A Substack Alternative for Fiction

Do you want to be a Reamer?

I’m a diehard fan of Substack, but I’m introducing you to another option specifically built for fiction.

Monetizing Joy #2

Substack Could Have Done This

Have you heard about Ream Stories?

Substack could have done what Ream Stories does. Laterpress could have, too. In fact, it’s kind of a cross between the two.

What is Ream?

First of all, people on Ream are called Reamers. Are you kidding me? Either they figured their main product would be adult-oriented or they really didn’t think that one through. (You choose whether you’re able to see adult material or not.)

what you see as a reader when you're browsing titles

Let me share with you their sales-pitch image, and then I’ll break down what I’ve learned that they don’t tell you in that image.

BEFORE I DO THAT, THOUGH: If you use Ream, you’ll set up payment tiers. When you publish, you’ll have the options of public, followers, and then all the tiers you’ve set up. (I’ve only set up one.) Here’s the thing to remember: you have to click on every level you want to have access to that story or chapter.

My options are Public, Follower, and Subscriber. If I click only on Public then once you become a Follower or a Subscriber, you can’t see that story any more.

That gives you extra control, and you can do some fun things with it, but it’s a little confusing at first.

Ream vs. Substack

My experience with Laterpress was that readers didn’t click through, but maybe it will be different with Ream. You could offer free articles and stories on Substack and run your subscription fiction service through Ream. They take 10%, like Substack, and use the same payment processor.

You can choose to have Ream handle sales tax and VAT, but that didn’t look like a good idea to me. It complicates access to subscriber emails. It limits you to payouts when you’ve reached at least $50 and adds additional payout fees.

If you handle tax yourself, it runs like Substack.

The presentation of the story itself isn’t identical to what you’d see on Laterpress or Bookfunnel, but it’s similar. The big difference is the community function, which I think is basically chat, and the ability to leave commentary on a book, line-by-line.

Instead of the Note’s social media aspect, you have the book browser. Other than people finding your book as they browse, you’ll have to bring your own readers in.

You can publish nonfiction there as well, but it’s the inverse of Substack. There you have multiple genres and sub-genres to choose from for fiction. For nonfiction, your genre choice is nonfiction. There are nonfiction sub-genres, however—thirteen at present.

The lowest you can charge is $3 a month. There doesn’t seem to be an annual option.

You can schedule when to publish chapters in a serial, and readers are brought back to where they left off reading.

Until next time,

I’m Thaddeus Thomas