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You write the book.We help you manage everything around it.

Publishing a book creates a surprising amount of work that has nothing to do with writing it.

AuthorChecklist.com helps you figure out what needs to happen, catch the things you didn't know to look for, find the people and programs you need, and keep the publishing side of your book from getting scattered everywhere.

Built for authors and the professionals who help them.

Get startedFreeExplore the site

Most of AuthorChecklist.com is free to browse without an account. Create a free profile when you want to save your work, manage a book, collaborate, or use the tools built around it.

Today's news

News Summary: Substack Strengthens Ties with Publishing Industry; Pitches Platform to Fiction and Nonfiction Authors

Self-Publishing Advice Center, 10 hours ago

Deadline in 20 days

Audie Awards

Genre categories (fiction, nonfiction, mystery, romance, science fiction, fantasy... Checked September 13.

Coming up

JLF Seattle 2026, September 17 to 20, 2026

Seattle, WA

Book deal

ONE TRUE THING by Zilla Jones, to Lara Hinchberger of Penguin Canada, by Elizabeth Bennett.

September 8, 2026

New guide

The Book Club Spotlight Scam: How It Works and How Authors Can Verify Invitations

The invitation may mention your book, link to a real group, and sound genuinely thoughtful. That does not mean the sender is real.

Updated Sep 19, 6:35 PM Eastern from the site's own feeds and records.

What brings you here?

I'm writing or publishing a book

You don't have to know what you don't know.

The hard part of publishing often isn't doing the work. It's finding out the work existed while you still have time to do it.

AuthorChecklist.com helps you see what needs to happen around your book, when it matters, who normally handles it, and whether it actually got done.

That means:

  • Fewer missed deadlines and opportunities
  • Less wondering what you're forgetting
  • Less time Googling the same publishing questions
  • One place for the information that's otherwise scattered across email, spreadsheets, bookmarks, notes, and your memory
  • A clearer view of what you've done and what still needs attention
Get startedFreeSee what authors get

I work with authors

Spend more time helping authors. Spend less time rebuilding the system around them.

If you work with authors, you probably already have your own spreadsheets, checklists, notes, bookmarks, email threads, and ways of keeping everything straight.

AuthorChecklist.com gives you a repeatable place to manage that work across authors and books.

That means:

  • Less duplicated administrative work
  • Fewer things falling through the cracks
  • One consistent process you can use across authors
  • A clearer view of what needs attention and who owns it
  • Easier collaboration with the authors you support
  • Better research tools when you need to find people, programs, or opportunities
  • A public professional presence that helps authors find and understand what you do
Get startedFreeSee professional tools

Looking for something in particular?

Search the checklist, directories, authors, books, awards, review outlets, identifiers, guides, glossary, book deals, festivals, events, and more from one place.

For Authors

You wrote a book. Now make sure everything around it actually gets done.

There are ISBNs, metadata, retailer listings, library records, author profiles, reviews, awards, competitions, events, distribution, deadlines, contacts, and dozens of other details surrounding a book.

You shouldn't have to discover all of them by accident.

AuthorChecklist.com gives you a map of the work and a place to manage your part of it.

  • Know what you're supposed to do

    See the work surrounding a book in the order it normally happens.

  • Catch things before it's too late

    Find deadlines, submissions, records, and opportunities while you can still do something about them.

  • Stop keeping the whole book in your head

    Keep your contacts, dates, submissions, responsibilities, notes, and results together.

  • Know what your publisher or team should be handling

    Every task explains who normally owns it, so traditionally published authors can use the site too.

  • Find the places your book can go

    Research awards, review outlets, libraries, bookstores, festivals, events, distributors, and other parts of the publishing world.

  • Look like you have your act together

    Create useful author, book, and media pages with the information journalists, librarians, event organizers, booksellers, and others regularly need.

Get startedFree

What it looks like

Real pages from an Author Profile: the checklist, the book page, the media kit, the records, the calendar, and the rest. Select one to see the whole page.

Everything that comes with your Author Profile

Your Author Profile is more than a page about you, and creating it is free. It's your home for the publishing work, information, and records surrounding your books. The cards marked $40come with a book you add.

  • Your author page

    Create a public page with the information readers, librarians, booksellers, journalists, and others may want to know about you.

    A home for your author identity.

  • Your publishing checklist

    See what needs to happen, when it should happen, who normally handles it, and what you should check before marking it complete.

    Understand the process. Don't miss the details.

  • Your book page$40 with a book

    Give each book its own page with the information, links, and details you want people to be able to find.

    One page for each book.

  • Your media kit$40 with a book

    Keep the materials someone covering you or your book may need in one place, without assembling the same files every time someone asks.

    Make it easier for people to talk about your work.

  • Your calendar

    Every due date, revisit date, publication day, award deadline, and review window on one calendar, with a feed your own calendar app can subscribe to.

    Nothing slips because nobody wrote the date down.

  • Your outreach tracking$40 with a book

    Log every agent, editor, publisher, reviewer, podcast, or bookstore you pitched: what you sent, when, and what came back. Follow-up dates land on your calendar.

    Know who you asked and where it stands.

  • Awards & competitions$40 with a book

    Find awards and competitions that may be a fit for your book, save the ones you're considering, and keep your deadlines, submissions, fees, and results together.

    Know what you entered and what happened.

  • Submissions$40 with a book

    Keep track of submissions to trade publications, review outlets, journals, awards, and other opportunities without relying on email and spreadsheets to remember everything.

