Frequently asked questions

Everything you need to know before you start writing in Bookshaper.

Getting started ↓Features and workflow ↓AI and your manuscripts ↓AI credits and usage ↓Pricing and access ↓Data, privacy, and backup ↓Support ↓

Getting started

What is Bookshaper?: Bookshaper is a desktop writing application built for novels and long-form manuscripts. You write in a scene-based editor, organize your story with Outline and Beat Cards, track characters and locations, run narrative analysis, style your book with built-in typography tools, and export to EPUB or PDF—all in one app.
Do I need to be an experienced writer to use it?: Not at all. Bookshaper is designed for authors at every stage—from first-time novelists to experienced published writers. The writing tools are straightforward, and the analysis features help you see your story the way an editor would, whether you’re learning the craft or refining it.
Can I start writing directly in Bookshaper, or do I need to import something?: Both. You can create a new project and start writing from scratch, or import an existing manuscript from DOCX, EPUB, or Markdown files. Either way, your work is organized into chapters and scenes from the start.
Is Bookshaper a desktop app or a web app?: It’s a desktop application for macOS, Windows, and Linux. Your manuscripts are stored locally on your device and optionally synced to the cloud with end-to-end encryption.
What types of writing does Bookshaper support?: Bookshaper is designed for book-length manuscripts—novels, memoirs, essay collections, narrative nonfiction, and similar works. The writing, organization, styling, and export tools work equally well for fiction and nonfiction. Short-form projects like short stories and novellas fit naturally too. The analysis features are most useful for narrative-driven writing, where structure, pacing, and character arcs matter most.

Features and workflow

How is Bookshaper different from Scrivener or Google Docs?: Scrivener is great for organizing a manuscript, and Google Docs is great for writing prose—but neither gives you insight into your story’s structure, pacing, or character arcs. Bookshaper combines a focused writing environment, structural organization tools (Outline, Beat Cards, drag-and-drop), narrative analysis, character and continuity tracking, interactive dashboards, and publication-ready export—all in a single app.
What can the analysis actually tell me about my manuscript?: You get a prioritized report card that highlights what’s working and what needs attention, with specific guidance for each finding. Under the hood, it analyzes structure, character arcs, pacing, themes, emotional valence, continuity, and voice consistency. It also tracks what changed between analysis runs so you can see whether your revisions are moving things in the right direction. Every finding is something you can act on or ignore—nothing is changed without your say-so.
What is AI Chat?: AI Chat is a conversational panel you can open alongside any view in Bookshaper. It knows your manuscript’s structure, characters, and analysis results, so you can ask follow-up questions about your story, brainstorm plot ideas, get craft advice specific to your scenes, or ask how to use a feature in the app. Each conversation is saved with your project so you can pick up where you left off. AI Chat costs 1 credit per message in platform mode, or uses your own API key at the provider’s rates.
How do I outline my manuscript? What’s the difference between Outline, Beat Cards, and Synopses?: Outlining in Bookshaper is free, and there are two ways to do it under Structure. The Outline view is one editable tree — parts, chapters, scenes, and beats — that you build and rearrange top-down (great for plotters). Beat Cards is the bottom-up companion: capture loose beats and spin them up into scenes (great for pantsers). Both are on every plan. Synopses is a separate, Pro feature in the Insights section: a read-only, top-down read of your manuscript that pulls together a per-chapter summary, pacing, beats, and structural-gap notes from your analysis. In short: you build your structure in Outline or Beat Cards (every plan), and the analysis reads it back to you as Synopses (Pro).
Does the AI write or generate text for me?: Bookshaper’s analysis starts by examining your writing and showing you what’s working and what might need attention. Beyond analysis, it offers targeted editing tools: scene refinement, line edit, expansion, and dialogue harmonization. Every proposed change appears in a diff view so you can review, accept, or reject it individually. The marketing blurb generator creates back-cover copy and taglines, and Cover Studio lets you design front covers, back covers, and spines—starting from AI-generated concepts or your own artwork. Nothing is ever applied without your explicit approval.
What are the Refine and editing tools?: Refine reshapes your prose across six dimensions (voice, tone, diction, syntax, figurative language, structural style) while preserving meaning. Line edit offers sentence-level clarity and rhythm improvements. Expansion develops thin passages with beat-level annotations. Dialogue harmonization ensures consistent character voices across chapters. Every change is shown in a side-by-side diff view with full undo/redo history.
What are style profiles and drift detection?: A style profile (ESP) captures your writing’s voice signature—its characteristic patterns of diction, syntax, and tone. Once generated, drift detection compares new writing against your profile and flags when your prose diverges from your established voice. You can freeze a profile to lock it in, or refresh it as your style evolves.
What are the visual dashboards?: Interactive charts that provide the evidence behind every coaching finding. They show word count distribution, chapter balance, POV patterns, dialogue-to-narration ratios, tension plots, pacing heatmaps, and a timeline view. You can click any chart element to jump directly to that scene or chapter.
Can I customize how my book looks when I export it?: Yes. The style editor gives you control over typography, spacing, margins, running headers, ornamental decorations, hyperlink appearance, and more—across dozens of style targets. You can preview in real time for both print and ebook formats before exporting to EPUB, PDF, or DOCX.
How do I sign in to Bookshaper?: You can sign in with email and password or use any of the supported social logins: Google, Microsoft, Facebook, Apple, LinkedIn, or X. Social login uses your existing account with that provider—no extra password to remember.

