Frequently asked questions

Yes. Listing your books, creating an author profile, and everything in the guides is completely free, with no hidden charges and no forced payments. Every author account comes with 5 free listings. The optional paid extras are extra listing slots past those 5, the Upcoming Release subscription for a book that isn't finished yet, message-token packs, and ARC requests beyond your free ones. For readers, everything is free apart from optional message-token packs. None of the extras is ever required. Publishing a short story is free too, for you and for everyone who reads it.

No. Never. We don't sell your book and we don't sit between you and your reader. Every book page links straight to wherever you sell it, whether that's Amazon, IngramSpark or your own website. You keep 100% of what you earn.

Readers who want to discover books outside the bestseller lists, with free short stories, ARC requests from indie authors and a free reader account. It's also for independent and self-published authors who want to be found, whether you're drafting your first manuscript or already have books on sale.

No. We're a discovery platform, not a publisher. You publish your book wherever you choose, and we help readers find it. Our publishing guide compares the main platforms if you're deciding where to go.

The core of IndieFiction (listing books, author profiles, browsing and the guides) is built to stay free, and optional paid features like the Upcoming Release subscription are what fund it: hosting, email, the domain, security. They stay exactly that, optional and clearly marked.

Abhishek Aggarwal, an independent author based in Melbourne, Australia. IndieFiction went live in August 2026 as a free home for indie books, and it's still small and hands-on: every book is approved by a person, not a machine. You can reach us at hello@indiefiction.com, and the founder section of our About page has Abhishek's own address.

Create a free account, then head to submit your book. You'll add the title, a short description, your purchase link, a cover, and choose your own genre. Once approved, your book gets its own page and appears on its genre shelf. An account comes with 5 free listings, for individual indie authors; if you've published more than that, extra slots come in bundles of 5 from $3 USD a month (see “Can I list more than 5 books?” below). Each book needs its own listing, so a collection or box set can't be listed as one book. We don't list planners or journals. The free plan isn't for presses, publications, or other organisations or businesses. If that's you, the Business plan is yours, and you can always write to us if you're not sure which fits.

Yes, on the Business plan: $9.99 USD a month plus tax, with the first 15 days free on your first subscription. It covers up to 50 listings, a publisher page with your logo and the authors you publish, a published-by link on every book page you list, and short stories. Each listing names its author, and you can add a short “About the author” and their website or social links, shown on that book's page. An optional add-on puts up to 3 works in progress in Upcoming for $4.99 USD a month. The honest part, said here too: business listings are visible while the plan is active. If it lapses they are hidden, not deleted, and everything returns when it restarts. You create a business account to begin; it's a separate account type from an author account, and it doesn't switch between the two.

Two ways, both automatic. We email you the decision (approved, or not this time with the reason), and your account page keeps a record of it under “What's happened”, so if the email ever goes missing the answer is still waiting where your books are. When you're signed in, the bell in the header shows how many are new and opens the full list. Notifications stay for six months, and you can dismiss any of them whenever you like.

With a reader account, yes: every author who has an account and has left their inbox open has a Message button on their page, and their books carry one too. They get a notification and can reply from their own account. A conversation is private to the two of you. Either of you can block the other, which closes it both ways, and either of you can report a message to us. Authors can switch messages off from their account page. Authors can also write to a reader from the reader's public page, and readers can switch that off the same way. For the first week of a new account, its messages are checked by us before they are delivered, until the other person has replied. That keeps out scammers who pose as agents and publishers.

So that a message means something. Every account gets 5 free tokens on the 1st of each month, and opening a new conversation uses one. Replying in a conversation that already exists is always free, in both directions. Unused free tokens do not carry over, and a token is not returned if a message is held, blocked or never answered.

Yes: $5 USD for 50 tokens, plus tax where it applies, from your messages page. Checkout is handled by Stripe and we never see your card. Paid tokens never expire and carry forward for as long as your account exists; they are not refundable once bought, and they are forfeited if you delete your account. A conversation opened with a paid token is also announced to the other person by email, with a link to reply; the message itself is only ever shown inside their account.

