Built from Scratch: Build a Real Business with AI

by Brian Turner

Most people are not stuck because they lack ideas.
They are stuck because they hesitate, overthink, and spend too long preparing.

Built from Build a Real Business with AI is a practical guide for entrepreneurs, creators, and operators who want to move faster without getting lost in tools, hype, or complexity.

This book is not about learning artificial intelligence for its own sake. It is about using AI as leverage to reduce friction, speed up execution, and build something real that actually works. Instead of theory or technical detail, the focus stays on decisions, action, and momentum.

The book is written for two types of readers. Those who want to start a business but keep stalling at the beginning. And those who already have a business but feel busy, inefficient, and stretched thin. In both cases, the problem is not knowledge. It is delay.

Through short, direct chapters, the book introduces a clear operating approach. Decide what matters. Build a usable first version. Make a real move. Use AI to remove slow and repetitive work. Improve what already works instead of restarting. Measure progress without obsessing. Stay consistent when motivation fades.

AI is positioned as a support tool, not a decision maker. Readers learn where AI actually saves time, where it creates distraction, and how to use it without turning it into a hobby.

Built from Scratch is for builders who want less noise and more progress. It is for anyone ready to stop preparing and start building with clarity, speed, and intention.

95 pages, Kindle Edition

Published January 12, 2026

About the author

Brian Turner is the author of a memoir, My Life as a Foreign Country, and five collections of poetry— Here, Bullet and Phantom Noise; with The Wild Delight of Wild Things, The Goodbye World Poem, and The Dead Peasant’s Handbook due out from Alice James Books in Fall, 2023. He’s the editor of The Kiss and co-editor of The Strangest of Theatres. A musician, he’s written and recorded albums with The Interplanetary Acoustic Team, including 11 11 (Me Smiling) and American Undertow with The Retro Legion. His poems and essays have been published in The New York Times, The Guardian, National Geographic, and Harper’s, among other fine journals, and he was featured in the documentary Operation Homecoming: Writing the Wartime Experience, nominated for an Academy Award. A Guggenheim Fellow, he’s received a USA Hillcrest Fellowship in Literature, the Amy Lowell Traveling Fellowship, the Poets’ Prize, and a Fellowship from the Lannan Foundation. He lives in Orlando with his dog, Dene, the world’s sweetest golden retriever.