GoodNovel Q&A

So long as you understand what you mean by “best,” Amazon’s KDP is still by far the largest audience and the greatest profit potential. We publish directly to Kindle Unlimited. Note, however, that Amazon’s rules for content are notoriously vague and that books can be “deleted” at any time for no clear reason.

Smashwords is a great way to get into distribution with a writer-friendly platform that has a good scope of distribution to retailers such as Apple’s iBookstore, Kobo, Barnes & Noble and more. They charge 10-15% for ebooks that are non-epub (which means they convert your work for you).

The largest trick to consider when it comes to publishing adult content is how each platform considers it in terms of promotion. While many platforms allow adult content, some of them refuse to promote it. As a result, it ends up getting lost in the puddle of all of the other content. So, be sure to consider this when deciding on a platform to publish your work.

Manga Psychologicum Horroris by Neuroscientist delves into the dark world of a researcher whose experiments started to mix up Reality with Perception. The Neuroscientist started to realize the presence of Beings on the edge of human sensory capacity, and to his surprise, these entities started to interact with him. As the Neuroscientist delves into the unknown, he questions his sanity while things start to get worse. The artwork takes up most of the burden in terms of oppressing the reader.

I think most people overcomplicate this. If someone wants to post their own work online for everyone to view for free on their public social media accounts then that’s perfectly legal and fine by me. Sometimes searching for circle names or certain tags on Pixiv or Twitter will even pull up the complete work. The legality depends on the artist and their consent for public display, not on the platform through which it’s displayed (e.g. corporate sites). Following artists is not like finding books in a store, though. It’s not organized that way.

I’ve found that most sites that advertise ‘no ads’ are either dishonest, will be inundated with ads in the near future, or even host stolen content. I try to stick with the publisher’s own app and clearly stated model for revenue generation. For example, free chapters of current titles are uploaded daily to my Shonen Jump app, and the reading experience is consistently excellent – high-res pages etc. Archive.org does have a huge text collection of older completed titles, but it is a real pain to navigate. That said, it is an amazing resource for public domain and even independently published works. For someone who reads a huge amount of manga, however, saving up for a Viz book or subscribing to Kindle Unlimited is the best way to go.

It's an isekai/portal fantasy with a twist on possession, i.e. an object possesses the protagonist and transports them to a spirit world where they are forced to live out the ghost's story as if it were a live-action roleplay. The plot follows the protagonist's struggle to survive the ghost's memories while trying to alter the events of the past in order to find a way to escape the spirit world. The story is a type of dungeon-crawl, but instead of a physical dungeon it's a traumatically charged and potentially painful spiritual one.

From a purely practical, 'I just want to watch anime' perspective: Crunchyroll. It's the biggest platform, it has both seasons, it works on most devices, and the subscription is reasonable.

The uncensored discussion is a fan-debate rabbit hole. For a casual viewer who just heard the show is good and wants to check it out, Crunchyroll is the obvious and correct answer. They won't know what they're 'missing,' and they'll have a great time.

Recommending anything more complicated to a newcomer is a surefire way to make them give up before they even start. Keep it simple.

I have mixed feelings about the ending of ‘Love Letter from the Future’ which I found to be somewhat bittersweet rather than purely positive. For me, the central conflict of ‘Love Letter from the Future’ is one of time and fate, and it’s not easily resolved. While some characters do reach a point of peace and find some form of closure, it is not easily achieved and often involves considerable sacrifice. The ending is not one where everyone can walk off into the sunset in search of their own ‘happily ever after’. If you’re after stories that end up on the very positive side then this story may leave you with more questions than you had at the start. The emotional payoff is there but with a tinge of sadness at what has been lost along the way.

It's a pleasant but odd story, fitting the themes of the collection. It's not quite the sort of story I would have liked, emotionally.

