GhostAI: AI-Powered Editing Tools for Book Authors
GhostAI has a certain set of skills…
GhostAI is open source (MIT) and under active development. Features, skills, and capabilities evolve based on real manuscript feedback from authors using it in the wild.
GhostAI is a suite of Claude Code skills purpose-built for book authors. Unlike web-based AI tools that work on snippets of text, GhostAI operates at the file-system level — it understands your full manuscript structure, maintains context across chapters, and integrates directly with your writing workflow. GhostAI is open source under the MIT license.
Getting Started
- /ghost-start — A conversational onboarding for your book. GhostAI interviews you about your topic, your audience, and what you're trying to accomplish, then builds a full chapter outline and sets up your manuscript so you can start writing immediately. No blank page.
- /ghost-outline — An in-depth chapter planning session. Goes beyond a flat table of contents: challenges your structure, asks what each chapter is really trying to do, and helps you decide what deserves a chapter versus what belongs as a section or a callout. Good for restructuring an outline you already have or building one from scratch.
Writing
- /ghost-draft — Turns an approved outline into a first-draft chapter that sounds like you. GhostAI analyzes your existing writing to profile your voice (sentence rhythm, vocabulary, tone) and uses that profile when drafting. You edit, rewrite, or keep whatever lands.
- /ghost-expand — Takes rough notes, bullet points, or stream-of-consciousness jotting and expands them into finished prose. Preserves your intent and phrasing where it works, smooths what doesn't. Best when you know what you want to say but haven't put it into flowing sentences yet.
- /ghost-interview — Inverts the usual writing flow. GhostAI interviews you with short questions about a chapter or section, you answer in your own words (typed or via voice input like Wispr Flow), and the transcript becomes prose with your verbatim phrasing leading. Best when you know the material cold but the page won't sound like you, or when you want to talk a chapter into existence rather than type it. Transcripts are saved alongside the manuscript and can feed back into your voice profile.
Editing
- /ghost-review — A development editor that reads your entire manuscript, not just a chapter. Catches the problems authors and beta readers miss on first pass: a concept introduced in chapter 2 but defined in chapter 5, an argument that stalls in the middle, the same point repeated three times across different chapters, pacing that drags or rushes. This is where GhostAI's cross-chapter memory matters most.
- /ghost-edit — A copy editor for one chapter at a time. Catches grammar issues, flags awkward sentences, and suggests cleaner phrasing without flattening your voice. Runs a publish-readiness checklist before you ship: broken links, missing images, typos, inconsistent capitalization, placeholder text you forgot to fill in.
Progress
- /ghost-status — A dashboard for your book at a glance. Word counts per chapter, estimated reading time, chapter length balance (are any chapters three times longer than the rest?), how much is drafted versus still outline. Also estimates costs for running the other GhostAI skills against your current manuscript, so you can budget before kicking off a full review.
How to Get GhostAI
GhostAI is free and open source under the MIT license. Clone it from github.com/leanpub/ghostai and run the install script — see the repo's README. If you want hands-on training from the people who built it, attend our GhostAI Workshop, Full Day Workshop, or Book Bootcamp.
The Future of GhostAI
GhostAI is MIT-licensed and evolves continuously. The workshops and Book Bootcamp teach you to use GhostAI effectively on your own manuscript, with hands-on help from the team that built it. New skills, better prompts, and refinements ship as authors use GhostAI in the wild and tell us what works.
Requirements
GhostAI requires Claude Code (a terminal-based AI tool) with an Anthropic API key. macOS or Linux required (WSL2 on Windows is fine). GhostAI is designed for technical authors who are comfortable with the terminal.
Leanpub authors love Leanpub.
We're authors too, and we built Leanpub to be the platform we would love to use. It turns out, we weren't alone...
As an academic, I like Leanpub because it lets me write and get my ideas out there quickly. Leanpub is simply the best place for publishing my books.
Roger D. PengAssociate Professor of Biostatistics at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public HealthLeanpub's book-creation tools allowed me to focus on creating the types of books I wanted to write instead of worrying how to create my own book publishing toolchain. I have never regretted using Leanpub to publish my ebooks.
Chris HartjesThe Grumpy ProgrammerLeanpub takes the pain out of publishing. They provide the tools, you provide the books and then magic happens.
Ryan BiggAuthor, Multitenancy with RailsI love using Leanpub because I can write my book using simple Markdown notation. Leanpub let's me focus on my content and they handle the rest.