Yes. A free reader account gives you a private shelf: press Save to TBR on any book page, reading list pick or unwrapped Blind Date parcel and it goes on your TBR, then mark it finished when you have read it. You can also follow authors and other readers, and you hear on your account page first when one of them lists a new book, publishes a short story, or posts a review or note. When an author you follow publishes a story or lists a book, we email you too; you can switch that off in your account settings. Nobody sees your shelf unless you choose to show part of it on your page. A reader you follow sees you on their own followers list, and nobody else sees who you follow. A reader account cannot list books, so if you write as well, create an author account instead: it can save and follow too, and a switch on its account page opens the whole reader side, with your books and author page untouched. Readers can also write reviews (a short blog post about a book, no star ratings) and notes, which appear on their public page at indiefiction.com/@handle (live as soon as they choose a handle) and in the site-wide feed at indiefiction.com/reviews. That page works as a link in bio too: up to six link buttons (shown once you have published a review or a note), the one book you choose as currently reading, a pinned post, and a QR code to share it. You can give it a colour theme and a banner photo, pick up to six favourite books, and switch on your Finished or Want to read shelf; both shelves stay private until you do. Only you see how many people visit your page and which links they tap, as daily totals: never who.

Yes. Your author account has a reader side: use the Author | Reader switch on your account page. There you get a shelf for the books you want to read, and you can follow other authors and readers and say hello with a message. You also get a reader page at indiefiction.com/@handle, where you can post reviews of other authors' books and short notes. Your books and author page stay exactly as they are, and you can switch back whenever you like.

Yes. Books are submitted through an author account so your book is tied to a real person, which means you can edit or remove it later, and readers can find everything else you've written. Creating the account is free and takes about a minute.

No, that part is entirely optional. You can submit a book without ever writing a bio. But a profile gives you a public author page readers can browse and recommend, and your name becomes a link on every one of your books rather than plain text. Readers can also recommend you from that page; the count is public, and your account shows it too. You can add a profile any time from your account.

Any genre, fiction and non-fiction both. Despite the name, IndieFiction covers fantasy, romance, thrillers, poetry, memoir, self-help, business and more. The book needs to be genuinely self- or independently published and available to buy or to pre-order somewhere; you tell us which when you submit, and a pre-order says so on its page. Give a pre-order its release date and we switch it to available for you on the day. Books that are still being written are declined: the Upcoming Release plan is built for exactly those.

Yes. Whoever lists the book adds the other writer's name in the Co-author box, when submitting or later from the edit page. It shows beside the lister's name on the book's page and in search, and you can add their website or social links too if you like. The book stays on the lister's account and counts toward their listings, so only one of you should list it. Please add someone only if they agree to be named.

Pick every format you sell: ebook, paperback, hardcover and audiobook, at least one. Each has its own optional ISBN box, and we check that a number is a real ISBN before saving it, so a typo can't slip through. You don't need an ISBN to list. If your book is on Kindle Unlimited, answer Yes to that question and your book's page tells readers they can read it there. Change any of it whenever you like from your book's edit page.

JPG, PNG, WebP or GIF, up to 4 MB, and portrait covers look best. Big images are made smaller in your browser before they upload, so most covers go through without any trouble. If a file is still too big after that (GIFs can't be shrunk), the form tells you before anything is sent. You can swap the cover any time from your book's edit page.

Your book's address is set when it's first approved, and it stays put even if you change the title, so links you've already shared keep working. If it really needs to change, say for a new title or a spelling fix, write to us and we'll move it. The old address then forwards to the new one, so nothing breaks.