    One place for dates, status, and results.

  • Your publishing records$40 with a book

    Keep important dates, decisions, links, results, milestones, and other book-related information together instead of scattering it across documents, spreadsheets, bookmarks, and inboxes.

    Your publishing history, in one place.

  • Your publishing contacts$40 with a book

    Save your publisher, editor, agent, publicist, designer, distributor, and other book-related contacts with the book they belong to.

    Stop searching old emails for the right person.

  • Collaborators

    Invite the people helping with your book to work with you on milestones and publishing tasks. Publishers, editors, publicists, and other professionals can also purchase access for an author and collaborate with them directly.

    Publishing may be collaborative. Your workspace should be too.

  • Your book$40 with a book

    Add a book for $40, once. Keep its important information, publishing details, milestones, links, and records together in one place.

    One payment per book, every edition and format of it.

For Industry Professionals

A better system for work you're already doing.

AuthorChecklist.com is not trying to replace editors, agents, publishers, publicists, book coaches, marketers, or other publishing professionals.

It gives them a better place to apply their expertise.

  • Stop rebuilding the same process

    Start with the same publishing framework for every author, then adapt it to the book.

  • See what needs attention

    Keep deadlines, tasks, submissions, milestones, and responsibilities visible instead of spread across systems.

  • Give authors one place to look

    Work from shared information instead of maintaining one version for yourself and another for the author.

  • Keep multiple authors straight

    See the work across the books and authors you support without relying on memory or a maze of separate spreadsheets.

  • Research faster

    Use publishing directories and advanced filters to find people, organizations, programs, and opportunities that fit a particular project.

  • Be easier to find

    Claim your listing, explain what you do, say what you're looking for, and give authors a useful public page about you.

Get startedFreeHow professional access works

AuthorChecklist.com = More than a checklist.

The benefits come from connecting information that normally resides in different places.

The publishing checklist

See what happens around a book before, during, and after publication.

Every task explains:

  • What it is
  • Why it matters
  • When it matters
  • Who normally handles it
  • How to tell whether it actually got done

Browse the checklist

Directories

Find the people, organizations, places, and programs involved in publishing and promoting books.

21,228 listings in 8 directories, free to read.

Every listing shows where its information came from and when it was last checked.

People and organizations listed on the site can claim their pages, correct them, or ask to be removed.

Explore the directories

Awards, reviews, identifiers, and opportunities

Find things authors often discover too late or have to hunt down individually.

For example:

  • Awards and competitions
  • Review outlets and trade publications
  • Book identifiers
  • Author identifiers and records
  • Literary festivals and conferences
  • Author events
  • Submission opportunities

Explore publishing resources

Guides, glossary, and reference information

Understand the terms, systems, and processes nobody stopped to explain.

That includes:

  • Publishing glossary
  • Guides
  • Templates
  • Official lookup tools
  • Industry news
  • Book deals
  • Recent reviews

Explore guides and resources

When browsing isn't enough.

Anyone can search the public directories.

Professional Search is for people who need to use the database as a working research tool.

It can include:

  • Advanced filters
  • Multiple criteria at once
  • Saved searches
  • Prospect lists
  • Personal notes
  • Exports
  • Alerts when listings change
  • Alerts when submission windows reopen
  • News alerts tied to what you follow

The benefit is simple: spend less time hunting and more time acting on what you find.

How Professional Search works

A good time to try it.

For authors

Your Author Profile is always free.

Through October 31, 2026, use code WriteWell to add one book at no charge.*

That book stays yours permanently.

*One code per account.

For publishing professionals

Set up a professional account by October 31, 2026 and Professional Search is included free for twelve months.

No code needed.

Neither offer turns into an automatic subscription. Nothing renews on its own and nothing is charged later.

Get startedFree

Know what's happening around books now.

Today in publishing

Headlines and book deals from the publishing press, each one linked to whoever reported it. We write none of it.

Industry news

All news

Deals

All deals

Recent book reviews

All reviews

New releases

All new releases

Not publishing a book? There's still plenty here.

Much of AuthorChecklist.com is a public resource.

Visitors can use it to:

  • Find authors and books
  • Discover new releases
  • Find independent bookstores
  • Find author talks, signings, and launches
  • Find book festivals and literary events
  • Look up libraries
  • Explore the people and organizations involved in publishing

None of it needs an account.

Find author events near me

Author talks, signings, launches, and other events published by authors and venues.

Explore events and places

From the founder

Adam Zuckerman, founder of AuthorChecklist.comAdam ZuckermanJD/MBA & Founder, AuthorChecklist.comAuthor of No Loose Ends (Wiley, 2026)

Why I built it

After publishing No Loose Ends with Wiley in 2026, I realized how much goes into a book beyond actually writing it.

There were identifiers, metadata, retailer pages, library records, trade reviews, awards, deadlines, submissions, author profiles, and a long list of things I didn't know I was supposed to know.

I wanted the checklist and record-keeping I wish I'd had, so I built AuthorChecklist.com.

It's grown considerably since then, and we're still adding to it.

If there's something that would make publishing a book easier to understand or manage and you don't see it here, please let me know.

You wrote the book.We'll help you keep everything around it straight.

Know what needs to happen. Catch what you might otherwise miss. Keep the important information together.

Get started freeExplore AuthorChecklist.com

The checklist, directories, guides, glossary, news, and most reference information are free to browse.