Beta readers, a writing group, an editor or a friend can read your book in MechaSquid and comment on it, without seeing anything else of your work. This page covers sharing a copy, the two ways in (a link and an invitation), what readers can do, the questions you can ask them, the changes they can suggest, and how you hear about it.
Share your book privately
Choose Share on the book's Overview or at the top of the Manuscript. Sharing is private: nobody finds a shared copy by searching, and only people with its link or invitation can open it.
In the dialog, choose The whole book or Chosen chapters (tick the ones you want), then one of the two ways in, described below. MechaSquid makes a shared copy and gives you its address.
Readers get your chapter titles and the text of your scenes, with the pictures in the text. They never see your plans, your scenes' working titles, scenes that are in no chapter, your wiki, or anything else in MechaSquid.
Update the shared copy
A shared copy is a snapshot, not your live text, so readers never see a half-written sentence while you type. When you want them to read your latest version, open Share and choose Update shared copy under that copy; the dialog says when it was last updated. With The whole book, chapters you have written since join the copy when you update it.
Readers who have the book open get the new copy when they come back to it after a while, with a note saying so. Their comments are kept: they stay on their words while those words are still there, and you can always read them on the Comments page.
A link or an invitation
There are two ways to let someone in, and you can use both on one copy.
New secret link is for a group, or for anyone you trust with the address. Anyone who has the link can read, with no account. Everyone holding the same link counts as one reader: they see each other's comments and your replies. Give the link a name ("Writing group"); their comments are signed with it, and you can rename it later by clicking it. Readers may comment decides whether they can comment, and the Comments box beside each link changes it later.
Invite a reader is for one person. It makes a personal invitation link, which you send yourself (MechaSquid sends readers no email). The first account that opens it becomes the reader: they sign in, or create a free account, and need no invitation code of their own. They comment as themselves, and no other reader sees their comments, so beta readers do not sway each other. You see their name and email address in the Share dialog. The note you type ("Who is it for?") is for you alone.
Either way, the link is shown only once: copy it straight away. If you lose it, make a new one (and revoke or cancel the old one). + Another link to this copy and + Invite a reader to this copy add more ways into the same copy.
What your readers see and do
The reading page shows your book in a reading typeface, with ☰ Contents to jump to a chapter and Continue where you stopped to pick up where they left off.
To comment, a reader selects words and chooses Comment. They can give the comment a colour, edit it and delete it; once you have answered a thread they can still edit it but no longer delete it. Under each scene they see their own threads with your replies. Hide comments takes the colours off the words for a calmer read.
An invited reader finds the book under Shared with me, reached from their dashboard. A link holder simply opens the link.
Ask your readers questions
In the Share dialog, under a copy, open Questions for readers. You can ask up to three questions at the end of each chapter of the copy, and up to three At the end, such as "Did you see the twist coming?". Each place is saved when you leave its box.
Readers find The author asks at the end of that chapter, with a box under each question. Their answers come to you as comments on the chapter, with the question above them, in the same places as every other comment. Readers through a link with comments off see no boxes.
Changes your readers suggest
A reader who spots a typo or a clumsy phrase can select the words, choose Suggest a change, type what they would write instead and, if they like, why. It reaches you as a suggested change, never as an edit: nothing in your book changes until you take it.
If the words are no longer in your book as they were, or the change would cross a paragraph, a link or emphasis, the suggestion cannot be made, and the reader is offered Post it as a comment instead. A published book takes no suggestions.
Readers see their suggestions beside the scene: waiting for the author, the author took it, or the author did not take it. They can withdraw one that is still waiting. They never see your reason.
Review a suggested change
Suggested changes wait under Revisions, marked Suggested change with the reader's name. In Write mode, a suggestion for the scene you are in shows at the top of the Comments tab of the right panel.
Each change is shown with the paragraph before and after it, the words that would go and the words that would come in marked. Accept takes it, Accept and edit takes it and opens the page so you can keep working, and Reject refuses it. If you have rewritten that passage since, it says so, and accepting keeps what you wrote.
Read and answer readers' comments
The Comments page lists every open comment in the book. From readers shows only those from your readers, from every link and invited reader at once; you can also pick one reader or one link. Click a comment's words to open the passage with the thread beside it.
Reply right there, or resolve the thread when it is dealt with. Remember who reads your reply: everyone who holds that link, or that invited reader alone. A reader's answer to one of your questions is listed under its chapter, with the question above it.
The Overview tells you too: Needs you counts open comments from readers, and Since you were last here lists what arrived after your last visit.
Get an email when readers respond
MechaSquid can email you when readers comment, answer your questions or suggest a change. The email says who and how many, up to which chapter, and links to the Comments page. It never contains the words of a comment, and it covers only what you have not already seen in MechaSquid.
MechaSquid only emails a verified address. On your Account page, in the Email section, your address says Verified or Not verified; if it is not, choose Send the link again and click the link in the email. Then, under When readers respond, choose At most once a day or At most once a week, or Off.
Once a copy has a link or a reader, the Share dialog offers the same thing as a tick: Email me when readers respond, which turns on the daily email. Every such email has a link that turns it off.
Revoke a link or remove a reader
Open Share. Beside a link, Revoke asks you to confirm (Revoke for good, or Keep); it stops the link at once, and anyone who opens it is told it no longer works. Beside a reader, Remove (then Remove for good) takes the book out of their Shared with me at once. An invitation nobody has opened yet has Cancel.
Comments already made stay with you in both cases. To let someone back in, make a new link or invitation.