Meet the Substackers who want to save the American novel

In book world, the summer of 2025 is officially the summer of Substack.

Over the past few years, Substack has been slowly building a literary scene, one in which amateurs, relative unknowns, and Pulitzer Prize-winning writers rub shoulders with one another. This spring, a series of writers — perhaps best known for their Substacks — released new fiction, leading to a burst of publicity that the critic, novelist, and Substacker Naomi Kanakia has declared “Substack summer.”

“Is the Next Great American Novel Being Published on Substack?” asked the New Yorker in May. Substack “has become the premier destination for literary types’ unpublished musings,” announced Vulture.

Can Substack move sales like BookTok can? No. But it’s doing something that, for a certain set, is almost more valuable. I