Everything the book needs, in one app.

Write the chapters, keep the people, places and storylines beside them, revise with earlier versions to hand, and export the finished files. All of it lives in one project folder on your own computer.

Write

A quiet page for a long book.

Chapters sit in a tree on the left and the prose takes the middle. Flow mode clears everything else away when you only want the page.

Chapters are plain Markdown files, with no length limit
Flow mode leaves just the page
Search across the whole project
Import a Word (.docx) file, or Markdown, ODT, RTF, plain text or EPUB: InkSpine splits it into chapters and shows you the result before anything is created. From Scrivener, compile your draft to .docx first
An optional word-count goal and deadline for each book
An Activity record of words per day, streaks and milestones, with no pace warnings and nothing to share

InkSpine editor showing a chapter split into three scenes in the tree, with the chapter inspector open — The editor

InkSpine dashboard showing a three-book series, a continue-writing card with the last paragraph written, and a recent-activity feed — The dashboard

Worldbuilding

Worldbuilding that stays linked to your prose.

Characters, places, lore and factions live beside the manuscript as structured pages, not in a separate spreadsheet.

Characters, locations, lore and factions as structured pages
Mention one by name and it links to its page
Shared across the books of a series
Up to 10 entries per project in Free, shared across the four kinds; unlimited in Core
1 book per project in Free; unlimited books in Core

InkSpine worldbuilding screen showing sixteen character cards with monogram portraits, roles, colors, and descriptions — Worldbuilding

InkSpine character detail card open over the worldbuilding grid, showing aliases, description, notes, and what readers know — An entry open over the Worldbuilding screen

Whatever you’re writing.

Choose what you’re writing when you start, and change it whenever you like. The app’s words change with it; your files don’t.

Fiction

Characters, locations, lore and factions that link into your chapters and carry across the books of a series, and a story-arc board that shows where a thread went quiet.

Characters, Locations, Lore and Factions, each on its own page and linked into your chapters
Story arcs as lanes across the book, with beats you place in chapters
A point of view on every chapter, and a story time

InkSpine story arc board showing seven arcs as horizontal lanes with named beats placed in chapter columns

Memoir & life writing

The people, places, memories and documents of a life, beside your chapters. A Threads board shows where a strand of the story went quiet, and photos and footnotes come through to the finished book.

Knowledge holds People, Places, Memories & documents and Groups & families
Story arcs become Threads, with beats named Setting, Event, Memory, Pressure, Reflection, Turning point, Setback and Climax
Point of view is called Narrator, and story time is Date

InkSpine in Memoir mode: the Knowledge screen with tabs for People, Places, Memories & documents and Groups & families, showing six people cards from a family memoir

InkSpine in Memoir mode: the Threads board, five threads such as “My father and me” as lanes across six chapters, with beats named Setting, Memory, Pressure and Reflection

Non-fiction & research

Chapters, the people, works and topics you write about, and an Arguments board that shows where an argument stalled. Footnotes and figures come through to EPUB, DOCX and PDF.

Knowledge holds People, Places, Works & topics and Organisations
Story arcs become Arguments, with beats named Context, Question, Claim, Evidence, Finding, Reframing, Counterpoint and Conclusion
Point of view and story time are hidden, and come back if you switch modes

InkSpine isn’t a reference manager: it doesn’t format citations or build a bibliography.

InkSpine in Non-fiction mode: the Knowledge screen with tabs for People, Places, Works & topics and Organisations, showing four interview sources for a research book

InkSpine in Non-fiction mode: the Arguments board, five arguments such as “Buried rivers flood more” as lanes across six chapters, with beats named Context, Question, Evidence and Counterpoint

Plot and arcs

See the whole book at once.

Move chapters around like index cards, check who is on stage where, and follow each storyline as its own lane.

A corkboard of chapter cards with status, word-count target and point of view
A plot overview of who appears where, with optional layers for pacing, locations and story beats
Story arcs as lanes across the chapters, kept per series so one plot can span a trilogy
The longest stretch a storyline has gone without a beat, which is often where a middle sags
Up to 3 story arcs per project in Free; unlimited in Core

InkSpine corkboard view showing twenty-four chapters grouped under parts, with final, revising, draft, planned, and cut statuses — Corkboard

InkSpine plot overview showing sixteen characters plotted across twenty-four chapters with POV and presence markers, plus pacing, location and arc-beat layers — Plot overview

Revise

Every draft kept, and tools for the second pass.

Each chapter keeps its earlier versions as you write. Compare one beside your draft and copy back what you want.

Every chapter keeps its earlier versions automatically
Open and compare earlier versions: the 3 most recent per chapter in Free, every version in Core
Repeated-word check on the open chapter
Book-wide repeated-word scan, in Core
Book-wide rename, in Core

VersionsCompare and copy back.

Read an earlier version of a chapter beside your draft and bring across the lines you want.

Repeated wordsCatch the echoes.

Check the open chapter, or scan the whole book in Core.

RenameChange a name once.

Find a name everywhere in the book and replace it in one pass. Reviewing every match is free; applying the change book-wide is part of Core.

Publish

See the finished book before you export it.

The Export screen builds the real file and shows it to you: the PDF as facing pages, the EPUB at phone, e-reader and tablet sizes.

Validated EPUB 3 and DOCX files
A PDF for proofing, or for sending to an agent or a first reader
Export presets you can reuse
Footnotes and figures come through to EPUB, DOCX and PDF
The preview is free for everyone; writing the EPUB, DOCX and PDF files is part of Core
Markdown and HTML export, always free

InkSpine Export screen on the Print paperback PDF preset, showing a facing-pages spread: the last page of chapter one with the author’s name as running head and a page number, beside the opening page of chapter two, “The Salt Road” — PDF preview

InkSpine Export screen on the Ebook for KDP EPUB preset, with a Kindle-size device preview of the title page and the opening of chapter one, “Prologue — The Cinderfields” — EPUB preview

Your files

A folder of plain files you own.

A project is a folder on your own disk. Open it in any text editor and back it up like any other folder.

Prose as Markdown, and the details behind your notes as readable JSON
Works offline; no account needed to write
No proprietary format to export your way out of
Earlier versions of every chapter are kept as you write
Anonymous crash reports and usage analytics are on by default, never include prose, and can be turned off

The Salt Road/
  books/
    01-the-salt-road/
      manuscript/
        01-prologue.md
        02-the-salt-road.md
        03-the-cinderfields.md
  characters/
    elias-rook.md
  locations/
    the-cinderfields.md
  .inkspine/    the details behind each note, as JSON

Works offline, with no account. Your manuscript is never tracked, and it stays on your computer unless you turn on an optional connected feature.

How InkSpine handles data →

Platforms

macOS, Windows and Linux.

One app, opening the same project folders on all three.

macOS

macOS 11 Big Sur or later (Apple Silicon and Intel)

Signed and notarized by Apple.

Windows

Windows 10 or Windows 11, 64-bit

The first launch may show a SmartScreen notice. Why it appears

Linux

Linux, 64-bit (x86_64), with glibc 2.35 or newer and WebKitGTK 4.1, such as Ubuntu 22.04, Debian 12 or Fedora 37 (.deb and .rpm packages)

Over a free limit? Nothing is deleted: it stays in your files and you can still read it.

Compare Free and Core →

Writing a book is heavy work. Do it in a tool that helps.

InkSpine is a desktop app. We’ll email the link, with a free trial of InkSpine Core included.

Download InkSpine freeInkSpine is a desktop app for macOS, Windows and Linux.

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