Short stories must be written by a person. We don't accept AI-written stories, and AI agents, bots and other automated tools may not create accounts, post or submit anything here. We remove them when we find them. Spelling and grammar checkers are fine. For books, we neither require nor forbid AI tools. We don't run AI detectors or put labels on anything, because detection is unreliable and a false accusation harms a real writer. The full position, including how we use AI ourselves, is at AI on IndieFiction.

A little matchmaking game at Blind Date with a Book. You tell us what you're in the mood for (a few taps, no account needed) and we hand you three books wrapped in paper: no covers, no titles, just a line about why each one turned up. Unwrap the one that whispers to you. The matching happens in your browser and your answers are never saved to an account or profile; if you've accepted analytics cookies we count plays and unwraps the same way we count page views, and that's all.

Three levels of book trivia in the book quiz, from questions anyone who reads will know up to proper bookworm territory. Ten questions a level, a clock on each, four hints if you need them, and six out of ten opens the next level. Pass Level 2 or 3 and we'll email you a certificate, with your name on it if you like. The quiz runs in your browser with no account needed; your address is used only to send the certificate, unless you also choose to join the reader newsletter. We count how each question performs (right, wrong, timed out) with nothing attached that could identify you, and that is how we retire bad questions.

Tags are how we recommend your book to readers: the mood, the tropes, the setting, the themes a genre alone can't express. You pick at least one when you submit a book, and can change them any time from your account. Choose from our list, and add a few of your own if ours don't cover it. Tags from our list appear as quiet “what to expect” pills on your book's page and give it a shelf under Moods and tropes; they also work behind the scenes, matching your book to what a reader tells us they're in the mood for, in site search and in Blind Date with a Book. Tags you write yourself stay off the page and feed search only.

Short, hand-picked lists on our reading lists page: a first handful of books for each genre and the moods readers ask for most, five at a time, plus a list of every free short story. They're starting points, not rankings; nobody pays to be on one and we rotate the picks as new books arrive, so more authors get a turn. A book qualifies when its author has an IndieFiction account, is subscribed to our author emails, and has written a real description, because the description is where each list's one-line pitch comes from. The best way to be considered is the ordinary one: keep your account, stay on the list, and give your book a description worth quoting.

Yes, both, from your account. Change the title, description, genre, cover, formats or buy link and the update goes live straight away; there's no second wait for approval. Your author name follows your profile: change it there and the books listed under your old name change with it. Take a book down and it comes off the public site immediately. Everything you submit stays under your control.

No. Buy links, profile links, and co-author or author links must go straight to the store or site, with no affiliate or referral code and no commission-earning shortener such as amzn.to. This is the same for authors and Business accounts. If you paste a store link that carries a code, like Amazon's tag=, we remove the code and keep the plain link; a link that only works through an affiliate redirect is refused, and the form asks for the store link instead. See the terms.

That'll be one of the listings migrated from our old site, which pre-dates author accounts. Open the book's page and use “Claim this listing”. Once we've verified it, the book links to your account and you can edit its details like any other.

Yes. The free plan covers 5 published books, and past that, extra slots come in bundles of 5 for $3 USD a month or $30 USD a year, plus tax where it applies, up to 15 books in all. You add a bundle from your account page in a minute; checkout is hosted by Stripe and we never see your card. If a bundle ever lapses, your books all stay up for 30 days, and after that your newest books beyond your remaining slots are hidden, never deleted: resume the bundle and they come back instantly. If you're listing for a press or other organisation, the Business plan is the right fit instead.

It's the plan made for the book you're still writing. For $4.99 USD a month plus tax where it applies (about the price of a coffee), your unfinished book gets its own page in Upcoming, up to 3 sample chapters readers can read free, and a reader list: real email addresses from people who want to know the moment it's published. It covers one work in progress at a time: finish it and the same plan points at your next one. The full details are on the pricing page.

