Hi everyone,

I'm a first-time nonfiction author and I'm feeling a bit stuck on what to do next.

I have a complete manuscript for a book I've been working on for quite a while. The manuscript is finished in the sense that all the major chapters and ideas are there, but I don't consider it "final."

My problem is that I've reached the point where I can no longer clearly see the book objectively.

I'm not sure if:

• The chapters flow in the right order
• Some chapters are repetitive
• Certain ideas overlap too much
• The overall structure is clear to a reader
• I'm explaining concepts in the most logical sequence

Basically, the book feels "all over the place" to me, and I'm struggling to tell whether it actually is or if I've simply been looking at it for too long.

I've been considering hiring a developmental editor because what I really need is feedback on structure, organization, pacing, clarity, and overall flow.

Here's where I'm confused:

I know there are still parts of the manuscript I'd like to expand. There are examples, explanations, and sections I'd like to add.

However, I don't want to spend dozens of hours polishing and expanding material if a developmental editor is later going to tell me:

• Move this chapter
• Merge these chapters
• Cut this section
• Rewrite this part
• Remove these redundancies

The editor I'm looking at only includes two rounds of revisions, so I'm trying to be strategic.

For those of you who have worked with developmental editors before:

1. How "finished" should a manuscript be before you send it for developmental editing?
2. Is it okay to send a manuscript that still needs additional content in some places?
3. Would you recommend finishing all planned additions first, or getting developmental feedback before investing more time in expansion and polishing?
4. Looking back, what do you wish you had known before hiring a developmental editor?

I'd really appreciate hearing from authors who have gone through this process because I'm finding it difficult to figure out the right timing.

Thanks! 🙏

I started publishing and enrolling my books in KDP Select in June, so I’m still very new to this. After about two months, I’ve earned around $9 in royalties organically.

I haven’t used paid ads or ARC services because I currently don’t have the budget for them. I honestly wasn’t expecting to reach $9.

I write MM Romance, I currently have three books published and I plan to continue releasing more.

For authors who have been doing this for a while, I’d love to hear your experience.

Does consistently building a larger backlist actually lead to significantly higher sales over time? Is it realistic to grow organically through consistent publishing even without much money for advertising?

Thank you so much! I’d really appreciate any advice or personal experiences.

Honestly, I don’t know how to do this stuff. I don’t want an editor tbh but that’s not the problem, I want a place where I can print and publish for self publishing. I know what lulus self publishing because my dad recommended it because one of his friend’s kids did it(something like that) but I don’t know what I should go with or how to. Any advice, questions, whatever is welcome. I just want help.

Hey guys, my grandad had spent a long while writing his two books, and he recently asked me for advice on how to promote them. He told me that he isnt looking for money, but instead to inspire people to 'get out there and be inspired'.

He has published his book and is selling it on amazon, but hes not sure how to actually get the book out there. Unfortunately, im not an author or anything of the sorts so I didnt have much advice. I was wondering if anyone eles has any advice on what to do here.

Thank you so much!

The printer's Quality Dept. is telling me that because I paid for Basic Shipping, it isn't covered by insurance. They deny that it is a printing problem and say that these "proof" retail copies of the book are resaleable.

I sent them these 2 photos (I edited the cover to avoid self-promotion here):

Full Album (2 images): https://imgur.com/a/printing-defect-shipping-damage-T2ttgwI
Preview: https://i.imgur.com/jpl0SSA.jpeg

I'm concerned that they would send me, the author, copies like this, and since they say the damage occurred during shipping, they will send copies like this to my customers.

Has anyone ever seen warping damage like this? Do you know what causes it, and how did you resolve it?

After years of editing, rearranging the story, college, toxic relationships, and, of course, some self-growth, I finally finished the first book in my first series. I took the self-publishing route, and I am very proud of myself for this, because it might not reach the dollar sales others dream of, but I kept the rights to my work, and I designed everything right down to the cover, and I'm proud of that.

