Amazon’s ebook subscription has a new name. Kindle Unlimited is now Kindle+, Amazon announced on October 22 in an email to subscribers. Members in the US will still pay $11.99 a month and can keep up to twenty titles at a time with no due dates, and their reading history, notes, and saved titles will carry over to the new service.
The main change is a larger audiobook library. Subscribers in the US can now read a title’s ebook or listen to its audiobook at no extra cost, according to Good e-Reader. Authors with ebooks already enrolled in KDP Select and with associated audiobooks created using Amazon’s Virtual Voice will automatically be included in the Kindle+ library. Those with eligible audiobooks published through ACX can enroll their audiobooks in KDP Select through the KDP bookshelf. As with ebooks, listening activity on audiobooks will be paid by page through the KDP Select Global Fund. Read Amazon’s announcement on the KDP Community site at https://www.kdpcommunity.com/s/article/Kindle-Unlimited-is-now-Kindle-KDP-audiobooks-now-included.
Looking ahead to next month, Indie Author Training’s AI Tech Summit takes place November 20 and 21. Day 1 is free to attend and explores AI tools for every stage of an author’s business. Day 2 tickets are $499 and include hands-on workshops and walk-throughs for putting those tools to work. Sign up at https://summits.indieauthortraining.com/ai-tech.
Note: Indie Author Magazine, Indie Author Training, and our other sister sites maintain a neutral stance on artificial intelligence. In our coverage, we seek to provide an objective, informative take on the technology, and we encourage authors to make decisions about whether to use AI platforms based on their personal values and what’s best for their business.
This Week’s Indie Author Magazine Articles
You can learn a lot about improving your next launch by studying the previous one. Columnist Susan Odev details how a publishing postmortem can give authors a clearer look at what parts of their process worked best. She also offers a look at her own launch campaign’s strengths and the lessons she’s taking away from the experience for book 2.
Susan Odev
As part of IAM’s leadership series on the people behind the companies authors use daily, IAM publisher Chelle Honiker spoke with Evan Gow, the founder of StoryOrigin. Gow runs the platform as a team of one, serving as its engineer, its customer support, and its CEO. This week, read how a plan to write fiction turned into a software business, and get his advice on keeping newsletter subscribers engaged so they remember why they signed up. Watch the full video interview on IAM’s YouTube channel at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NP98_Z5dGqM.
Chelle Honiker
Teachings from Indie Author Training
Webinar: “From 7,113 Unread Emails to an Actionable Inbox: Using AI to Triage Your Author Business”
When illness left author Skye MacKinnon facing 7,113 unread emails across fifteen accounts, ordinary inbox-cleaning advice wasn’t enough. She needed to find the small number of messages that genuinely required her attention without spending weeks reading newsletters, automated notifications, and conversations that were no longer relevant.
In this practical session, MacKinnon demonstrates how she used an AI assistant alongside Thunderbird to turn that backlog into an organized, prioritized workflow. Using anonymized examples, she shows how AI can search across multiple accounts, identify potentially important correspondence, check sent mail to see whether something has already been handled, separate newsletters and low-priority messages, draft replies for review, and turn outstanding emails into a manageable to-do list. The session also covers the safeguards that keep the author in control. AI should not decide what to delete, send messages without approval or treat every unread email as equally important.
Watch the replay at: https://webinars.indieauthortraining.com/talks/from-7113-unread-emails-to-an-actionable-inbox-using-ai-to-triage-your-author-business.
Upcoming Webinars
October 27, 12 p.m. ET: “Finish the Book You Keep Starting” with ProWritingAid brand manager Scarlett Sangster
Sign up at https://webinars.indieauthortraining.com/talks/stop-collecting-halffinished-drafts.
November 3, 12 p.m. ET: “Direct Sales for Authors at Any Stage” with Greg Keogh of Curios
Sign up at https://webinars.indieauthortraining.com/talks/direct-sales-for-authors-at-any-stage.
November 4, 12 p.m. ET: “Tarot for Writing: Using Tarot to Write Your Stories” with Mariëlle S. Smith
Sign up at https://webinars.indieauthortraining.com/talks/tarot-for-writing-using-tarot-to-write-your-stories.
Indie Author Tools Directory
Have you visited Indie Author Tools lately? Our tools and services directory rounds up essential resources for indie authors at every stage of the publication process, from outlining to marketing and everything in between. Check out our listings in the following categories, or let us know which tools we’re missing at https://www.indieauthortools.com.
- Cover artists: https://indieauthortools.com/cover-artists
- Editors, from developmental through proofreading: https://indieauthortools.com/editors
- Marketing tools: https://indieauthortools.com/marketing-tools
- Audiobook production and narration: https://indieauthortools.com/sound-audio-books
Indie Author Tools Spotlight: StoryOrigin
StoryOrigin brings several marketing tasks that authors often manage in separate places onto one platform. Authors can deliver reader magnets through their own landing pages, send review and beta copies, organize group promotions, and arrange newsletter swaps with other authors, using the history of past swaps to judge whether a partner is a good fit. Learn more at https://www.indieauthortools.com/email/storyorigin.
More Indie Publishing News
Here’s a look beyond our pages at the latest headlines and happenings in the publishing world.
- Audiobook authors with titles on Audible have until December 31 to enroll them in ACX’s new payment model. The legacy model ends January 1, 2027, and titles still on the old terms will be withdrawn, according to a new guide from the Alliance of Independent Authors (ALLi). The new model raises headline royalty rates, but membership listening is now paid from a shared “Member Value” amount, so ALLi cautions that a higher percentage on a different base isn’t automatically a raise. Read ALLi’s full guide at https://selfpublishingadvice.org/acx-and-audibles-new-payment-model-what-you-need-to-decide-before-31-december.
- YouTube may be adding audiobooks. The Wall Street Journal reports that the platform has been in talks with major publishers about an official audiobook offering that could launch as early as 2027, and that Google is considering including it in YouTube Premium. Nothing has been announced yet, and it isn’t clear whether independent authors would be able to take part. Read Good e-Reader’s summary at https://goodereader.com/blog/audiobooks/youtube-might-offer-audiobooks-in-2027.
Anything we’ve missed that you think we should cover? Any topics or questions you’d like our team to explore? Let us know at feedback@indieauthormagazine.com. Your suggestion may just make it into an upcoming article.