Yes, both are optional and both live on your upcoming book's edit page. For a trailer, paste a YouTube or Vimeo link. It needs to be Public or Unlisted with embedding allowed, and we check that when you save. On your book's page the cover becomes the poster: readers press play and the page dims like a cinema, with your sample chapters and the reader list one tap away when it ends. Nothing loads from YouTube or Vimeo until someone presses play. For a co-author, add their name, and their website or social links if you like. Please add someone only if they agree to be named.

Yes. On your upcoming book's edit page, the optional Part of a series section takes the series name, this book's number, and up to six earlier books you have listed on IndieFiction, in reading order. They show on your upcoming page as covers linking to their IndieFiction pages, and each of those book pages gets a Coming next line pointing back. Please keep series links out of the chapters themselves: chapters stay just the story.

Readers leave their email on your book's page, and they're told plainly that it goes to you. You watch the count grow from your dashboard and download the addresses whenever you like. The list is yours to keep, with one condition: you use it only to announce this book, never for anything else, and every email you send includes a way to opt out.

Your plan runs to the end of the month you've paid for. After that your book and its chapters are hidden, not deleted, and you get 30 days to download your reader list before our copy is removed. Resubscribe within those 30 days and everything comes back exactly as you left it. After that, your book and chapters still come back, but the reader list starts again from empty.

Checkout happens on Stripe's own payment page, the same processor behind millions of online businesses. Your card details go to Stripe directly and never touch IndieFiction's servers. Card changes, invoices and receipts live in Stripe's billing portal, linked from your account, and cancelling takes two clicks on your own dashboard.

Two things worth knowing before you pay. Stripe sells every plan and pack here as the merchant of record, which means it works out and collects whatever tax your country charges on digital services and adds it on top. So the $4.99 USD for the Upcoming Release plan, like every price here, is the price before tax, and the total at checkout depends on where you live. There is no tax to add in some countries, and the checkout always shows the full amount before you confirm. And when the payment lands, your statement will read LINK.COM* INDIEFICTION, not IndieFiction, because Link is the part of Stripe that handles the sale. It is us, and it is the right charge.

You won't be left out of pocket. If two subscriptions ever end up on one account, we cancel the newer one and refund it in full, tax included, without you asking, and we email you to say so. It happens automatically, usually within the hour. If a refund doesn't reach you, tell us and we'll chase it.

The happy ending: announce the release to your reader list, delete the work in progress, and submit the finished book free like any other book here. Then point the same plan at your next work in progress from your account page.

A place to publish a finished piece of short fiction and have it read here, free, by anyone. It has nothing to do with listing a book or with the Upcoming Release plan. It is its own thing, and it is free. Readers get something to read; you get a page that ends with who you are and everything else you have written. Browse them at short stories.

Between 1,500 and 15,000 words. We check when you publish, so anything outside that cannot go live, but you can save a draft at any length and come back to it.

For a sense of scale, that is roughly an 8-minute read at the shorter end and 75 minutes at the longer. These are proper short stories. The minimum is there because a very short fragment does not give a reader enough to arrive for; the maximum because this is short fiction, not somewhere to serialise a novel.

Yes. Anyone can leave a comment on a story page under whatever name they type, no account needed. Comments appear straight away, spam is filtered, and we remove anything that breaks the community guidelines. If a comment on your story is abusive, email hello@indiefiction.com and we will deal with it.

As the author, you can reply under any comment from your story's page in your account. Your reply shows beneath the comment, marked Author, and you can delete it and write a new one whenever you like.

Both. On your story's page in your account, under Details:

Linked book. Say the story is a prequel, a sequel, set in the same world, or a companion to one of your books listed here. Readers see the link under your title and your book's cover the moment they finish, and the book's page points back to the story.

Series. Give each part the same series name and its own number. Readers see “Part 2 of…” at the top and a link to the next part at the end. Each part is still its own story, so each one needs to be between 1,500 and 15,000 words.

You can also add a blurb: two or three sentences shown above your story and in search results.