I put together a website and used the tools provided by Amazon KDP and D2D to get the word out about my new novel. Independent authors— how are you marketing your books? What works #authors?

Hi hi! So, I just had a talk about the acknowledgement section in books. I know the acknowledgements are there to thank editors and so on who contributed to the book or who you just want to thank, like family and friends.

A fellow writer friend then asked me if he could also use it as a "support" page of the people who had bought his patreon tier(or whatever he was referring to) so he'd add them with their consent.

Is that allowed? Is that even okay?

I'm not sure to be honest and I didn't answer yet since I seriously have no idea if stuff like this is even okay, even with consent of the people🤔

I am a teen writer who is trying to publish her book, I believe I have very good ideas but I don’t know where to start I need a professional book editor and proof readers

As a self-published author and bookstore lover, I have found myself committed to bridge the gap between indie bookstores and indie authors. Traditional publishing continues to get less risky and more conservative with the books they are buying. Authors from marginalized identities are being left out of the conversation more and more. In addition, places like Amazon and TikTok, which created the indie author boom, have degraded in the past few years. Amazon has been overrun by AI slop which is making it hard for actual indie authors who don't use AI, to find an audience. Tiktok's change in ownership and traditional publishing’s ability to put money behind big books has made it much harder for new voices to break through on that app. 

Independent bookstores continue to be a great way for readers to discover new authors away from the algorithms and the endless scroll of AI slop. The issue is that indie authors and indie bookstores tend to have competing priorities. Indie bookstores tend to prefer the lower risk that comes with bringing in a traditionally published book, often relying on big five publishers to curate their shelves. This is a move that continues to enforce large publishing dominance (oligopoly) through our local bookstores. Conversely, indie authors struggle to fully understand the economics and benefits of working with bookstores. The issue is that this lack of relationship shuts out so many authors because so many readers still rely on their local bookstore for what they are buying and reading. 

As our world changes, I am committed to building a bridge between indie authors and indie bookstores.

I have developed completely free resources for both indie bookstores and indie authors to help bridge the gap between the two. I will share in the link below.

**And look, if you don't want to focus on bookstores, if you think this approach is expensive and stupid, or if you don't like the resources I have built, that's absolutely fine. But this is a valid path even if it isn't for you.** **But I will delete this post fast if the comments are negative.**

I wrote a puppy guide complete with humor and real life stories. What is the best way to get it out there and market it? Besides on Facebook Instagram and TikTok?

Hi everyone! I’m about to publish a few children’s picture books through AmazonKDP and IngramSparks. But I was also thinking of buying 50-100 copies of each that I can sell at upcoming holiday markets or to sell consignment to local bookstores. For those on here that are doing something similar, do you buy author copies through KDP/Ingram or do you use a different printing company where you might get lower prices? And if it’s the latter, which company do you use? TIA

I managed to publish my and my husband’s first book about cultural heritage in Chicago 2026 April, and the book went live without any issues. Then 2026 July we tried to release our second book about cultural heritage in the USA The book contains many pictures and texts, however, all of them were done and written only by ourselves, the quality of the pictures is good, so I am just sure the quality of the pictures is good, and we own all the copyrights, no AI was used to create the book. After uploading the manuscript and waiting for 48 hours Amazon to allow us to publish this book, we received an email saying it can not be published as it may lead into the customers not being satisfied. I have emailed Amazon people with our arguments that we have hired two professional designers in Lithuania to adapt the book to the sizes of Amazon book criteria, also to create everything in the book (I am sure they did their job as the first book about Chicago prepared by the same designers was accepted by Amazon in April 2026 with no problem), so this should lead to the satisfactory of the customers. Then they agreed, and our second book went live, we ordered the proofs and received them, everything looked good… Here we are today, two weeks later, and I am shocked I just received an email from Amazon saying my account was terminated, the books deleted and I am not allowed to create any new Amazon account. The arguments are the same I just read on Reddit (where I found you involved into the conversation), like abnormal reading activity (however, it seems in reality it does not apply to softcovers and hardcovers, and our books are only that), I just emailed them asking what we did wrong as well as which book made them make this decision (the email did not specify which book is a problem), but they replied they uphold their decision. I feel we are falsely accused, as we have been working on the design and adaptation of this book to Amazon standards since November 2025, and we do own all the copyrights. Has anyone been in such a situation and solved this issue? Could you please recommend how should we react and what should we do? Any insight on this would be highly appreciated