It is much like watching Star Wars. Although many now watch the movie in chronological order, the original release order (Empire, Return of the Jedi, A New Hope, The Phantom Menace, Attack of the Clones, and Revenge of the Sith) is much better for the viewer’s experience. The big reveal in Empire means very little if one has watched the prequels first. Likewise, Lonesome Dove has a number of big revelations, as well as the weighty history of Gus and Call, the fate of Maggie, and the origin of the Hat Creek brand. All of these are much better experienced in the order that McMurtry published them, as opposed to the more informative chronological order.

The manhwa titled 'The Building Manager' or sometimes translated as 'The Building Owner' is a really interesting, somewhat atypical take on the urban fantasy and action genres. At its core, the story follows Kang Younghyun, an unassuming young man who unexpectedly inherits a massive, dilapidated apartment building from a distant relative. The twist is that this isn't an ordinary building; it exists in a liminal space between the human world and a realm inhabited by ghosts, monsters, and other supernatural entities. Younghyun's new job is less about collecting rent and more about acting as a mediator and sometimes enforcer between his human tenants and the supernatural residents. The building itself is a character, with shifting layouts and rules.

What really pulled me in was how the plot balances the day-to-day management struggles with larger, creeping mysteries. Early on, it's about Younghyun learning the ropes, dealing with tenant disputes that involve curses instead of loud music, and trying to keep the building standing both physically and metaphysically. But as it goes on, you start to get hints about the true nature of the building's origin, the powerful entities that might be pulling strings from the shadows, and why Younghyun specifically was chosen as the heir. It's less about explosive battles, though there are some, and more about strategic problem-solving, negotiation, and uncovering a hidden history that ties into Korean urban legends.

The central plot driver is Younghyun's attempt to restore the building to its former glory, which requires completing specific tasks, appeasing powerful resident spirits, and preventing the building's total collapse, which would have catastrophic effects on both worlds. His growing relationships with key tenants, both human and not, form the emotional backbone. The art style does a fantastic job of making the mundane apartment corridors feel eerie and the supernatural elements feel oddly mundane. The pacing can feel a bit slow if you're expecting constant action, but the atmosphere and world-building are top-notch. I'd say the main plot is about a guy trying to do his new, impossible job while unraveling a conspiracy he never asked to be part of.

After her journey, the princess returns to her kingdom and takes back her throne. The prince and the rest of the court realize too late the error of their ways and publicly acknowledge the true value of the princess. Bittersweet for her as the relationships with them can never go back to what they were before. In the end she sits on her throne, looking out at the same set of courtiers who had once treated her with such disdain. The image of her, now, is one of triumphant power. The movie doesn’t go into much detail of how she will deal with the relationships of the people around her now that she has achieved her goal and has been recognized for her true worth.

The story complicates the notion of victimhood. While Kacey is certainly a victim of circumstance and of much emotional and psychological trauma, the ending also suggests that she may well be a perpetrator of some sort or another—possibly even a party to a cover-up of her own actions as she descended into the depths of her own panic. The resulting moral ambiguity makes for a very complex and thought-provoking read that resists reduction to simplistic morality tales long after one has finished reading.

The building ownership hook in 'The Owner of a Building' might seem like a strange premise at first glance, but I stuck with it and found the real appeal is in the bizarre supernatural clientele the protagonist has to deal with. It's less about real estate and more about the hilarious, sometimes unsettling, situations that arise from managing a property that attracts ghosts, monsters, and other entities as tenants. The main character's deadpan reactions to these increasingly absurd scenarios create a unique comedic tone that grew on me.

It's not a high-stakes action story or a deep character study, so go in expecting a series of episodic, often self-contained weird encounters. The art style complements this perfectly—it's clean and expressive, good at selling both the mundane and the supernatural elements without being overly flashy. I'd say if you enjoy manhwa that play with urban fantasy concepts in a low-key, slice-of-life way, with a dash of dry humor, it's definitely worth checking out for a change of pace.

