Learn How to Utilize ChatGPT to Summarize a Book Effectively

ChatGPT is definitely an interesting tool that can be extremely helpful if used right. On the other hand, despite being among the best of its kind, it still lacks many capabilities and isn’t advanced enough to fully imitate the way a human mind works. This is why using ChatGPT can be a double-edged sword. That being said, you can still try to summarize a book using the tool and see what kind of results you get. Here’s how to utilize ChatGPT to summarize a book effectively.

1 Decide Which Book You Want to Summarize

The first and most obvious step is to decide which book you want to summarize. It can be a lengthy book or one on the shorter side. It all depends on your personal needs. However, you should make sure that the book was published before September 2021. Why? Because ChatGPT is only aware of the events that occurred before that time. It will likely be very confused if you ask it about a book that was published later.

2 Log into Chat.OpenAI.com/chat

Once you have chosen the book you want to summarize, you can open your preferred browser and log into https://chat.openai.com/auth/login or sign up for an account. Having an account means you can use the tool, so if you don’t have one already, you will need to create it now. It is completely free, so you don’t have to worry about any costs. That being said, if you really fall in love with the tool, you might decide to purchase the paid version eventually.

3 Ask ChatGPT to Summarize the Book

Now that you are logged in, you will have to send a request to ChatGPT and ask it to summarize the book you chose. You can do this by typing “summarize [book title]”. You can also try opening the book in a separate tab and copy the URL into the request you send to ChatGPT. Keep in mind that you always have the option to work with a professional writer from the writing service Trust My Paper who can help you summarize the book or even do it for you from start to finish for an affordable price.

4 Don’t Summarize What You Haven’t Read

One of the most important things you should remember about ChatGPT is that it isn’t perfect. No matter how advanced the program is, it has limits that you will discover fairly quickly once you start using the tool. This is exactly why you shouldn’t try to summarize a book you haven’t read. If the tool makes up the plot or the characters, you will get the wrong information without even knowing that there is something wrong. It’s best to use the tool to get a summary of a book you read to refresh your memory.

5 Know the AI’s Limitations

Speaking of limitations, it’s a good idea to study the tool before you start using it so freely to summarize books. Test it out with articles to see how well it summarizes them. Likewise, give it some requests and see how well it does. Get acquainted with the AI and try to learn about as many of its limitations as possible. And always remember the most important one – the tool doesn’t know about the events post-September 2021.

6 Don’t Let the AI Fantasize

If you do try to force ChatGPT to summarize a book that was released after 2021, be prepared to see some fantasies and hallucinations. The program will try to make up the plot of the book though it will likely first act confused about your request. You can still try to summarize the book yourself by using the Write My Essays AI tool which has a variety of features designed for students and professionals. One of them is a summarizing tool that may be useful to you.

7 Ask About Classics and Famous Books

If you want to play it safe, it’s best to use ChatGPT to summarize classics and famous books. These books often have their summaries readily available online, so the tool will likely use those (and the book itself) to make its own summary. This may result in a messy summary, but you can still try to ask the tool to summarize a well-known work for you and see how well it does. You can also try doing this with books in different languages.

8 Consider Using Other Tools

Lastly, don’t forget that you can try other tools if ChatGPT doesn’t work for you. You can already start with the Write My Essays tool noted earlier or try the ChatPDF tool. As the name suggests, this is a program similar to ChatGPT that specializes in summarizing PDFs. You can summarize up to three PDFs of up to 120 pages per day for free or purchase a monthly plan.

Wrapping Up

All in all, ChatGPT definitely isn’t perfect which is why you should be using it with caution. If you want to summarize a book with its help, use the tips in this article to help you. However, it’s best to rely on your own knowledge of the book’s content.

There is no AI-powered tool that can perfectly imitate the human mind. Well, not yet. This is why you should work on developing your own comprehension and summarization skills to rely on your own abilities rather than those of a tool.