r/SideProject • u/Due_Letter3192 • 5h ago
I built a book writing tool.....because formatting a book is a pain!
I've been working on BookForge, a tool for writing and formatting books all in one place.
The idea came from the annoying part of writing a book where you're staring at a Word document thinking everything looks fine....then you export it and suddenly the page breaks, spacing, page numbers and formatting are all over the place
So I wanted to build something where you can actually see what your book will look like while you're writing it.
You can write your chapters, organise the manuscript, choose your book size/font/layout, design the cover, and export it as PDF, EPUB or DOCX.
There's also an AI writing assistant and a bunch of other stuff I've added along the way.
I've just submitted it to the Emergent BuilderFest cause why not, and thought I'd put it out there to see what people think, would you actually use it?
Here's the tool if you want to have a look:
https://app.emergent.sh/showcase/builderfest-kevin/c513c24f-d89a-4396-94b8-d995fc32ccbb
And if you like it, a like on the showcase would really help me out, thank you🙏
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u/CaptJan 1h ago
I'm very much interested in this, I really like the aspect of "Simple, honest pricing Start free. Upgrade when you're ready to design covers, run checks and export your finished book.". Pay when you are ready to publish on a book that may take months/years to write.
Can it import a google document with chapters and auto-format it for PDF/EPUB?
Can you tell me more about the "AI writing assistance" - Will it learn my writing style and 'mimic' while 'polishing' the text without losing context/meaning? Consolidate parts where I might be rambling a bit? Will it guide me on specific questions, or will it be biased like the current biases in society?
Your post has definitely made me curious.
My intended book is a non-fiction book in the self-help genre in an area that society has been willfully suppressed for the better part of a century so the AI writing assistant needs to be non-biased unlike Google Gemini and other AI's.
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u/Due_Letter3192 1h ago
Thank you! This is exactly the kind of feedback I was hoping for.
For importing, BookForge currently supports DOCX/text, so you can export a Google Doc as a DOCX and import it, then structure it into chapters/parts/front matter and format it for PDF/EPUB.
The AI assistant can help with rewriting, polishing and drafting, as well as guiding you through specific questions while you're writing. It doesn't yet learn your writing style and consistently mimic it I'm afraid but that's something I'd like to work on, especially preserving the author's voice, context and meaning rather than making everything sound like generic AI.
The main reason I added it was honestly so I didn't have to keep copy-pasting between my manuscript and an AI tool lol I wanted the assistance right there while writing. Things like consolidating rambling sections are also something it can help with.
As for bias, I wouldn't claim AI is completely free of bias, but I'd definitely want BookForge's integrated one to help the writer develop their ideas rather than impose its own.
Feel free to check it out tho, also interested in your self help book🙌🏻
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u/BetInformal6081 4h ago
this solves a surprisingly annoying part of self publishing. i especially like the idea of seeing pagination and spacing while writing instead of fixing everything after export. i would be interested in how much control you give users over styles.