The pacing can feel a bit meandering, and there isn't a huge overarching plot driving things forward for a long while. It's the kind of series you read a few chapters of when you want something light and quirky. For fans specifically looking for intense power progression or complex world-building, this might not hit the spot. But if the idea of a landlord navigating lease agreements with a vengeful spirit sounds amusing, it delivers on that specific, niche premise pretty consistently.

The commercial afterlife of a book is certainly an interesting subject to think about. The Little Prince, as a book, continues to sell in impressive numbers as a ‘classic’. The major film of the book has generated toys, games, clothes and even a theme park ride for fans. All over the world, on lunchboxes and toys etc., the Prince is depicted as a cartoon character. And this is the exact opposite to what the book is saying – that we should be valuing the things that are invisible, unique and have required a lot of time and effort in a relationship. The fox’s famous line from the book is ‘You become responsible, forever, for what you have tamed’. Thus, the major film franchise about The Little Prince is responsible for ‘taming’ the story for masses of viewers everywhere. It is safe for them to watch. I am sure Saint-Exupéry would have been both amused and saddened by this. Adaptations of The Little Prince are trying to spread his message. But so much of what they do is precisely the thing that The Little Prince is criticizing.

Just a note from me. Hawk is a pretty cool character and one of the better crime fiction folks out there. Now back to the order of the debate.

The main books of the End Times Series were written to be published in the intended chronological order of the story. The main books are: Left Behind, Tribulation Force, Nicolae, Soul Harvest, Apollyon, Assassins, The Indwelling, The Mark, Desecration, The Remnant, Armageddon, and then Glorious Appearing. All the other books in the End Times Series are prequels, sequels, or spin-off books and were written after the main books. However, some of the prequels were written after the main books.

I also explore curated lists on audiobook platforms like Libro.fm. Because most indie bookstores curate lists of books to recommend to their customers, you can sometimes find Queer Comfort Reads or Hopeful Romances on stores like The Ripped Bodice’s list of recent releases.

Libro.fm also allows you to buy audiobooks while supporting your local bookstore of choice. Listening to a quiet, cozy romance while doing chores is totally transforming. It makes the task at hand more intimate. I highly recommend anything by Lori Prince or Abigail Rakocy (again, so perfect for slice-of-life stories). They bring such warmth and engagement to their work.

These three novels by Giles Blount (published in sequence 2013-2014) form a superb thriller series for people who like their stories to be set in distinctive locations and to develop strongly in sequence. All three Novels are set in Promise Falls which goes from being a somewhat troubled town to a full-blown disaster area as the Novels progress. So, a keen reader should read them in sequence to get the full ‘atmos’ of this great series by Lincolnshire born author, PJ Barclay.

I wanna go back and reread everything in preparation for the LN now. This comparison is going to be fun. Maybe I can even do a side by side comparison of the chapters and make notes and post them up somewhere when the next volume comes out.

I saw A Million Little Pieces last year, after the memoir had been mostly exposed as non-true. For some reason, they made the film anyway, probably because the true parts of the memoir were so dramatic and because of the “scandal” surrounding them. (Maybe people would come to see it.) The film got little attention. (It was pretty weak, anyway.) Then there’s The Reader, which is a “prestige” adaptation. It received an Oprah sticker, but very little box office or praise in terms of overall quality of adaptation, as the material and the people adapting it are so so so important. Some books are very, very visual, while others are completely locked within the heads of their characters.

I get that our cultural moment is one in which we demand authenticity from our celebrities and then devour their private lives as content. But Omar is offering something different, authentic art rather than authentic biography. His work is his truth as expressed through a character, a song, a performance.

That’s healthier. People can get enough of truth and connection from an artist’s work instead of from their dating app profile. His stance, whether on purpose or not, challenges the part of fandom that’s a voyeur. We have to relate to the work he created instead of to him. And that has a lot of integrity to it, which I admire a lot.