Frequently Asked Questions

You log in with Bank-ID, accept the terms and verify your email address.
You upload your manuscript (docx).
We check spelling and any potentially offensive content.
We suggest subject categories and keywords for search.
We provide examples of cover images, or you can choose your own.
We format the text into EPUB (e-book) and PDF (the printed book's interior).
We show the book layout in preview mode, so you can see your finished book.
You can choose to order a printed sample copy.
You are offered a chance to listen to our AI voices reading excerpts from your book.
You can choose to order production of an audiobook (WAV and MP3).

Here the production itself is complete. In the next step we help you with the publishing.

GoRead uses large language models (AI) to process the text of manuscripts. In no way are these language models trained through GoRead's use of the language models. Here we describe how we use AI:

• We perform a spell check of the book, and check whether it contains potentially problematic phrasing.

• We generate suggestions for subject categories and keywords.

• We create a suggestion for the back cover text of the book.

• Based on the back cover text, suggestions are created for the cover of the e-book, the audiobook, and the front cover of the printed book.

• We also use AI to create an audiobook based on our AI voices.

Using our own technology, we create an EPUB for the e-book, as well as the interior for the print file and images for the cover of the printed book. The author personally approves each step in the process.

No, that is not included in our service at the moment.
However, we distribute your books to streaming services and online bookstores.

GoRead supports manuscripts written in Swedish, Danish, Finnish, Icelandic, English, German, Polish, Dutch, and Bulgarian. GoRead also offers high-quality and cost-effective AI translations between these languages.

You can find the terms of use at the following link: https://www.goread.com/se/sv/tos

You can delete your project before you have ordered audiobook production or published any format to the sales channels. But before you delete your project, we would like to make you aware that most things in your manuscript can be edited within the service, so that you don't have to delete and upload a new manuscript.

• Make sure the current project you want to delete is selected

• Click the Manage Project button at the bottom left of the page

• And click the Delete project button

There is nothing preventing you from having two projects with the same name in parallel, but it might become a little difficult to keep track of which is which.

Yes, that works fine. To upload a new manuscript and start creating a new book, click at the top left of the page on your existing book, then select "Create new book" at the bottom of the list.

GoRead supports translations to and from Swedish, Danish, Finnish, Icelandic, English, German, Polish, Dutch and Bulgarian. After uploading an original manuscript and going through the steps Manuscript, Details and Cover, you can purchase a translation whereupon the text, title, cover and all details about the project are translated into the target language. It takes about an hour to translate a book.

The cost of the translations is the same as for the audiobook production, i.e. SEK 249 (€24.90) as a start fee plus SEK 6 (€0.60) per thousand characters including spaces. A short novel costs from SEK 300-400 (€30-40) and a full-length novel SEK 3000-4000 (€300-400).

We have developed a translation process using AI that takes place in four steps: translation, extraction and separate translation of local terms such as names, places, etc., separate review of words and expressions that the AI itself is uncertain about, a linguistic review, and a final agent that reasons about the linguistic review and makes well-founded decisions about which expression best fits the context.

GoRead is not a publisher, and the author retains all rights to the book and its various formats.

We do not edit the manuscript, but we point out any potential spelling errors. In addition, we analyze the text using AI and flag potentially problematic passages based on defamatory, politically provocative, and offensive wording. We have a process in place to prevent the publication of books that may violate the law.

In all other cases, the author is the responsible publisher of the book and decides whether to let the book reach an audience despite any flags we may have raised.

Copyright is a protection for artistic works such as books. You do not need to apply for it – the protection is activated immediately when you create the work. Whoever creates the work automatically becomes the author. This means that only those who created the work may decide who is allowed to print, copy or distribute it. As an author, you can license your rights to the book to other actors and publishers.

Copyright can normally only arise for works created by humans. AI-generated material only receives copyright if the human contribution is so significant that the result is primarily an expression of free and creative human choices. Texts and images generated by AI often lack copyright. We label AI-generated material in accordance with applicable rules.

To be able to upload your manuscript, it needs to be in the .docx format
Good to prepare before you upload your file:

• Headings: Set chapter headings in Heading 2 and subheadings in Heading 3, Heading 4, etc.

• New paragraph: To display your new paragraph as an indent in the text, mark the new paragraph with a tab or a single line break.

• Blank line: If you instead want a blank line in the text, suitable for a time jump, scene change, or topic change, indicate it by making two line breaks in the text.

• Common parts to include in a manuscript: - Dedication (optional) - Prologue (optional) - Foreword (optional) - The book's text - Epilogue (optional) - Acknowledgements (optional)

• Copyright page/imprint page: We will build this page together with you on our "Details page". So it is not something you need to prepare yourself.

