autonovel-drafting

Autonovel — Phase 2 (Drafting)

Draft each chapter in sequence from the scene-level outline. Per-chapter loop: draft → mechanical gates → surgical rewrite loop → grading gate (see references/surgical-rewrite.md).

When to use this skill

• State.json shows "phase": "drafting"
• Foundation complete; outline.md has scene-level beats; world/characters/voice/canon all present
• chapters_drafted < chapters_total (or chapters_total is 0 and we need to count from outline)

Prerequisites

!`cd "$AUTONOVEL_WORKSPACE/$NOVEL_SLUG" && ls -la outline.md world.md characters.md voice.md canon.md`
!`cat "$AUTONOVEL_WORKSPACE/$NOVEL_SLUG/state.json"`

If any foundation file is missing, hand back to autonovel-foundation.

Workflow

Step 1 — Resolve the next chapter

Read chapters_drafted + 1 as the next chapter number. New foundations already carry chapters_total. For a legacy drafting state where it is zero, count the validated outline headings for the loop bound; the first atomic checkpoint persists that derived count. Do not edit state.json by hand.

Step 2 — Draft loop

For each chapter index N from chapters_drafted + 1 to chapters_total:

a. Compile and build context for chapter N. At the start of every chapter, run the deterministic preflight before spending a model call:

python ${HERMES_SKILL_DIR}/lib/validation.py preflight "$AUTONOVEL_WORKSPACE/$NOVEL_SLUG" --chapter N

Nonzero exit means the accepted foundation does not contain a safe drafting packet for this chapter. Report the returned issue codes and stop this chapter; the command does not mutate state. After preflight, re-run the task-specific resolver (unchanged inputs use its fingerprint cache):

python ${HERMES_SKILL_DIR}/../autonovel/lib/genre_resolver.py compile --state "$AUTONOVEL_WORKSPACE/$NOVEL_SLUG/state.json" --workspace "$AUTONOVEL_WORKSPACE/$NOVEL_SLUG" --task drafting.chapter

Read:

• outline.md — get the scene-beat section for chapter N
• world.md, characters.md, voice.md, canon.md — full
• chapters/ch_{N-1:02d}.md if N > 1 — get the last 1000 words for continuity (prose texture and immediate scene state; NOT a source of facts — see the STORY STATE block below, which replaces re-reading older chapters for facts)
• references/chapter-prompt.md (THIS SKILL's reference dir) — get the chapter draft template
• genre_context/story-contract.md — the persistent story-specific genre promises
• genre_context/compiled/drafting.md — the bounded static drafting packet
• genre_context/compiled/evaluation-chapter.md — the profile-compliance and semantic genre-slop criteria used by Gate 4
• genre_context/resolved.json — selected-pack metadata and the generated pattern-bundle pointer used by the mechanical scan
• profile from state.json — rating, exclusions, and content tags to match against the outline coverage map; do not reopen source pack Markdown from Drafting
• STORY STATE block (if story_state/facts.json exists — see references/fact-extraction.md for how it's populated):

  !`python3 ${HERMES_SKILL_DIR}/lib/story_state.py query "$AUTONOVEL_WORKSPACE/$NOVEL_SLUG/story_state/facts.json" {N} <characters-in-this-beat>`
  

  <characters-in-this-beat> = the entity keys of characters named in chapter N's outline beat (space-separated CLI args). Include the returned facts and participating characters in {GENRE_DRAFTING_BLOCK} rather than duplicating a separate story-state block. Budget: this story-state portion must stay <= 1.5k tokens; this cap does not include or truncate the story contract or compiled drafting packet. If the query runs longer, narrow the subject list further to only the characters actually on-page in this beat rather than the full cast. If story_state/facts.json does not exist yet, skip this block — it is created on the first chapter's fact-extraction step (references/fact-extraction.md).