, even if its written by AI I suppose, as long as it meets the rules. Otherwise whats the point of this site. I personally wanted to contribute as a thank you for all the stories I have read. Now I guess I will just publish my work instead...

Does anyone know of any other sites where I can contribute my work. ??

 

[MillieDynamite]

No, that isn't the problem. You're wrong, AI makes mistakes, and the mistakes aren't why it, or something that resembles it, gets rejected.

The problem here is that when people write well it looks like AI, because there are no mistakes, and adding mistakes is not the answer. Is it ?

 

[Five_Inch_Heels]

We should be able to share our work, even if its written by AI I suppose,

No. One must never use that. Ever. For any purpose.

"And for those of you that say you have no problems, that may be more to do with your work being below par, than we are doing something wrong, because I can see the quality of work has started to drop over the past four months."

By the way, when I quote your posts here, they are lit up with red squiggly underlines denoting spelling errors.

 

[Cafanathaw]

No, that isn't the problem. You're wrong, AI makes mistakes, and the mistakes aren't why it, or something that resembles it, gets rejected.

It makes mistakes, but they tend to be logical ones, it gets confused when the number of characters increases, or the plot gets complicated, or the story gets too long. But in general it writes with perfect grammar, no spelling mistakes, and generally good story structure.

But as someone has pointed out on an earlier post if you write something that is complicated and technical, such as a scientist describing a process, then this will be triggered as AI, rather than a human who has done some homework, and scripted character specific prose accurately.

But not everyone has that problem do they.

 

[Cafanathaw]

No. One must never use that. Ever. For any purpose.

By the way, when I quote your posts here, they are lit up with red squiggly underlines denoting spelling errors.

Yep so I look Human and not AI...apparently we have to do that to our work now.. hooray

 

[MillieDynamite]

One key to machine writing is Perplexity, how predictable is the writing is. If it is very predictable, the detector’s say it’s AI. Another, Burstiness, how often does the pace and rhythm of the writing change? AI-generated text often has low burstiness, featuring a monotonous, consistent, or uniform sentence structure.

AI often overuses certain words, such as “tapestry,” “delve,” “leverage,” “testament,” “significant,” and “enhance”. AI often repeats certain phrases or sentence structures because they are common in its training data.

Yes, AI can produce perfect grammatical text, which can sometimes feel artificial because it lacks the natural errors, idioms, and varied, imperfect sentence structure often found in human writing. However, Novel Factory and Sudowrite can produce imperfect grammar. But that perfection alone will not get a rejection. Though almost every human writer slips, on tense, now and again, when writing.

Other factors influence decisions on whether it is or isn’t it AI influenced.

 

[MillieDynamite]

My writing here is never, ever, very good. Jus' saying,

No. One must never use that. Ever. For any purpose.



By the way, when I quote your posts here, they are lit up with red squiggly underlines denoting spelling errors.

 

[MillieDynamite]

I don't write technical scientific material as fiction. Even my science is made-up shit by me. Though, I do, in fact, do research for the stories I write.

It makes mistakes, but they tend to be logical ones, it gets confused when the number of characters increases, or the plot gets complicated, or the story gets too long. But in general it writes with perfect grammar, no spelling mistakes, and generally good story structure.

But as someone has pointed out on an earlier post if you write something that is complicated and technical, such as a scientist describing a process, then this will be triggered as AI, rather than a human who has done some homework, and scripted character specific prose accurately.

But not everyone has that problem do they.

 

[Five_Inch_Heels]

AI often overuses certain words, such as “tapestry,” “delve,” “leverage,” “testament,” “significant,” and “enhance”. AI often repeats certain phrases or sentence structures because they are common in its training data.

If you want to delve into significantly enhancing leverage, consider a longer prybar.

 

[MillieDynamite]

I might delive in to that, after I finish the wall tapestry I've been working on. I have a testament of authenticity for it already, and need to enhance its ageing before I make a significant profit selling it on the dark web.

If you want to delve into significantly enhancing leverage, consider a longer prybar.

 

[Cafanathaw]

One key to machine writing is Perplexity, how predictable is the writing is. If it is very predictable, the detector’s say it’s AI. Another, Burstiness, how often does the pace and rhythm of the writing change? AI-generated text often has low burstiness, featuring a monotonous, consistent, or uniform sentence structure.

AI often overuses certain words, such as “tapestry,” “delve,” “leverage,” “testament,” “significant,” and “enhance”. AI often repeats certain phrases or sentence structures because they are common in its training data.

Yes, AI can produce perfect grammatical text, which can sometimes feel artificial because it lacks the natural errors, idioms, and varied, imperfect sentence structure often found in human writing. However, Novel Factory and Sudowrite can produce imperfect grammar. But that perfection alone will not get a rejection. Though almost every human writer slips, on tense, now and again, when writing.

Other factors influence decisions on whether it is or isn’t it AI influenced.

Yes, a good example of someone using someone else's words. However none of this really helps people get work submitted. The crux of the problem is that I have so far 14 chapters, each chapter over 20 something pages long, all my own words, ideas, and typed myself, no error checking, no tools, not even grammerly telling me my spelling or grammar is bad. It's not even done by accident, as I don't have it installed, nor is co-pilot turned on. put every submission comes up as AI written...which it is not, it is 100% human written, edited and checked.

