An honest answer, from people who make books.
Should You Write a Book? is a free tool made by Scribe Media, a book writing and publishing company in Austin, Texas. We built it because the most useful thing we can tell some people is "not yet," and the most useful thing we can tell others is "you can do this yourself."
Who we are
Scribe Media has published more than 3,000 books, including 23 New York Times and Wall Street Journal bestsellers. Scribe helps people write and publish nonfiction books, from coaching people who write their own to ghostwriting books from interviews. The legal company is Bond Financial Technologies Holdings, LLC, doing business as Scribe Media.
Because Scribe sells book services, you should know how this quiz decides, so you can judge it for yourself. Here are the rules.
How the quiz decides
Each answer has a weight. The quiz then applies these rules, in this order:
- Not ready yet if you are not sure why you want to write a book, or if your reason, your idea and your reader are mostly unclear. Nothing else matters until those are settled.
- If you already have a full draft, the result depends on budget: enough for full publishing means Ready now, a smaller budget means Get help (an evaluation or editor), and a very small one means Write it yourself and self-publish.
- Ready now if your reason, idea and reader are clear, you could invest $25,000 or more, and you are not trying to rush the book out in a few months.
- Get help if you could invest at least $5,000 (or are not sure yet) and something is still in the way: the idea needs shaping, your time is short, writing is a struggle, or you are in a hurry.
- Write it yourself if you have the time and the comfort with writing and a smaller budget. Writing your own book is free, and publishing it well can cost a few thousand dollars.
- Not ready yet if you have an hour a week or less and a budget under $5,000. That is not enough for any route to go well this year.
Your platform (whether people already know your work) does not change the result. It changes the advice on the result page.
Where the numbers come from
- Self-publishing costs, writing pace and publishing facts come from The Scribe Method, Scribe's book on writing and publishing, free to read online. Each guide links the chapter it cites.
- Prices, time commitments and project lengths come from scribemedia.com/pricing and scribemedia.com/services, checked on October 20, 2026.
- Author results come from Scribe's published success stories. Each one links to the full story on scribemedia.com. They are among the strongest results, not typical ones.
If you spot something out of date, email privacy@scribemedia.com and we will fix it.
Your privacy
No cookies and no advertising trackers run on this site. Your answers stay in your browser. We count how many people start and finish the quiz, with no way to tell who they are. Read the privacy page for the details.