Taylor OtwellCreator Of LaravelLeanpub is a game changer for independent authors, removing the hassles associated with formatting, book production, and electronic sales, freeing up the time to do what we do best: write.
W. Jason GilmoreAuthor, Easy Laravel 5Leanpub helped me achieve my goal of publishing a book. Its simple, easy to use interface got my book up and making money within weeks, I love Leanpub!
Samantha LaingGrowing AgileLeanpub helped me gauge interest in my book, get payments early on when it was only a few chapters, and has got me a bunch of sales just from people browsing around the site.
Phil SturgeonAuthor, Build APIs You Won't HateLeanpub helps me see my books as I write them. Even better, I can find readers early, to read my books and offer suggestions. I can pivot, if I see the need.
Johanna RothmanAuthor of 8 Leanpub books and counting…Leanpub made it simple for me to run with my book idea and build my reputation in the Ruby community. I went from first draft to first sale in days, not months or years.
Aaron SumnerAuthor, Everyday Rails Testing with RSpecFour years ago, I joined Leanpub to just give it a try. Today, over 28,000 book sales later, I cannot help but say that I'm the biggest Leanpub fan on this planet!
Manuel KiesslingAuthor, The Node Beginner BookLeanpub makes publishing your own book super easy. The fact that you can release updates continually helps with the mindset of getting a minimum version out ASAP and then iterating to improve.
Karen GreavesGrowing AgileI earn more royalties from my books on Leanpub than I do with well established publishers or through Amazon (which I publish on thanks to Leanpub's mobi conversion).
Paul BradshawPaul runs the MA in Online Journalism at Birmingham City UniversityLeanpub allows me focus on content, takes care everything else and offers an amazing author royalty. It’s a fantastic platform for writing and publishing books.
Simon BrownAuthor, Software Architecture for DevelopersI love that Leanpub makes writing and publishing a beautiful book so simple. I no longer spin my wheels with layouts and formats - Leanpub gets out of the way when it's time to write, and then automates everything when it's time to publish.
Daniel RootAuthor, Trello DojoWith Leanpub, the first person who purchased my book for $9.99 almost two years ago (and only received a preface, and two short intro chapters) has had access to almost every bit of knowledge I've gained in those two years, and *that's* the value.
Jeff GeerlingAuthor, Ansible for DevOpsSimple and lean, forces me to focus on writing and marketing, and pays excellent royalties.
Reg "Raganwald" BraithwaiteAuthor, JavaScript Allongé, the "Six" EditionLeanpub forces you to focus on writing and gives you immediate feedback. Allowing Leanpub to take care of the curation and delivery helped me focus on shipping my book.
Paul RedmondAuthor of Writing APIs With LumenWhile most eBook exporter apps today can generate PDF files and many support ePub, there's one tool we recommend above all after trying 8 of the most popular: Leanpub.
Matthew GuayContent Marketer at Zapier
The Leanpub 60 Day 100% Happiness Guarantee
Within 60 days of purchase you can get a 100% refund on any Leanpub purchase, in two clicks.
Now, this is technically risky for us, since you'll have the book or course files either way. But we're so confident in our products and services, and in our authors and readers, that we're happy to offer a full money back guarantee for everything we sell.
You can only find out how good something is by trying it, and because of our 100% money back guarantee there's literally no risk to do so!
So, there's no reason not to click the Add to Cart button, is there?
See full terms...
Earn $8 on a $10 Purchase, and $16 on a $20 Purchase
We pay 80% royalties on purchases of $7.99 or more, and 80% royalties minus a 50 cent flat fee on purchases between $0.99 and $7.98. You earn $8 on a $10 sale, and $16 on a $20 sale. So, if we sell 5000 non-refunded copies of your book for $20, you'll earn $80,000.
(Yes, some authors have already earned much more than that on Leanpub.)
In fact, authors have earned over $15 million writing, publishing and selling on Leanpub.
Learn more about writing on Leanpub
Write and Publish on Leanpub
You can use Leanpub to easily write, publish and sell in-progress and completed ebooks and online courses!
Leanpub is a powerful platform for serious authors, combining a simple, elegant writing and publishing workflow with a store focused on selling in-progress ebooks.
Leanpub is a magical typewriter for authors: just write in plain text, and to publish your ebook, just click a button. (Or, if you are producing your ebook your own way, you can even upload your own PDF and/or EPUB files and then publish with one click!) It really is that easy.