What is going on with BookStack?

Changes are happening and BookStack is getting its own website? But why?

A screenshot of the new website.

Hi everyone, it’s me. Hazel— the person who runs BookStack. From burnout to a birthday break (to not actually using the break for its intended purpose), it’s been a weird time for this blog. Weird enough that some of you must be wondering: What’s going on with BookStack. Or, maybe it hasn’t crossed your mind. Either way I’m going to talk about it, so let’s get into the meat.

The BookStack Catalog is getting its own website.

You saw it in the thumbnail for this post, and you might’ve saw it in a tease on my Substack notes. But the truth is out, BookStack is getting its own website.

To be clear, I’d gotten so hyper-focused on this project. It started on a whim, after exploring Notion, which was recommended by

Robin Taylor (he/him)

. I thought it was intriguing, but instead felt even more compelled to build a website.

Gravitating to Squarespace, I began experimenting with what it had to offer. I’m not a web designer by any means, but Squarespace is surprisingly intuitive— despite some hassles here and there.

Below you can look at some of my progress on the website, which includes a look into how things are being organized. But also, a glimpse into the new style for Author Profiles. This one featuring

Ariadne Pautina

.

So what’s happening with this Substack then?

Once the website is up and published, new book listings and author profiles will be moved over there. You’ll also be able to subscribe to the website’s newsletter to get updated when new book listings are added.

For the time being, posts like Author Spotlights, Book Reviews, Indie Release Radars, etc… will continue to be posted here on Substack. There is no plan to move these over any time soon.

The Writer’s Roll podcast will continue to be posted over here, whenever I actually get around to recording the next episode.

Aside from that, design changes will be happening to this Substack in order to reflect the new Website’s theme.

So the catalog is moving to a new site, is there anything else changing?

Yes. To accommodate the cost of moving to a dedicated website, a few things are happening. Let’s take a look:

• Book Listing Fees: To those who don’t know, to get listed in the Catalog, you typically have to pay a small fee to get your books on there. However those are going away in favor of…

• Affiliate Links: We’re going to be testing out using Affiliate links to help generate revenue. Since a lot of our content contains links to where you can buy books, I feel like this just makes sense. More details on this will be shared when I have them.

• Giveaways: The state of these have been kind of uncertain, but we’re going to try and do more of them. I think the new website will be a great place for them, too.

• Merch: I’m currently in talks with

  Rachel Tribble
  to create merch you can buy, which will directly support our mission of growing BookStack (and bringing awareness to more indie authors.) Not much to share yet, but I’ll share updates as we continue to work on this.

But uh, when will the website be up?

There’s no set date yet, as the website is still pretty early on. However, I’m hoping for sooner than later. I’ll have to start paying for the website at the end of this month, so I’m eyeing mid-to-late September to get it all up.

That’s a pretty fast timeline, but it’s all pretty loose. If I need more time I’ll continue working on it. Again, I’ll share more details as we get closer. I want this to come out as perfect as it can be, and I’m excited to share it all with you.

BookStack is always evolving and growing, or doing its best to. And you’re all what make’s that possible. So you can better believe I’ll never stop striving to make it great. Though I do want to reassure the posting reductions are still in place for current content.

Anyway, that is it for this update post. And I’ll see you all in the next one. If you’re excited about the website, please let me know. I’m really proud of it!