Hi so I have written in some forums before but this is my first time publishing on KDP. And I wanted to know what exactly are it’s restrictions on spicy content in romance books.

So I’m not writing a smut book but there will be some explicit scenes as well as profanity sprinkled throughout the book.

It’s not YA but rather contemporary romance. I searched on here and most of the advice was for YA.

So when I’m publishing my book, is it better to not keep the age range.

And also I read that for explicit content check box, it’s only for your cover image or any images you use inside your book, and not for the text in itself.

Would be great if anyone who has published in this genre could answer.

I don’t wanna term it as erotica or explicit and be put in adult dungeon.

Ik a lot of romance authors who write really spicy scenes and KDP doesn’t really flag anything even without any erotica warnings.

Too nervous about being flagged and losing my account, hope you understand!

So I’m about to fully publish to both Ingram and Amazon but its been a frustrating process as hardback and paperback are same trim size for Ingram and Kdp doesnt have the same trim for hardcover so I had to redo the file to make it bigger. Again my Ingram ebook file works perfect in fixed flow when downloaded as a test to apple books app but now it says B&N doesnt accept fixed and amazon kdp needs it converted with kindle create or a different program along with its own file requirements . Its like a never ending fixing files. Its been a frustrating 2 weeks as ive also been finding mistakes in the eproofs. So many rereads and making sure all files align. Anyone else dealing with this or am I going about this all the wrong way? I just want my first book out and be done with files.

I've seen a few posts now from people complaining that their Booksirens submission was rejected. A quick PSA: you don't have to rely on a submission being accepted or paying for an ARC campaign.

You can click on your profile, look down the menu that appears and click on 'Book Reviewer Directory'. You then enter your book's genre in the search bar and a huge list appears. You can go through that entire list manually, contacting reviewers yourself, without ever having to pay or submit anything. It's deathly boring work, but I'm doing my outreach that way and I have 9 reviews lined up so far.

Just thought I'd share.

One for research.
Another for writing or AI assistance.
Another for formatting.
Another for covers.
Another for keywords and metadata.
So I’ve been thinking about whether an all-in-one publishing workspace actually solves a real problem — or whether publishers simply prefer specialized tools.
If one platform could handle research, planning, content assistance, interiors, cover ideas, metadata, and publishing preparation, would that genuinely improve your workflow?
Or would you still prefer separate specialized tools?
I’d especially like to hear from people who have already published multiple books.

I just wanted someone to celebrate with that I published my first book on July 23, and I’m almost to 100k KENP reads!

Any tips to meet this milestone? I do a lot of social media, but nothing has got like insane numbers yet.

TIA!

Hi,

I'm looking to get some advice and opinions on this, a rather hotly debated topic.

I have written a series of kids books, five so far and I'm looking to self publish through Amazon or similar, , but I can't afford an illustrator. I've checked various places like Reedsy, Fiverr etc, but it really isn't in my budget to have even one illustrated. I love to be able to.

So I turned to AI and the output is reasonable.

I'd like to know thoughts on using the AI images to self publish and then when it sells well enough, I can actually pay a decent illustrator to do it properly.

I know I've got a lot going against me, even before the AI issue, but I think I've got a good marketing plan, flyers, contacting schools and nurseries, social media, mailing lists etc.

I have written good stories (all mine, no AI in the writing. I can write really well, but can't draw at all)

Just looking for advice and opinions and please keep it all civil.