I as a human should not have to change the way I write so I don't get mistaken for a machine. And why can't I just be taken at my word that this is what I wrote. What does it gain me to lie about the source. There is no money in this, no recognition, it's just fun stories to amuse others..all this talk is ridiculous and a complete waste of time. I will just post the stories somewhere else. No loss to me.

 

[MillieDynamite]

If it's a waste of your time, don't participate in the discussion. I can only tell what AI detectors look for; I can't even tell you if Lit uses an AI, an AI detector, or proprietary software that checks. But something in your writing is triggering the rejection, and only you can fix that.

Yes, a good example of someone using someone else's words. However none of this really helps people get work submitted. The crux of the problem is that I have so far 14 chapters, each chapter over 20 something pages long, all my own words, ideas, and typed myself, no error checking, no tools, not even grammerly telling me my spelling or grammar is bad. It's not even done by accident, as I don't have it installed, nor is co-pilot turned on. put every submission comes up as AI written...which it is not, it is 100% human written, edited and checked.

I as a human should not have to change the way I write so I don't get mistaken for a machine. And why can't I just be taken at my word that this is what I wrote. What does it gain me to lie about the source. There is no money in this, no recognition, it's just fun stories to amuse others..all this talk is ridiculous and a complete waste of time. I will just post the stories somewhere else. No loss to me.

 

[BuannaRa]

Don't alter your work. Re-submit the next chapter for publishing, and put a statement in the Notes field on the publishing form saying they hit you with a false positive for AI and asking for a real live person to do the review and approval.

Thanks, I will give that a try. Appreciate the practical advice.

 

[StillStunned]

So a bit about me, I am a professional writer, I have two published books, and articles in countless journals and magazines.

Assuming your stories were trad published, I bet you went through several rejections before they were accepted. At least that's the normal process. Terry Brooks and JK Rowling are two authors I know off the top of my head who shopped their works around for years before getting their lucky break.

So if trad publishers can reject manuscripts, why not Lit? They have just as much right, if they don't feel the writing matches what they're looking for.

Also: "articles in countless journals and magazines" isn't a qualification for writing fiction. In fact, the style that works for non-fiction articles is likely to be a hindrance when writing fiction.

And for those of you that say you have no problems, that may be more to do with your work being below par, than we are doing something wrong, because I can see the quality of work has started to drop over the past four months.

We should be able to share our work, even if its written by AI I suppose, as long as it meets the rules. Otherwise whats the point of this site.

I'm starting to become very tired of all these posters who claim that the only reason their stories trigger an AI warning is that they're "too good", and that everyone else's work must be bad. It hints at a complete lack of understanding of what writing is. If your writing resembles AI slop, you should make it *better*, not worse.

I'm sure getting a rejection is very frustrating and painful, but there's really no call to insult other writers whose only crime is that their stories are getting published. And no, it's not because the writing is so much worse than yours. I haven't seen your writing, but if you were so much more amazing than everyone here you'd be winning the Booker Prize and the Nobel, not trying to get sex stories published on a free website.

Also:

I wrote this note with AI, but put in my own mistakes so it would pass bull filter.

How would you even prompt this? "ChatGPT, write a rant for me about my story being rejected as AI. Make me sound really angry, emphasise that I never use any writing tools, and make it apparent that I feel very strongly about this. Not strongly enough to actually write this post myself, mind, but very strongly."

If this post seems like I'm mocking you, then that's probably a good thing. A fool may hold up a mirror to a king to say, "This is how others see you."

 

[Cafanathaw]

Fair point. I'm not angry at being rejected, just disappointed at what this place has become. This started out if I am correct as a place for like minded people to share their work, and not be judged by others, not a publishing house.
My only anger is at those that say, to those people here who are being "auto-rejected" based on an algorithm (and there are a lot of them), where no human bothers to read what has been rejected, that they should "not write fiction because they are no good at it," and "it is not for everyone". Who are they to say that ? And even if they are correct, and these people would never be picked up by a publisher, why cant they have a go and submit their ideas ? Instead you hold them up against those that manage to get past the filter, and claim they are writing slop. I don't mean to insult the other writers who get past the filter, but come on have you read some of them, some don't make sense , they are barely in English. Yes they haven't reused the similes and metaphors three times in 50,000 words, because they didn't use any. But their bustiness is high because they can't stay on plot for more than four lines.
So mock me all you want, I really don't care, and I am certainly not angry about it, I just feel sorry for say one woman in here who spent six weeks toiling over a story, to be told she didn't write it, because thats what we are saying here, we are insinuating that people are liars, that they did not write the things they spent their time on. That people who are neurodivergent, who may well have a great story in them can't use tools to correct their grammar or structure.
But happily applaud someone who spends thirty minutes smashing out two pages of ill formed, unstructured text, and say they can write fiction and you can't.
I honestly posted on here with an honest question, same as everyone else here, how do you get a human to read your submission and make a true adult decision on it. If that human actually says its not for us, its not good enough, etc then thats fine. But thats not what we are talking about is it.
But instead of answers I got people trying to drag me down, whatever.
And as for the line about I put errors in to so I seem Human, that is a mechanism sometimes used in writing, in fiction and all other forms, its called humour. I realise its not used on the internet much anymore, having being replaced by other things like hate, insults, condescension. (I added a smiley face so you can tell I am still not angry, but feel free to bite back x x)