From November 2026, each month has a writing prompt: a theme with one line of guidance, shown on the short stories page. Write a story for it and, on your story's page in your account, tick the box saying it was written for that month's prompt, under Details. Once the story is published and approved, it is listed on that prompt's page, and every past prompt stays up with its stories at monthly prompts. It is not a contest: there is no judging and no prize. The story has to be published during the prompt's month (a few days' grace after) to count, and the usual word limits and review apply.

One short story leads the short stories page each week, with a badge on the story itself. It is picked automatically every Monday: the newest approved story that has not been featured yet, so every story gets its turn, and once all have, the one featured longest ago goes again. Now and then we choose one by hand. Stories marked as explicit are not featured. The author gets a notification on their account page when it is theirs.

Yes, on the device you were reading on. Come back to a story you were partway through and you will see Continue where you left off above the text. Your place is kept in your own browser and never sent to us, so you need no account, and it will not follow you to another device. It is forgotten once you finish the story, after 90 days, or when you clear your browser data.

The same goes for Reading settings at the top of every story: a larger or smaller text size, a sepia or night page, and a serif or sans font. Your choice is remembered in this browser for every story you open.

Yes, completely. You keep the copyright. What you give us is permission to publish it here for people to read free, and to quote a short extract when we promote it (in the newsletter or on our social accounts), always credited to you and always linking back to your story.

That is the whole of it. We cannot sell your story, license it to anyone else, put it in a paid product, or publish it in full anywhere but here. Delete the story and the permission ends. The terms spell it out.

Yes. Once a story is live, your stories page shows its view count and the average time readers spend on it, and the story's own page shows the view count to everyone. Likes sit beside both.

The numbers are aggregate only: you see how the story is doing, never who read it. Counting starts the day the story goes live, and a view means a visit: the same reader coming back tomorrow counts again.

You also see how far readers get: what share of the last 90 days' readers read to the end, and how many reached a quarter, halfway and three quarters, so you can see where a story loses people. That count started on 6 October 2026, and the percentage appears once five readers are counted.

From our side, yes. We do not ask for exclusivity and we are happy for your story to live in several places.

The catch is on your side. Some platforms and publishers do ask for exclusivity, and checking that you are free to publish here is your responsibility, because we have no way of knowing what you have agreed with someone else. Worth a look at the terms you signed before you paste it in.

No. Anyone with an account can publish one. If you have books here they appear at the end of your story, and if you don't, your other stories go there instead. Writers who have never published a novel are exactly who this is for.

Because we look at every new story before it reaches search engines. Yours is live and shareable the moment you publish (the link works and you can send it to anyone), but it stays out of Google, out of site search and off our home page until we have reviewed it.

It is a quick check, not a critique, and we will not ask you to change your writing. Once it is done your story goes into search on its own.

Newly approved books appear at the front of the “New on the shelves” tab automatically, so every new listing gets time on the home page. We also occasionally hand-pick a featured selection. Beyond that, your book lives permanently on its genre shelf and its own page.

The Shout-Out is our weekly email: four indie books in every issue, sent free to everyone on our newsletter and kept on the site afterwards. Nobody pays to be in it and it isn't a ranking. Books wait in a queue, oldest listing first, one book per author, and each author is featured once, so everyone gets a turn. Your book joins the queue by itself once it's approved, has a cover and is out now (a pre-order waits until it's released), as long as you're subscribed to our emails, because that's how you'll see the issue your book is in. When yours is picked, your account page tells you too.

From your account, ask for ARC readers for any book you have listed here, published or on pre-order. Add your sign-up link (a Google Form, or a BookFunnel, StoryOrigin, Prolific Works or BookSirens link), a short note to readers, the formats you offer, and whether you used AI for the cover or the text. You also tick to accept our ARC terms: honest reviews only, so never ask for a positive review or a minimum star rating. Once we approve it, it sits on the ARC page for 30 days and goes in our Friday email to ARC readers. Each author account has two free requests in total (a Business account has five), and after that a request is $10 USD, plus tax where it applies; if we can't approve one, you get it back. Readers sign up through your form, so their details go to you, and you send the copies. The ARC readers page for authors has the full picture, and our sign-up form guide helps if you don't have a form yet.