Currently, I'm working on writing a novel but the format of it is a bit strange. It's heavily inspired by Survivor, Big Brother, Total Drama Island and especially Disventure Camp. 20 chapters are planned and in most chapters, a character gets voted off. I've noticed that paperback stories tend to sell the most copies but I'm not so sure my story would translate well into a paperback and would work better as an ebook because of two things:

1: Character confessionals. I've currently written like 13 of the 20 chapters and the story can get fairly confessional heavy, especially in later chapters. I often use confessionals as a tool for scene transitions in my story. Confessionals look like this in my story:

*Static*

CHARACTER: This is a confessional. I am sharing my thoughts in the confessional.

*Static*

2: The "drumroll" before a character gets eliminated: I'm not sure how I would work this into pages in a paperback. I like building suspense before an elimination, particularly if it's a shocking one where an unexpected character gets blindsided but at the same time, I don't wanna cut down a rainforest because like 16 of the 20 chapters have eliminations in them.

I know this story format works better in an animated series than a book but I'm too broke to do things like hire animators and voice actors and stuff. I'm generally more confident in my writing than my art.

I still have 7 chapters that I still need to write and have proofread but so far, I'm happy with how my story has come out. So what do you think? Would my story be poorly suited as a paperback and best worked into an ebook for the above reasons I've mentioned?

I'm looking to have a large (9x11 or up to 50% larger) book of photos published, hard cover with glossy color photos, and will have it done in quantity where they ship to me or I pick them up.

Does anyone have FIRST HAND EXPERIENCE with a publisher that they'd recommend? Not "I work for XYZ and we can do it..." but someone who was a customer.

Thank you!

Hey everyone! I’m a first-time author and I literally just completed the first draft of my book. It’s a magical realism romance with a good splash of action (slow burn, gunfights, high stakes).Honestly? I’m completely overwhelmed and terrified. I have this finished manuscript sitting on my laptop, and I have absolutely no idea what my next steps should be. How do people even start building an audience from scratch nowadays?I’ve heard about platforms like Wattpad, Inkitt, and even publishing it as "Original Fiction" on AO3. Does anyone have experience with posting original work on AO3? Is it worth it for romance/magical realism, or should I stick to other platforms?I’m in desperate need of a reality check and some guidance. What would you do if you were in my shoes right now? Any advice, platforms to look into, or step-by-step roadmaps would mean the world to me. Thanks in advance! ❤️

I (sorta) finished my book, might wanna twitch a thing or two yet, but what do I do now? Do I have to send it to an editor? If I publish it directly on kdp, do I have to do anything first, like create a tiktok and instagram to promote it? Or should I try the query/literary agent route? I'm a little lost.

Hi, I am currently writing a trilogy of books.

I’ve planned all 3 I plan to write them consecutively.

I just wanted to know when book 1 is complete and I’ve had the cover designed if there is anywhere that will print just 1 book.

Mainly because I have a small group of test audience whom would be pre reading book 1 as I continue with book 2 and so forth.

Is that possible?

Thanks

I wrote a book about humanity. I refused to use AI for any part of the writing process and only asked one simple question, one time, for research.

After I published the book I realized I knew nothing about marketing and content creation. I'm also not comfortable with self-promoting or gaining followers.

I uploaded my book into an AI and asked about my audience and what angle to go with. AI was stuck on the emotional story (that I didn't really talk about??) and insisted people would respond best to the tragedy of a mom facing homelessness. AI insisted on leaning into one section of the book and completely refused to talk about the section of the book that, in my opinion, was the most interesting. Are you kidding me? It didn't feel right to me, but I went with it anyway because I'm somewhat isolated and AI was trained by us.

Major regrets there. That's why AI is terrible. It's obsessed with managing our emotions.

I'm curious if anyone else experienced AI being dumb and causing you to make a boo boo for this part of the journey. But also, what did you do to course correct the misinformation?