How do I use AI to publish my book?

Ever sat, staring at a blank computer screen or a notepad, and wondered how you were going to craft the book stuck in your head?

Have you felt the burden of trying to source out the perfect words, and yet nothing would come to mind?

There’s a solution for that.

While AI is causing a lot of havoc in creative spaces, the truth is it’s a technological advancement on par with the industrial revolution or the internet.

Despite how much you may gnash your teeth at the prospect, AI is here to stay and is going to increasingly affect your industry.

But there’s a way to leverage AI, retain your writer’s pride, and produce higher quality work than you thought possible.

So, here’s an answer to your question, “How do I use AI to publish my book?”

This article will give you a list of AI tools you can use to help you in the writing process, retain your hand on the project, and deliver a book that isn’t just an expression of your creative soul but is refined enough to be sold as a product.

Because in the end, there are two options:

Create for yourself and accept that it may not be something the reader enjoys?

Or

Write for the reader and maximize your creativity and skill in producing something of high value.

Let’s get started. Let’s answer your question, “How do I use AI to publish my book?”

The first step in your writing process is: brainstorming.

What AI can help me brainstorm?

Any of the major AI agents can help you come up with brainstorming, outlining, and initial idea creation.

For instance, let’s say you want to write articles for your website or build an online persona. Content is king, and frankly, it is the most accessible way to start getting your product in front of people. This means you need to consistently create content that will catch your target audience.

After all, the name of the game is bringing solutions to problems. That’s how search engines work, AI works, and it’s how capitalism works.

I offer a solution to your problem. You pay me for the solution.

To start, you may need ideas or help refining your ideas.

Simply go to an AI like Grok, ChatGPT, or Gemini and ask it to brainstorm a list. You can pick any number of brainstormed items you want the AI to produce.

Here’s an example. Let’s say you run an organization geared towards answering questions authors may have about the publishing process. Here’s what you can ask an AI like ChatGPT to brainstorm.

“You are a publishing company that specializes in educating your market on the various aspects of independent publishing. You want to write consistent content for social media, including videos, articles, and posts. Come up with a list of 365 questions an author might ask regarding the self-publishing process that your publishing company can then create content that brings a solution to each of those questions.”

Presto. The AI will spit out 365 questions related to that topic. Not all of them may be useful or sound good, but it’ll give you a powerful launching point.

If you’re an author who wants to write a sci-fi story but isn’t quite sure what it should be about, then ask the AI to give you 25 ideas for a sci-fi thriller. Peruse what it comes up with. Something may stick that you think would be a good idea.

From there, it’s time to outline or storyboard the idea.

How do I outline my story with AI?

Take your idea and prompt the AI. While you can certainly use one of the main general AIs, there are AIs dedicated to crafting stories, writing outlines, and building plot lines.

Some of the AIs that can help you outline your story include:

• • Sudowrite

• • Novelcrafter

• • Squibler

• • NovelAI

(Bonus hint: AI was used to source out these programs.)

With AIs like these, you can create plots, get suggestions on improved storytelling tools, enrich your readers’ experience through refined themes, and get massive headway on how your story should be constructed to maximize readers’ enjoyment.

Otherwise, you can always use one of the general AIs to help you build an outline or plot line for your story.

To do this, give the AI your story idea and any other information you want to include, such as characters with descriptions of who they are, or must-haves in plot line, setting, themes, or more.

It’ll craft an outline that you can use all of, some of, or none of. That’s the best part.

AI is not offended if you reject what it gives. Think of it as a writing assistant with absolutely no ego and always willing to help.

Once you have your outline or skeleton written, your next step is the actual writing.

Should I use AI to write my book or article?

It depends. If you’re more interested in efficiently producing a piece of work and bringing it to market, then allowing AI to write the actual content may appeal to you.

However, there are some things to remember:

1) AI is still in its infancy when it comes to crafting interesting, RELIABLE, and unique writing. If you’re a highly skilled writer or reader, you may start to notice methods that AI employs time and time again. But most readers wouldn’t notice the difference. It’s your preference how much you rely on AI to do the actual writing.

