How it works
From your words to a real book, one step at a time.
Including what we do, what you decide, and what happens if something comes back wrong. Nothing here is a surprise later.
The steps, in order
Tell us what you have
Start with a finished story, a rough draft, or just an idea. A finished story is laid out as you wrote it and we do not change a word without your say so. A rough draft gets one light edit pass. An idea gets a first draft written from it, and the more you tell us at this point, the more of the book comes from you.
Say who is in it
Add up to four characters and describe how they should look. You can upload a photo if you want the drawings closer to life, though you do not have to, and any photo you upload is deleted once the book is finished.
Choose how it looks and sounds
Pick the illustration style your book is drawn in, and the reading age you are writing for. The age changes the vocabulary, the sentence length and how much happens on each page.
Read it back and change it
Your story is laid out across twelve illustrated spreads, and you can edit any line of it. The editor will point out places that trip when read aloud, and you can ask it about a specific line, but nothing changes unless you accept it.
See it start to look like a book, free
Before you pay anything, we draw your cover and your opening pages in the style you chose, so you can see your characters on the page while it still costs nothing.
Pay once, and we illustrate the rest
When the words are where you want them, you choose an edition and we illustrate every remaining page, keeping your characters consistent throughout. This is what the payment is for, which is why the digital edition costs something too: US$11.99 digital, US$37.99 softcover, US$44.99 hardcover.
Change the pictures you do not like
Go through the finished book page by page. Every book comes with an allowance for changes, which stretches to roughly a dozen small tweaks to a picture or around six pages redrawn from scratch. You can still fix any word at this point too.
See the real thing, then approve it
The last step shows the finished book exactly as it will print, laid out as the spreads it binds into. Nothing goes to the printer until you approve it from that page. Printed books are 21 × 28 cm (8 × 11″) portrait, 28 pages.
What we use AI for, and what we do not
Every illustration in the book is AI-generated. That is what makes a one-off illustrated picture book cost what it does instead of the thousands a commission costs, and it is the reason this is possible at all.
On the writing, it depends on what you bring. Paste in a finished story and nothing is rewritten. Bring a rough draft and it gets one tidying pass. Bring an idea and a first draft is written for you to cut and change. The story is yours in all three cases, and so is the last word on every line.
What does not happen: we never publish, sell or share your book, and we do not use your content to train our own models. The FAQ has the detail on which outside services see what.
If something is not right
- What if I do not like the illustrations?
- Change them, before anything is printed. A tweak changes one detail and leaves the rest of the picture alone. A redraw takes the page back to your words and draws it again. Both come out of the same allowance.
- What if I change my mind halfway through writing?
- Nothing happens. Your draft saves and waits, there is no deadline, and you have not paid anything at that point.
- What if the book that arrives is damaged?
- Email hello@fableandkin.org within 14 days with a photo and we will reprint or refund it. The full wording is in our terms.
The first step is free
Writing the story, editing it and seeing your cover drawn all cost nothing, so you can find out whether you enjoy this before deciding anything.
See the full breakdown on the pricing page.