It is possible to make simpler edits to your manuscript in our service. In our manuscript editor you can, for example, change the heading level, add a line break at a scene change, or bold a section.

Not for the e-book and audiobook.

The physical book must be at least 28 and a maximum of 600 pages for printing technical reasons. A good rule of thumb can be to divide your manuscript into several volumes (parts) if it is longer than 100,000 words. 100 pages corresponds to about 20,000 words, and more than 500 pages (about 100,000 words) normally makes for a book that is too large to hold comfortably.

There is also a lower limit for how short a book can be. In cases where a physical book becomes shorter than 28 pages, we add blank pages at the end of the book.

When we perform content moderation, the manuscript is analyzed using AI, and potential concerns regarding content that may be politically provocative or defamatory are flagged to enable you to change wording before publishing the book. Content in the book relating to violent or sexual acts involving children under 18 years of age is also flagged as potentially offensive. No training of AI models takes place.

Where applicable, we specify the (subject) THEMA category 5X (Offensive or sensitive content) at distribution as a service to the reader. THEMA codes (subject categories) are an international classification system for books that describe subject, genre, time, and place, and are used by booksellers to organize and find books, where a main code identifies the main subject and additional codes can specify details such as genre, time, and place.

Here are the known limitations today:

Tables may look different in both the physical book and the e-book compared to how they appear in your word processing program. If you want more control over the design of tables, turn them into images and place them in the right spot in the manuscript. Also note that tables are not read aloud in the audiobook production.

Children's/young adult books currently have the same font size and line spacing as adult fiction. They should have both a larger font size and greater line spacing.

It's worth mentioning that we are continuously working on improvements. Partly by improving the formatting of your manuscript, and partly by giving you the ability to edit the manuscript yourself within our service.

Depending on how many steps you have progressed in the project, you can edit most metadata (details) by clicking the "Unlock to edit" button at the bottom of the page. You cannot edit the book's title afterwards.

You can edit your uploaded manuscript in the service, change headings, edit text, merge chapters, split chapters, and more.

If you want to distribute your work via streaming services and bookstores, your book needs an ISBN. You'll get that from us, and we take care of placing it in and on the book. You don't need an ISBN if you only want the book for private use. In the service, we display the ISBN as 0000000 or XXXXXXX until you decide to publish. That's when we assign your real ISBN to the book's various formats: one ISBN for the e-book, another for the audiobook, and a third for the physical book. Authors and publishers can also choose to upload their own ISBNs.

The time it takes varies depending on the channel. You can set a future publication date yourself.

Streaming services. We send the e-book and audiobook to the streaming services, which make it available within a few hours. Your book can therefore be released today if you want.

Online bookstores. We send the e-book and materials for the physical book (the interior) to the bookstores. The e-book is usually published within a day. Registering the physical book for sale often takes a few business days, but sometimes less time. As part of this, your book is registered in the Bokinfo system, which bookstores use to order books.

Ordering a physical book. When placing your order, you can order a sample copy that is sent to your home. You can also choose to order a larger number of books. The books are printed within 2 business days and sent by regular mail. You will normally receive the book within a week of ordering.

Printing and delivery of the book are handled by our partner, Publit. Usually, a print run takes a few business days. After that, regular postal delivery times apply.

Yes, you can sell your physical book yourself. To get physical books delivered, you can order any number of books to any address. You do this under "My Pages/Orders". If you want to order more after a while, go to the same page and place a new order. On the same page, you can also see all previous orders you have made.

If you discover an error in a published book, the usual approach is to redo the process with a new manuscript. You can then choose to withdraw (unpublish) already published editions and publish the new corrected edition. You do this using the Unpublish function in our service. It is located in the "Streaming" and "Bookstore" sections respectively. It usually takes 1–2 weeks before the removal of your work takes effect everywhere.

If you would rather publish through a publishing house, you can first download your e-book and audiobook files and then unpublish them with us.

You can also close your account at any time. You do this on the account page.

Our service distributes your e-book and audiobook to the common streaming services, making it available in most countries where each streaming service has customers. Your e-book and physical book are distributed to online bookstores in the Swedish market.

No, you choose yourself which formats you want to publish. We will ask you in our step-by-step process. In our process, however, we always first produce the e-book and interior. These formats will always be created in our process, free of charge. If you only want to release an audiobook, this is no problem; you make your audiobook in the following step, Audiobook.