2) You can use AI to write your first draft, and then you can build from there. Or, you can have it use your first draft and allow it to refine your writing. The choice is up to you. Some clients we’ve worked with have taken their poorly written blocks of text (no prior writing skills) and fed them into AI. What came out was a much more manageable and useful product. However, please note, from there, a human helped reshape and rewrite what the AI had produced to bring life to the writing.

3) Be wary of facts, figures, and claims made by AI. While AI architects claim that hallucinations are getting better, don’t ever trust every fact and figure the AI comes up with. Verify claims. Check sources and links.

That research paper you let ChatGPT write probably has some links that go nowhere or some facts that are misapplied from the source.

Once the writing is done, then comes the part you either love or dread: The editing.

How do I use AI to edit my writing?

Again, you can use one of the general AIs to edit your work. However, if you’re going to, be sure to prompt the AI with something similar to: “Please edit this piece of work. Do not change any ideas or conclusions. Only focus on grammar, punctuation, and word replacement where necessary. Follow best practices as outlined by MLA or APA.”

A general AI will do as much or as little of the editing process as you want. If you want it to change whole sections and directions of your story, then go for it. Tell it to do that.

The power of AI is in how specific you are with your prompting.

Otherwise, a more passive solution is editing software like Grammarly. Articles such as the one you’re reading are often run through Grammarly to ensure proper grammar, punctuation, and clarity of writing.

These programs provide a fail-safe for writers who love to get their ideas down, but can’t necessarily remember if they’re supposed to use two, to, or too.

Once the manuscript is completed and edited, your next step is cover art.

How do I create a cover for my book with AI?

Take your book idea and be specific with your prompt. If you have an idea of what you want the cover to look like, but you just don’t have the design chops, then be sure to prompt the creative AI with your idea.

Maybe it’s something like, “I need a book cover for my sci-fi thriller about aliens coming to earth and taking over. Make the cover dark and gritty. I want a UFO over the silhouette of a house. A lone, yellow light shines from a single window in the house’s attic. It’s nighttime. The trees next to the house are dark shadows. A widening beam is dropping from the UFO to the house. The cover feels haunting and suspenseful. The title of the book is My UFO Experience.”

What are some good AI programs for creating book covers?

Some image AIs you could use might include:

• • Canva AI Book Cover Generator
    • • Easy-to-use with drag-and-drop editing, genre-specific templates, and powerful text-to-image generation for professional results.

• • Venngage AI Book Cover Generator
    • • Tailored for authors, offering polished, customizable designs with AI suggestions for layouts, colors, and fonts—no design experience needed.

• • BeYourCover
    • • Specialized AI tool that analyzes your book’s title, genre, and summary to generate multiple theme-aligned, publication-ready covers quickly.

• • CoverDesignAI
    • • Focused on indie authors, creates unlimited custom 2D covers and 3D mockups from creative briefs, with strong typography and element controls.

• • NightCafe
    • • Excellent for generating high-quality AI artwork from prompts, ideal for unique illustrations (often combined with external tools for text).

Once you’ve put it all together, you can then load up your book to a site like Amazon and bring your book to market.

Why do I need an indie publisher when I could use AI?

Let’s say you look at this list and you decide, “I could do this myself.”

Good! We encourage you to do so. We at Panthera Publishing love encouraging authors to see themselves not as authors beholden to an antiquated publishing process, but as producers of a product for a market.

Your book was born from your passion and desires. But a high-quality, engaging product means your passion and desire can benefit many people: your readers.

If you can’t convey your idea properly, then no one will want to read your book, and your idea will stay for your eyes only.

Which is a sad place for it to be.

If you feel confident in approaching the publishing process on your own, then we at Panthera salute you and can’t wait to see your book come to market.

However, if you’ve read over this list and feel like you don’t have the time, the expertise, or the interest in embarking on this path, then that’s why we’re here.

After all, there are still pitfalls in the publishing process that experts can help you avoid as you work on finishing your book and bringing it to market.

We leverage AI to help improve your book, but at the end of the day, we want to help make it the highest-quality possible. We don’t want to replace your idea. We want to help you bring it to the widest market possible.

So if you’re looking over this AI publishing list but feel like maybe being a book producer is not your game, then leave the publishing to us. We’ll be as in-depth or hands-off with the production process as you wish.

Feel free to contact us and see how we can help you achieve your book publishing goals!