No. It's a plain statement for readers (none, the cover, the text, or both), shown on your request. We don't check it, and it doesn't change whether your request is approved or where it appears. Some readers care about AI and some don't, so it lets them choose. Not sure, say with a premade cover? Go with your gut: if you think the cover was made with AI, say so. It's between you and your readers. Short stories are the exception: they must be written by a person.

Yes. Once a book is approved, your account page has a Share your listing panel with your book's link, a “Listed on IndieFiction” badge to download, and the code for it if your website needs that. Using it is entirely up to you.

Yes. For every book you have listed here, the Share your listing panel on your account page has ready-made posts: a picture for your feed, a taller one for stories, a caption and the link. When something happens to your book (its ARC request goes live, it's picked for a reading list, it's in the Shout-Out or it's featured), there's a post made for that moment, and the email or notification takes you straight to it. The pictures show your cover and what happened; they never describe your book for you.

We can't promise sales; anyone who does is selling you something. What we can do is make your book findable: a page search engines can index, a genre shelf readers browse, and a direct link to your retailer. We also encourage everyone here to buy at least one indie book a month.

847 and counting. You can browse the whole library or narrow it down by genre.

Yes, on both the signup and login pages. Google confirms who you are and passes us your name and email address, and nothing else: not your password, not your contacts, and we never post anything to your account. There is no password on a Google account here, and nothing on the site asks you for one.

You get your existing account, not a second empty one. Because Google has verified that the address is yours, we connect the two, so your books, profile and everything else are exactly where you left them and either way of signing in works from then on.

From your account page, yourself, at any time. We show you exactly what will be removed first and ask you to type DELETE to confirm, because it cannot be undone. Your profile and your answers go; questions you asked stay up as Anonymous; books you listed remain credited to you but no longer editable. Your short stories, works in progress and their reader lists, reviews, notes, messages, shelf and follows are deleted, unused paid tokens and ARC credits are lost, and a Business account's listings are deleted with it. If you have a subscription it is cancelled first, so you are never billed after leaving. Prefer a person to do it? Email us and we will.

No. The newsletter is optional: you can untick it when you sign up, or turn it off any time from your account. We send the weekly Shout-Out (four indie books), new releases, publishing tips and the occasional author story, and every email has a one-click unsubscribe.

An ARC (advance review copy) is a copy of a book an author shares with readers, hoping for an honest review. Most come before release, and some are for books that are already out. Each author chooses their own ARC readers, so signing up doesn't guarantee a copy. Say yes to “Become an ARC reader” at the top of your account page and other authors can ask you to read theirs. It's entirely separate from the newsletter: turning one off leaves the other alone, and you can switch either off in Settings on your account page. Switch it off and you come straight back off the list. No account? The readers page has a one-box signup. Requests come in one email on Fridays, only in weeks when there are some, and every one has a link to leave the ARC list.

The ARC page lists indie authors looking for review readers right now. Join takes you to that author's own sign-up form, so what you enter goes to them, not to us; we only count that someone clicked. The author chooses who gets a copy. You never pay for an ARC, and you're never obliged to review it. Each request shows whether the author says they used AI for the cover or the text: that is their statement, not something we have checked.

We never sell it. We collect what's needed to run your account and reply to you, and that's all. We also use Google Analytics to see which pages and books people find, but only if you accept it in the cookie banner. Decline and the script is never loaded, and the site behaves identically. There are still no advertising pixels and no cross-site tracking. Change your mind whenever you like with “Cookie settings” at the bottom of any page. The full detail is in our privacy policy.

Get in touch. There's one short form and it reaches us directly. We reply as quickly as we can.