How to Import an Existing Manuscript Into Inkloom
If you have already started writing your book in another tool, you do not need to start over. Manuscript Import reads your existing manuscript, detects its structure, preserves every word, and builds the full Inkloom project around it.
Why import instead of starting over?
If you have already written part or all of a manuscript in another tool, starting over in Inkloom would mean losing your work or copy-pasting thousands of words and rebuilding the structure by hand. Manuscript Import solves this by reading your existing manuscript, understanding its structure, preserving every word you wrote, and building the full Inkloom project around it.
You do not need to start from a concept. You do not need to rebuild your outline. You do not need to re-establish your voice profile. Inkloom reads what you have and reconstructs the project state from it.
Supported formats
Inkloom imports four manuscript formats, each with different fidelity:
- DOCX: highest fidelity. Preserves headings, bold, italic, lists, blockquotes, images, and tables.
- PDF: medium fidelity. Reconstructs from the text layer. Scanned PDFs require OCR.
- Markdown: high fidelity. Preserves heading levels, blockquotes, images, lists, and section breaks.
- TXT: medium fidelity. Infers structure from text patterns like all-caps headings, indentation, and breaks.
Maximum file size is 100 MB. For best results, use DOCX or Markdown.
The import workflow
The import workflow has eight steps, each designed to preserve your original work while building the project state around it:
- Upload: select your book type and upload your manuscript file. Before anything is parsed, Inkloom saves an immutable copy of the original with a SHA-256 hash. The original is always recoverable.
- Analysis: Inkloom parses your manuscript into source blocks (paragraphs, headings, chapter headings, blockquotes, epigraphs, images, section breaks) with confidence scores. You see a fidelity report with word count, chapter count, image count, em dash counts, and formatting confidence.
- Punctuation check: if your manuscript contains em dashes, you see the exact count and examples. You choose a policy: keep and allow, keep but no new ones, flag during Voice Pass, or eventually remove. No automatic mass-replacement.
- Writing pattern check: Inkloom scans for formulaic contrasts, forced triads, repetitive openings, and other patterns. It explicitly states that patterns do not prove AI authorship. You choose: leave alone, review later, or create Voice Rules.
- Import intent: you tell Inkloom how to treat your writing. Keep exactly as written (chapters locked as Protected Original), keep for now (suggestions only), preserve but help restructure, or help rethink the manuscript.
- Author intent interview: adaptive questions about your plans that the manuscript does not reveal. Fiction: ending, mysteries, characters, reveals. Nonfiction: thesis, transformation, remaining topics, objections. All optional. Author intent overrides AI inference.
- Reconstruction: Inkloom builds the full project state. Chapters with your original prose preserved as a version. Outline with imported chapters marked complete. Retrospective Chapter Briefs. Blueprint fields (inferred, all draft). Voice Profile (proposed, requires approval). Continuity records (proposed, not canonical).
- Complete: a summary showing exactly what was imported and reconstructed.
Non-destructive: your prose is never rewritten
The most important principle of Manuscript Import is that your prose is never silently rewritten. Any textual change must use Inkloom's existing reviewable diff system. The original snapshot remains immutable.
Imported chapters receive explicit protection states. Protected Original means AI can read, analyze, and summarize the chapter, but cannot rewrite its prose unless you unlock it. Suggestions Only means Review and Voice Pass may surface findings, but every proposed change requires your approval. Normal Editing treats the chapter like any other Inkloom chapter, with the original preserved in History.
Observed is not canonical
When Inkloom extracts continuity records from your manuscript, they start as proposed, not canonical. This is critical. A character's lie in dialogue does not become world canon. A narrator's claim does not automatically become a verified fact. You must approve records before they become canonical.
This prevents Inkloom from treating fiction as factual record. It also prevents the system from building a false model of your book based on things characters say that are not true in the world of the story.
Works without AI
Even without an OpenRouter API key, Manuscript Import still parses the document, detects headings and chapter boundaries, preserves formatting, counts em dashes, performs deterministic pattern checks, creates chapter records, and retains the original snapshot. AI makes reconstruction more intelligent, but AI is not required for basic import.
This means you can import a manuscript, review the detected structure, and manually build your Blueprint and Outline without ever connecting an AI model. The editor, outline, blueprint, and all planning tools work offline.