Your story’s memory
Talk to your characters
Open a character and ask them something. They answer in their own voice.
What it is
Talk to your characters lets you hold a conversation with somebody from your own book. Open a character from the Story Bible and the Talk tab puts you in front of them: they answer in the first person, in your book language, using only what your Story Bible actually says about them — their description, their arc, how they speak, and their relationships with the other people in the story. You can read their answers or hear them out loud: each character has their own speaking voice, and their face pulses while they talk. It is a way to find out what you think, on a day you do not feel like writing. Nothing said in that conversation is written back on its own: it never touches your manuscript, and it reaches your Story Bible only for a fact you read and add yourself.
Where to find it: Workspace → left panel → a character card → Talk, which opens the conversation in one press. Open lands on the profile instead, and the Talk button at the bottom of the window gets you there from either. If you see no Talk anywhere, switch it on under Settings → General → experience mode.
What this covers
- A character answers in the first person, from your Story Bible
- Two modes: talk TO them, or ask a script editor ABOUT them
- They speak your book language, not the app language
- An honest warning when a character is too thin to be interesting
- The conversation is saved and is there on your other devices
- Nothing said in it ever reaches your chapters
- Keep a fact you like: read that one fact, press the button, and it joins the Story Bible
- Hear them say it, in a voice you choose for each character
- Or go hands-free: speak your question and they answer out loud
How to use it
- 1
Open a character
In the Story Bible, expand any character card. Talk opens the conversation straight away; Open shows the profile first. Either way the character window opens over your workspace — the scene you were in stays on screen behind it.
- 2
Go to the Talk tab
If you opened the profile first, press Talk — at the bottom of the window, or in the tab strip along the top.
- 3
Choose who answers
Talk to them, and they reply as themselves. Ask about them, and you get a script editor discussing their arc in the third person. The first is the default.
- 4
Ask something
Type and press Enter. Ask what they think of another character, why they did something, or what they would never admit.
- 5
Hear them say it
Press the speaker beside any reply and the character says it out loud, in the voice set for them on the Profile tab. Turn on "Speak replies" and every new reply is read aloud as it arrives.
- 6
Or put the keyboard down
Press Hands-free. Say what you want to ask and then pause — they answer out loud, and it starts listening again on its own. Start talking while they are still speaking to cut in. Press Hands-free again to end it.
- 7
Keep anything worth keeping
Press "What did this turn up?" under the conversation. Each fact it found is shown on its own, with the line the character said it in. Add the ones you want — one press per fact — and they join that character's sheet. Skip the rest.
- 8
Close it and keep writing
Your manuscript is exactly as you left it, and so is anything you did not add. The conversation is kept, so you can come back to it later or from another device.
What it gives you
A way in on a bad day
Five minutes with your protagonist is a lower bar than a blank page, and you usually leave knowing something about them you did not know before.
It only knows what you wrote
The character answers from your Story Bible, so what they say is grounded in your book rather than in a generic idea of a character.
You can be reckless with it
Ask your antagonist an absurd hypothetical. Nothing here changes your book unless you read a specific fact and press the button on it, which is what makes it safe to play with.
Good to know
- The conversation never writes to your manuscript, and never writes to your Story Bible on its own. Keeping a fact is always a press on that one fact — there is no "save this chat" and no "add all".
- A character can only speak from what the Story Bible records. Where it is silent they will improvise, and an improvised answer is not canon until you decide it is.
- A character with a two-line description will say so before you start. Filling in a line or two first makes a real difference.
- Each reply costs credits, like any other AI request. Replies are short on purpose, so a conversation is cheap compared with drafting a chapter.
- Only the newest turns of a conversation are kept. The panel tells you once when older ones are dropped.
- Hearing a reply is a separate cost from the reply itself, so a spoken conversation costs more than a typed one. The speaker button spends only when you press it; "Speak replies" spends on every reply until you turn it off. Trying a voice out with "Hear it" is free.
- A character's voice is chosen per language. English voices and Ukrainian/Czech voices come from different sets and are not interchangeable, so you pick from whichever set your book language uses — the other choice is kept if you change language later.
- Hands-free needs your microphone, and a spoken turn costs more than a typed one: the transcription, the reply and the speech are three separate charges. Reading and typing need no microphone at all — declining the prompt does not take the speaker button away.
- Only one conversation can hold the microphone. Close Talk to Charm before going hands-free with a character, and the other way round.
- Characters only — plot arcs and world entries do not have a Talk tab yet.
Questions
Does talking to a character change my book?
Not on its own. Nothing said in a character conversation reaches your chapters, your Story Bible, or the prose the AI writes for you later. You can ask your antagonist an absurd hypothetical, close the window, and find your manuscript exactly as you left it. The one exception is one you make: if the character says something you want to keep, you can read that single fact and press Add to Story Bible on it, which is the same as typing it onto their sheet yourself.
What language does the character speak?
Your book language. If you write a Ukrainian novel with the app in English, your character answers in Ukrainian. This is deliberate and it is the opposite of the research assistant, which follows the app language instead.
Can I hear my character speak?
Yes. Every reply has a speaker button, and "Speak replies" at the top of the Talk tab reads each new one aloud as it arrives. Each character has their own voice, set on the Profile tab under their portrait — until you choose one they are given a voice derived from their name, so two characters never sound alike by default. Their face pulses while they talk. Hearing a reply is billed separately from the reply itself, so a spoken conversation costs more than a typed one; previewing a voice with "Hear it" is free.
Can I talk to them instead of typing?
Yes — press Hands-free in the Talk tab. Say your question and pause; the character answers out loud and it starts listening again by itself, so you can keep going without touching the keyboard. Start talking while they are still speaking and you cut in, the way you would with a person. It needs microphone permission, which nothing else in the character window does: hearing a reply and typing a question both work fine if you declined the microphone prompt. A spoken turn costs more than a typed one, because the transcription, the reply and the speech are billed separately.
What is the difference between the two modes?
Talk to them and they answer as themselves, in the first person, with their own opinions — including unfair ones. Ask about them and you get an experienced script editor talking in the third person about what their arc is doing, where their motivation is thin, and what a scene needs from them.
What if I have barely written anything about this character?
The window tells you before you start, and names the two or three things it would most want to know. You can fill those in first, or talk to them anyway — but a character with two lines on their sheet will sound generic, and it is better to hear that from us than to discover it mid-conversation.
Is the conversation private, and is it kept?
It is kept with your book, so it is still there tomorrow and on your phone. It is never part of a manuscript export. It IS part of your account data export, because a conversation you had is yours whether or not it is your novel.
Start your first chapter
Every new account starts with two free credits, enough to talk a whole chapter through, have it drafted, and see how it reads.
Get started free