AI and your manuscripts

Are my manuscripts used to train AI models?: We don't authorize AI providers to train on your manuscripts, and because analysis runs on third-party AI platforms, this relies on each provider honoring its API terms. Your creative work is yours alone.
Do I keep creative control?: Always. Bookshaper shows you analysis results and suggestions. Every creative decision—what to change, what to keep, what to ignore—is entirely yours. No changes are ever made to your manuscript without your explicit action.
Is the analysis consistent if I run it again?: Largely, yes. The analysis is anchored to your manuscript rather than to random invention, so the structural findings — pacing, gaps, POV patterns, and the like — stay stable and comparable from run to run. Because the underlying AI is generative, the exact wording of a summary or note can vary slightly between runs, but the substance you'd act on holds steady.
Do I need a strong internet connection to use the AI features?: AI analysis, AI Chat, and cloud sync need a working connection—but the rest of Bookshaper does not. Writing, editing, organizing your story, styling your book, and exporting to EPUB, PDF, or DOCX all work fully offline. For the AI features, Bookshaper checks your connection before a full analysis run: if it’s too weak to finish, it tells you up front instead of starting a run that would fail, and if the connection drops partway through, analysis stops, keeps the work it already finished, and offers to resume where it left off once you’re reconnected. You’re never charged credits for work that didn’t complete.

AI credits and usage

What are AI credits?: AI credits meter Bookshaper’s AI features. Most AI work is priced by how much text it reads. Analysing a scene is about 2 credits and a chapter about 4, both rising with their length; character analysis is 2. Dialogue analysis and style operations cost 1–3 credits per run; AI Chat costs 1 credit per message. Refine, line edit, expansion, proofread, and narration scale the same way — a small selection costs 1–2 credits, a full scene typically runs 2–6. The manuscript-wide consistency check reads your whole book, so it is priced by length: around 2 credits for a single chapter, and about 40 for a 100,000-word manuscript. Pro subscribers receive 600 credits each month, reset at the start of each billing cycle. Credits are only charged on successful completion.
How many credits does a full manuscript analysis use?: It depends on structure more than length. Every phase is priced by how much it reads: a scene is about 2 credits and a chapter about 4, both rising with their length, 2 per character, and about 1 per chapter for story-bible extraction. The manuscript-wide passes (continuity verification, plot-thread continuity, synopses, act structure, and the insights summary) grow with the book too, rather than costing a flat amount. A short work of 20 scenes across 8 chapters measures about 125 credits. A dense 100,000-word novel of 159 scenes, 47 chapters, and 57 characters measures about 760, which is more than a month’s Pro allowance, so a book that size wants a credit pack for its first pass. That is why word count is only a rough guide — two 80,000-word novels can differ by half again depending on how finely they are broken into scenes and how large the cast is. The app shows you the exact figure before a run starts. The deeper consistency check is not part of that pass — it re-reads the whole book, is priced by length, and is quoted separately when you start it. Re-analysis after revisions only re-runs what changed, so it costs far less; if you need more than your monthly 600, credit packs are available.
What happens when I run out of credits?: You can purchase credit packs to continue analyzing. Packs come in three sizes: 500 credits for $12.99, 750 credits for $16.99, and 1,000 credits for $19.99. Pack credits are added to your balance immediately and don’t expire at the end of your billing cycle.
Can I use my own API key instead of credits?: Yes. Bookshaper supports Bring Your Own Key (BYOK) mode for Anthropic (Claude), OpenAI (GPT), Google (Gemini), Mistral, Groq, OpenRouter, and Together.ai. OpenRouter and Together.ai also let you choose from hundreds of open-source and frontier models — including Llama, DeepSeek, Qwen, and Mixtral — with a single API key. In BYOK mode, analysis requests go directly to the provider using your API key, and you pay the provider at their rates. No Bookshaper credits are used. BYOK also covers cover art: standard cover generation runs on your own OpenAI (GPT Image) or bfl.ai (FLUX) key, and Pro AI covers — with your title and author rendered right into the artwork — run on your own Ideogram key. You can switch between platform and BYOK mode at any time in Settings.
Do trial users get AI credits?: Yes. The free trial includes 75 AI credits — enough to analyze a few chapters and experience the narrative coaching workflow before subscribing.
Am I charged credits if an analysis fails?: No. Credits are only consumed when an analysis completes successfully. If something goes wrong — a timeout, a network issue, or an unexpected response — no credits are deducted.