It is in the "Publish your book" phase that you choose which formats you want to publish. E-books and audiobooks can be distributed to the streaming services. E-books and physical books can be distributed to the online bookstores, and to those bookstores that choose to order in a physical book. Audiobooks are not distributed to online bookstores as our partner Publit does not enable this, because the sale of audiobooks in online bookstores is vanishingly small.

Yes, you have two options.

You attach your own cover images (black and white or color) in PNG/JPEG at least 1000x1500 pixels in portrait format 2:3 (ebook and physical book) and 1000x1000 pixels in square format 1:1 (audiobook). If you only have one of the formats (portrait or square), you upload that one. We then create the other format using AI based on the uploaded cover.

Or use the AI-generated cover images we offer free of charge. These are created based on your book's content, and you choose yourself which of the 3 different generated images you prefer.

Based on the portrait image, we then create a complete print cover for the physical book. The cover appears on the front, the book title and author name on the spine, and the back cover text and EAN code on the back. The color of the spine and back of the print cover is chosen to harmonize with the color scheme of the front. For the audiobook, the square image is used. For the ebook, the portrait format is used.

We offer three different options:

• Paperback 155x230 mm (Softcover) - A paperback book in a larger softcover format. Well suited for non-fiction books, among other things.

• Trade paperback 135x210 mm (Softcover) - A popular trade paperback format in softcover. Recommended for fiction books.

• Hardcover 135x210 mm (Hardback) - A classic hardcover book with a hard cover. Recommended for shorter books (for example, children's books or short stories).

Before the print file is sent off, we prepare the interior and book cover for you so that you can preview and see how the book will look in physical form. You can also order a proof copy of the physical book.

Yes, you'll be able to preview everything.

• We'll show both the e-book and the physical book in preview mode.

• You'll be able to listen to a sample chapter of the audiobook with your chosen AI voice before ordering the actual audiobook production.

• You can order a sample copy of the printed book before deciding to distribute it.

To create an AI-produced audiobook via GoRead, you first choose one of our AI voices. In the Audiobook step, you can preview our voices by having any chapter from your book read aloud in minute-long audio clips. When you're satisfied, you select a voice and see the cost.

After payment, production begins and your complete audiobook is ready within a few hours. By using the latest technology for AI production of audiobooks, we can ensure a quality that today is so high that the listening experience becomes pleasant.

We carry out an editing step where we review the rarer words and numbers in your text to ensure the quality of the AI production. This is normally quick but during evenings and nights it may take a number of hours, as it requires manual review. The audiobook is then produced and can be published immediately after production.

To provide additional peace of mind, we also offer a money-back guarantee if you as an author should still not be satisfied with the quality of the audiobook.

You need to provide the book title, author, and language (Swedish as default). If there are additional contributors, you list them. If you have used AI to write the book, this needs to be stated. You can also list other contributors such as cover designer, editor, translator, photographer, illustrator, layout designer, etc., if there are any.

In order to categorize your book and describe its genre and content, each book needs 2-3 subject categories, which we produce and suggest for you. We also produce a suggestion for the back cover text that you can edit yourself.

We build this page according to industry standards. It usually includes:

Author name

Year of printing

Printer

Publisher, if applicable

Copyright

ISBN

Series

You choose one of GoRead's AI voices during the Audiobook step.

You can listen to a preview of the beginning of each chapter in your book to hear how it sounds. Once you have chosen a voice, you purchase the audiobook production.

After purchase, GoRead performs an editing step where unusual words, names, places, abbreviations, numbers, dates, and words in foreign languages are reviewed by us and corrected so that the pronunciations are accurate.

After that, the audiobook production starts, which takes under an hour for a full-length book and considerably less for a short story. Based on your manuscript, we manually go through and rewrite terms and words that we know can be difficult for the AI model to pronounce. Then a special audiobook manuscript is created and sent to the AI model. The AI model is very good at handling correct pronunciations even for words and sentences in languages other than Swedish.

When the production is complete, you will receive an email that it is ready. You can then listen to a preview of the audiobook if you wish.

When you feel ready, you publish your audiobook and e-book under the Streaming tab, and your e-book and physical book under Bookstore.

Yes, you can upload your own studio-recorded audiobook that has been edited by a professional audio editor. You do this in the service under the Audiobook step, after having uploaded the Manuscript, entered the Details, and uploaded or created a Cover. The audiobook file must be in MP3 or WAV format. The cost is SEK 999 (€99) to distribute your own audiobook through GoRead.

It is free of charge to:
- create an account
- format and create a finished layout including book cover
- produce and distribute* an e-book
- distribute* an audiobook

* We distribute the book files to the streaming services and online bookstores that GoRead has chosen to distribute to. They in turn publish the book files on their platforms.

