How it works
One link, however many people, one book
Set up the book
A few minutes
Who it is for, the occasion, and the chapters you want the book arranged into. You can change all of it later — none of these answers lock anything.Share one link
As long as you want to leave it open
Everybody gets the same link. It opens on a phone, needs no account and no app, and takes a few minutes to answer. You choose when to stop — there is no deadline we impose, and you can send reminders or add someone late.Watch it arrive
Photographs and messages appear as people send them. Only you see them. Contributors cannot see each other’s messages, and nobody can see the book being made.Arrange it
The book arranges itself into a first draft, and then it is yours. Move things, take things out, change how a page is laid out, crop a photograph, fix a name somebody spelled wrong. What you see on screen is what will be printed.Approve it and it is printed
Delivery estimate shown before you confirm
Approving prepares the finished book as a PDF — the cover and every page — and you read it through before anything is ordered. Then it is printed and posted. You see the delivery estimate for the address you are sending to before you confirm, and nothing prints until you do.
What we do, so they don’t have to
The book that arrives looks as if every contributor knew exactly what to say. They didn’t, on their own. We helped them. The structure of the book, the design of every page, the guidance for every person we ask, the prompts that fit each relationship — all from us.
Your job is to bring the people who know them. Theirs is to say what they mean. Ours is everything else. The book that arrives reads as if everyone tried hard. They did. We made trying easy.
What the people you invite have to do
Open a link, write something, and add a photograph if they have one. That is the whole of it. There is no account to make, no password, and nothing to install. If their work network blocks the page — some do — the same link works on their phone.
They will not be asked to write a lot. A short message from somebody who knew the person for a year is worth as much in the book as a long one from somebody who knew them for thirty.
Who can see what
Contributors see the page they are writing on and nothing else — not each other’s messages, not the book, not who else has been asked. You see everything. The person the book is about sees it when you give it to them.
If something is wrong
You can change anything up to the moment you approve it, and if you edit after approving, the book tells you it has changed and asks you to look again before ordering. If a printed book arrives damaged or wrong, we replace it.