The Books Next to Your Book So here's a thing that happened to me about three months into running this community, and I'm pretty sure it happened to you too, or it will, and nobody warned either of us. I watched an author — sharp writer, genuinely good book, had done everything "right" — post her launch blurb. She'd listed her comps with real care. Thoughtful ones. Books she actually respected, books that were doing well in her lane, books she'd studied. She was proud of that list. I could tell. A month later she came back into the channel with this very specific energy that I can only describe as "politely freaking out." She'd gone to her Amazon page and looked at the also-bought strip — the row of books that shows up under "Customers who bought this item also bought" — and the neighbors were wrong. Not a little wrong. Confusingly, embarrassingly wrong. One thriller she'd never heard of. A memoir with a pink cover that had nothing to do with anything. Something with a dragon on it that she definitely didn't write. She wanted to know what she'd done wrong. And here's the thing I had to tell her, and here's the thing I have to tell you: she hadn't done anything wrong. She'd just misunderstood what the strip is. The Quiet Mechanics First I'm going to state this plainly and early because the whole piece falls apart if you skip it. Also-boughts are co-purchase data. That's it. That's the whole mechanism. When a reader buys your book, Amazon notes what else that specific reader has bought — recently, in the same session, or in some rolling window of their purchase history that Amazon doesn't fully disclose but definitely uses. Do that enough times across enough buyers, and patterns emerge. Those patterns become the strip. The marble is in the bucket. No metaphors needed. A human being clicked "buy" on your book and also clicked "buy" on those other books. Amazon is just showing you the ledger. This means a few things you need to hold onto: It's not about rank. A book can be number one in a category and still have a weird also-bought strip if the readers who bought it are buying weird other things. The algorithm doesn't care about rank when it builds the strip.

I learned something very important today... if you have a story built and you import it, if said story had prologue, you need to do something special to it. you need to change the title to Chapter 1 or chapter 1 prologue or chapter 1a, just so it has a number in sequence to where it is on the the index/TOC. I've been trying to move a 0q3rq88r)(&(*_)) prologue in front of chapter 1 for almost an hour. I tried many things but the only thing that worked was changing the title to chapter 1 prologue, then it moved exactly where I wanted. I do not think I will forget this little life lesson.

I'm going to pin this to the beginning of the page and would like it see if everyone wanted to post their books that they've written on here. You can post as many links as you want as often as you want. I'd like to celebrate wins for everyone!

Time for accountability and what everyone has been working on this week. Let us know where you are, if you have blockers we can help with, had a rough go with personal life, made a win, started something new, or anything else. This doesn't have to do with books could be anything...

I'm Michael. I built the Professional Writing System and WordCrafter Pro after spending years trying to wrangle AI tools into something that actually helps writers write better stories — not just faster ones. The Professional Writing System is a set of Claude skills to help you as authors get the words out and get published. Each skill has a group of personas who are experts in their field that let you discuss your book not order the AI to do your bidding. They help you work out ideas, build the story Bible & outline, design believable characters, write your story (with help not write for you), and edit the work afterwards. The Merch and Marketing skills step in to help you build products around your story and sell it (the most important part) WordCrafter Pro is the latest in AI Writing Aids that has the entire PWS System baked in. Here in a scrivener styled interface you can organize all of your pieces together, control your context windows, get help when needed and get the stories published! With this system you never have to write alone again. You can even talk to the persona's individually ***** What you've walked into is the community hub for everything PWS: the skill files, the app we're building, the classes, the challenges, and most importantly, the other writers doing this work alongside you. Here's what to do right now: 1. Introduce yourself in the Introductions category. Tell us your name, what you write, and your biggest creative challenge right now. 2. Grab the free PWS Quick-Start Guide at [this link] It explains the four-phase system and shows you exactly where to start. 3. Browse the Start Here posts. The PWS Overview explains all four phases. The Community Rules are short and worth reading. This community is free and always will be. A paid Inner Circle tier is coming for writers who want deeper access, but everything you need to use the system lives here at no cost. the skills themselves and the PWS Studio App I'm developing will have a cost, but if you are reading this there will be a huge discount.