We have three cost items in the service:

- Audiobook. The cost of producing the audiobook consists of a cost for the AI production itself. The price is 300 SEK per hour of finished audiobook (45-50,000 characters/hour), plus a start-up fee of 249 SEK. The distribution of the audiobook to streaming services is free. We calculate and show you the cost. Prices stated include VAT.

- Printed book. If you want your book to be available for order in printed format via bookstores, a one-time cost of 999 SEK is added as compensation for carrying out these two steps. Firstly, a copy of the printed book, a so-called deposit copy, must be sent to the National Library of Sweden (KB) for storage with them. Secondly, the printed book needs to be registered in the Bokinfo system, which bookstores use to order the book when a customer has placed an order.

- Ordering a book. You can also order a sample book or a larger quantity of physical books for yourself at cost price via GoRead. We calculate and show you the cost. In addition to a base cost of 22 SEK for softcover and 75 SEK for hardcover, there is a charge of 22 öre per black-and-white page in the book. The pages that are in color cost 95 öre. All prices are exclusive of VAT, which is added at 6%. Shipping is added and the price depends on where the book is to be sent.

It costs nothing to create the cover and interior for the physical book. The physical book is ordered through a collaboration that GoRead has with Publit. When you order a physical book yourself, there are costs for printing, handling and shipping. You can see the exact cost on the order page, and it also depends on the number of pages in the book.

In addition to a base cost of about 28 kronor for paperback and 94 kronor for hardcover, there is an additional cost of about 28 kronor per 100 black-and-white pages in the book. All prices exclude VAT, which is added at 6%.

A 100-page paperback book would therefore cost about 55 kronor to print plus shipping. The equivalent book costs about 121 kronor in hardcover.

A 200-page paperback book would therefore cost about 83 kronor to print plus shipping. The equivalent book costs about 149 kronor in hardcover.

So if you want to order a copy of a 200-page paperback book, it will cost you about 83 kronor excluding VAT (about 87 kronor including VAT) plus shipping.

You decide yourself what price you want to sell the book for to the bookstores. The bookstore then adds its margin, which means they decide what the physical book is sold for in their store (online or physical shop). As a rule of thumb, you can assume they add 50% to their purchase price, but this can vary greatly.

To enable distribution of the physical book via the bookstores, there is a one-time cost to carry out two steps. First, a copy of the physical book, a so-called legal deposit copy, must be sent to the National Library of Sweden (KB) for storage with them. Second, all metadata about the physical book needs to be registered in the Bokinfo system, which the bookstores use to order the book when a customer places an order.

You receive 70% of the sales revenue from streaming services and online bookstores through monthly payouts within 60 days of each month-end.

You retain all rights to the various formats of the book. You cover the cost of producing the audiobook and retain the rights to the produced audio file.

The cost of producing an audiobook with an AI voice through GoRead starts at SEK 300 per hour of audiobook (45-50,000 words) plus a start-up fee of SEK 249 for each production.

You receive 70% of the sales revenue in monthly payments within 60 days of each month-end. You retain all rights to the various formats of the book. There is no cost to produce and distribute an e-book.

GoRead has signed distribution agreements with a number of streaming services, and they pay compensation for the use of the books to GoRead, which in turn pays compensation to the authors who have chosen to distribute their books through GoRead.

Through Publit, your books reach the online bookstores (e-book and physical book), they report sales and pay compensation to GoRead. All sales are displayed under My Account within 30 days and are paid out within 60 days after the last day of the sales month. Ahead of your first payout, you can see under My Account / Balance & Payouts how to proceed to enter your payment information.

Do you deduct tax from my royalty?
No. We do not make any tax deduction on the royalty amount, regardless of whether you are registered with us as a private individual, sole proprietorship, or company. This means that the royalty is paid out without us deducting preliminary tax.

Do you pay tax on my behalf?
No. You as the recipient are responsible for declaring the income and paying any tax, self-employment contributions, and other fees that apply to you.

Do you provide information to the Swedish Tax Agency?
Yes. We are required to submit a statement of earnings (kontrolluppgift) to the Swedish Tax Agency on royalty amounts paid out.
The statement of earnings shows how much royalty we have paid out to you during the year. When it is time for the tax return, you will receive documentation from us.

How does it work with VAT?
If your company is VAT-registered, 6% VAT is paid out in addition to the payable amount, otherwise not.

Can you provide tax advice?
No. We can only provide information about how we handle payments and statements of earnings. For questions about your own tax return, tax rate, deductions, VAT, or self-employment contributions, you need to contact the Swedish Tax Agency or an accounting consultant.