Do you wish you could get a personalized newsletter every day filled only with the things you love? Do you want to join a community of niche writers? Do you want to read a book little by little every day? If you answered yes to any of these questions, I have the site for you.
Unless you’re like me and deep into the indie writer sphere, you may not have heard of Substack. Founded in 2017, the online publishing platform has been growing in popularity over the past few years. It’s extremely popular with independent writers looking for a place to publish their content, and get paid for it. Writers can publish their work at their own speed, about topics they enjoy, and can charge for monthly subscriptions to their work. Many professional authors and journalists use the platform to publish works they may not get approval to write from bigger corporations.
The platform is extremely popular with readers as well. With the way the platform works, you can have a dashboard that is full of all the content you want, and get your subscriptions emailed to you. It’s like a little present to open every day! Readers also have a wide selection of substacks to read. Some require a subscription to access, but many are free. However, readers should understand that the platform is open to all, including those who would spread misinformation, and should approach every Substack not as a fact-checked newspaper, but as an individual’s personal writing. Make sure to check the “About” section of each Substack to check the credentials of the writer. There will be a bit of sorting through the bad in order to get to the good.
That being said, there are some real diamonds to be found on Substack. For literature lovers, you might enjoy Dracula Daily or Frankenstein Weekly, which allow you to read classic novels in small bites. I’m also a huge fan of Daily Kafka, which posts Franz Kafka’s letters to his wife on the days they were originally written. For those looking to unpack culture, you might find value in The Unpublishable by writer Jessica DeFino, Internet Princess by Rayne Fisher-Quann, or ¡Hola Papi! by John Paul Brammer. Whatever you’re into, take a look around the platform and see what you find!