Walkthrough 1 of 10

Start your first novel

Take a novel from a one-line idea to a full plan and an AI-written first chapter, using the Free plan’s sign-up credits and your free first outline.

10 minBeginner9 steps
In this guide

This guide takes a new novel from an idea to its first chapter. Everything here works on the Free plan: your first full outline is free, and the first chapter is paid from the 100 credits you receive when you sign up.

Before you start

  • An account with a confirmed email address. Create one if you haven’t yet — the confirmation link arrives by email and works for 24 hours.
  • An idea. A sentence about a person and a problem is enough to begin.

Step 1: Create the book

In My books, choose Create new book, then the Fiction card. The book is created right away and appears in your library as an untitled draft until it has a title.

Shortcut: type your idea into What would you like to write? at the top of the library, make sure Fiction is selected and press Continue. That takes you straight to the Concept step with your idea filled in.

Step 2: Start from scratch

The Start step asks “Do you already have a draft?” Choose Start from scratch. If you do have a manuscript, the Word import guide on the walkthroughs page covers that path instead.

Step 3: Describe your idea in Concept

Write the book in your own words: who it’s about, what they want, what stands in the way, and the feeling you want readers to have. A few sentences works; more detail gives better results.

  • Generate an idea writes a concept for you if the box is empty.
  • Edit with AI offers a sharper version beside yours. Choose Use this version or Keep mine — your text is never replaced without your say.
  • Record your idea turns a short voice note into text.

Press Next. Basics is filled in from your concept, free.

Step 4: Check the Basics

Read the description, then set the Title, the Author name (a pen name is fine) and the Language the book is written in. Pick up to four Main genres and any Subgenres that fit.

Set the length with Number of chapters and Target words per chapter. Twenty-four chapters of 2,500 words gives a novel of about 60,000 words. Everything saves as you type, so you can come back and change it later. Press Next step.

Step 5: Set the voice in Details & style

Press Suggest with AI for proposals on audience, point of view, tense, tone, writing style and story elements. Apply adds them to your choices without removing anything you picked.

For prose that sounds like you, paste six to ten paragraphs of your own writing into Your writing sample (up to 20,000 characters; it’s never published). Leave Mature content off unless the book needs explicit material. Press Next step.

Step 6: Generate your cast

In Characters, set how many to create — four is a good start — and press Generate with AI. It’s free. Open each character to check the name, role, background, motivation and conflicts. How they speak matters most for dialogue. To change someone, type an instruction such as “make her older and more cynical” and choose Edit with AI. Press Next step.

Step 7: Generate the outline

In Outline, check the number of Chapters and pick a Plot structure, or leave Let AI choose what fits. The line next to the buttons should read “Free — Your first outline is free”. Press Generate outline. You can leave the page while it works.

When it’s ready, open a few chapter cards. Adjust What happens, the Beats (one per line) and the Ending hook until the plan feels right — chapters are written from these cards. Then press Start writing.

Step 8: Write chapter 1

In Write chapters, the first empty chapter is selected. Choose a model: Swift (15 credits), Balanced (20) or Literary (30). Add a Direction for this draft if you have one, then press Generate chapter. The text appears as it’s written, and the chapter keeps going if you leave the page.

Step 9: Read it and make it yours

Edit the chapter directly in the editor. Changes save automatically, and every version is kept in the History tab. On the Free plan the AI writes the first chapter, and you can write the rest yourself. On Plus and above, the AI can write every chapter — one at a time, or all the remaining ones at once.

Next steps

  • The guide to writing and revising chapters on the walkthroughs page shows the rest of the writing tools.
  • Compare what each plan includes on the pricing page.

Try it as you read

Open AIBookWriter in another tab and follow along with your own book. The Free plan starts with 100 credits.

Start writing — it's free