What comes after FicStack?

FicStack is closed, but the problem it was trying to solve is still here.

Photo by Simone Secci on Unsplash

FicStack is closed, but the problem it was trying to solve is still here. Before I think too far ahead, I’d like to hear from the readers, writers, and curators it was built for.

When I wrote that FicStack was closing, I expected a few kind comments, maybe a little disappointment, and then the usual quiet drift of the internet.

I did not expect the response it received.

So first: thank you.

To everyone who commented, restacked, messaged, emailed, or simply said something kind — thank you. The response has meant more than I can properly say. FicStack was always a labour of love, but it was also a lot of labour. Seeing that people understood what we were trying to do has made the closure feel less like failure and more like the end of one version of an experiment.

A painful end, perhaps, but not a pointless one.

The clearest thing I’ve taken from the replies is that the problem FicStack was trying to solve has not gone away.

Fiction on Substack is still hard to find. Serialised fiction is still easy to lose track of. Short stories, fragments, strange projects, mood-led work, literary horror, speculative fiction, odd little worlds that don’t sit neatly in one category — all of it can vanish into the feed unless you already know where to look.

But the replies also made something else clear.

There is a difference between something being admired and something becoming a habit.

That distinction matters.

FicStack was appreciated. It helped some people. It connected some writers. It gave some publications a small bump. It made people feel, for a while, that someone was paying attention to fiction as fiction.

But it did not become a regular destination for enough readers to justify the cost, time, and maintenance. That is the honest truth. And if anything ever grows out of the FicStack idea, it has to begin from that honesty.

It also has to be able to support itself.

That may sound obvious, but it matters. One of the reasons FicStack had to close was that the money and labour required to keep it running were not matched by the level of use it received. A project can be loved, appreciated, and still be unsustainable. If there is ever another version of this idea, it cannot depend indefinitely on goodwill, volunteer energy, or me quietly absorbing the cost in the background.

That does not mean turning it into something extractive. It does mean being honest that any useful version of this has to have a model that keeps it alive without betraying the people it is meant to serve.

I’m speaking privately with a few people who understand this problem from different angles, but I don’t want to mistake private conversations for community need. The most important thing right now is to hear from the readers, writers, and curators FicStack was actually built for.

So I’d like to ask plainly:

What did you actually need from FicStack?

What did it do well?

What did it fail to do?

What would have made you come back?

And, perhaps most importantly, what would make something like this useful enough to become part of your actual reading or writing life?

If you are a reader

Photo by Clay Banks on Unsplash

I would especially love to hear from you, because one thing that came up repeatedly is the question of whether there are enough fiction readers on Substack who are not also primarily writers.

So:

• How do you currently find fiction online?

• Do you look for serialised fiction on Substack?

• Did you ever use FicStack as a reader?

• If not, why not?

• What would make you return to a fiction-discovery space regularly?

• Search?

• Curated lists?

• Genre pages?

• Mood-based recommendations?

• “Start here” guides?

• New chapter alerts?

• A newsletter?

• Human picks?

• Something else entirely?

Do you want a place to browse fiction the way you might browse a bookshop shelf?

Or do you mostly discover stories through people you already follow?

If you are a writer

Photo by Wilhelm Gunkel on Unsplash

A lot of the response came from writers, and I’m grateful for that.

But I’d like to ask plainly:

• Did FicStack help you find readers?

• Did it help you find other writers?

• Did it bring subscribers, comments, encouragement, or mainly a sense of being seen?

• Did you ever send readers to your FicStack listing?

• Would you have done so if the site worked differently?

• What would make a discovery tool worth sharing with your audience?

• What would make you trust it?

• What would make you distrust it immediately?

I’m especially interested in the difference between visibility and actual discovery.

Being listed somewhere can feel good. But did it help? If so, how? If not, what was missing?

If you were a curator, organiser, or community-builder

FicStack depended heavily on care. Not just code. Not just indexing. Care.

People gave time, taste, attention, and belief to the idea that fiction deserved to be easier to find. That mattered.

So I’d love to know:

• What makes fiction curation sustainable?

• What burns people out?

• Is a searchable database useful, or does fiction need more human-led curation?

• Would themed lists work better?

• Would a newsletter work better?

The more I think about it, the more I suspect fiction discovery is not just a technical problem. It is a trust problem, a habit problem, and a taste problem.

If you never used FicStack

Your answer may be the most useful of all.

If you liked the idea but never used it, why?

Was it unclear?

Did you forget it existed?

Was it solving a problem you cared about in theory but not in practice?

Was it too tied to Substack?

Did it need better search, better recommendations, better reminders, better design, better communication?

No offence will be taken. FicStack is already closed. The useful thing now is honesty.

What I’m not doing here

I’m not announcing FicStack 2.0.

I’m not promising a relaunch.

I’m not asking people to sign up for anything.

I’m asking because the response to FicStack closing made it clear that many people still care about the underlying problem.

And if the problem still matters, then it is worth understanding properly.

Not just from the builder’s side.

From the reader’s side.

From the writer’s side.

From the curator’s side.

From the people who used FicStack, the people who meant to use it and never did, and the people who only discovered it as it was ending.

The question underneath all this

FicStack began with a simple belief:

Finding fiction online should not be this hard.

I still believe that.

But the next question is harder:

What would actually make it easier in a way people would use?

That’s what I’d like to understand.

So if you have thoughts, I’d be grateful to hear them.

What worked?

What didn’t?

What did you wish FicStack had been?

What should something like it never become?

And if you read fiction online, what would make you come back - not once, but again and again?

Thank you again for the kindness you’ve shown over the last day or so.

FicStack is closed.

The question it raised is still open.

— Gary & Sylvienne