Pricing and access

How much does Bookshaper cost?: Bookshaper Basic starts at $9.99/month ($7.99/mo billed annually) and Bookshaper Pro is $14.99/month ($11.99/mo billed annually). Pro includes 600 AI credits per month for narrative analysis. Additional credit packs are available starting at $12.99. Download Bookshaper to start your free trial.
Is there a free trial?: Yes. The free trial includes full access to all features plus 75 AI credits for narrative analysis. Download the app to start your free trial.
Can I cancel anytime?: Yes. You can cancel your subscription at any time, and your access continues through the end of your billing cycle.
What payment methods do you accept?: Credit and debit cards via Stripe, plus Apple Pay and Google Pay where supported.

Data, privacy, and backup

Where is my manuscript stored?: Locally on your device as plain Markdown and JSON files. When cloud sync is enabled, an encrypted copy is also stored in the cloud. That synced copy is encrypted on your device before upload using AES-256 encryption, so the server stores only the encrypted archive and never sees its plaintext.
What is cloud sync?: Cloud sync automatically backs up your project to the cloud after each save. Your manuscript is encrypted on your device before it leaves—the server stores only the encrypted archive and has no access to plaintext content. If your computer is lost, damaged, or replaced, sign in on a new device and your projects are waiting for you. Cloud sync is available on all subscription tiers and can be toggled on or off per project in Project Settings.
How do I restore my project if my computer is lost or damaged?: You have two recovery options. From the cloud: open Bookshaper on any device, sign in, and go to File > Cloud Projects to download your synced projects. From a local backup: use File > Restore from Archive to open a ZIP backup from your backup folder. Both methods restore the full project including chapters, characters, locations, notebook entries, and settings.
Does Bookshaper automatically back up my work?: Yes, in two ways. Auto-backup creates timestamped ZIP archives of your project every 30 minutes to a local folder (configurable in Project Settings). Cloud sync uploads an encrypted copy after each save. Both are enabled by default so your work is protected from the moment you start writing.
Does Bookshaper share my data with third parties?: Manuscript content is never shared with third parties. Cloud-synced archives are encrypted on your device before upload—not even Bookshaper’s servers can read them. Billing is handled by Stripe. Anonymized usage telemetry may be collected to improve the product, subject to your consent.
Can I delete my data?: Yes. Your manuscripts live on your device, so you control them directly. Cloud-synced archives can be deleted from File > Cloud Projects or by disabling cloud sync. Deleting your Bookshaper account removes your account data and any cloud archives from our servers. Your local manuscript files are unaffected.

Support

How do I get help?: Email support@bookshaper.com or use the support link inside the application. We aim to respond within 24–48 hours for standard issues and faster for account or access problems.
Where can I report a bug?: The quickest way is from inside the app: open Help → Send Feedback… to file a report without leaving Bookshaper. The form automatically attaches your operating system and app version and accepts up to 50,000 characters, so you can paste logs or detailed steps. You can also email support@bookshaper.com with a description of what happened and what you expected—including your operating system and app version helps us track it down faster.

Still have questions?

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