Questions, answered plainly
What is this?
Dear Reader is a web app that delivers serialized, personalized horror fiction. You create an account, answer optional questions about yourself, and an AI writing engine weaves your answers into an authored story arc — a chapter about every week, with you as the protagonist. If you allow it, the story's antagonist occasionally writes to you by email between chapters.
How personal does it get?
Exactly as personal as you choose, and no further. You pick an intensity tier when you begin: Campfire uses only your name, region, and the surface fears you name; Under the Skin adds home details, routines, and the people you choose to mention; Too Close adds the deeper fears and griefs you volunteer. The story never uses material above your tier, you can list topics it must never touch, and you can turn everything down — or off — at any time.
Who writes it?
Software does. Every word of every chapter and letter is written by an AI engine, working from two things: the story arc's authored structure, and the details you chose to share. There is no human ghostwriter. The arcs themselves — their shape, their antagonists, how far each is allowed to go — are designed and curated with human care, but your chapters are written by a machine, for you alone. We'd rather tell you that plainly than sell you a mystique.
Is it safe? What if it stops being fun?
It's fiction, and it always says so — every page carries a reality anchor, and every letter is signed as fiction. If it ever stops being fun, the Lights On control is one tap: the story drops instantly to its gentlest register and the letters pause. And Dear Reader is entertainment for adults (18+) — it is not a crisis service, not therapy, and not monitored in real time by humans.
What does it know about me — and can I change that?
Everything the story knows about you lives on one page, called What the story knows, written in plain words — nothing hidden, nothing inferred behind your back. Correct a detail and the story quietly adjusts. Withdraw one and it leaves the story's memory entirely. You can download everything as JSON, or permanently delete your account and every trace of your story, whenever you like. The Privacy Policy is the formal version of this answer.
What are the letters?
If you opt in, the story's antagonist writes to you by email between chapters — in character, and always signed as fiction. You can write back (the story listens), ignore them, or stop them: every letter carries a one-click pause that is honored instantly, and Lights On pauses them too.
Is this like choose-your-own-adventure?
It's a fair comparison, and the difference is the point. Choose-your-own-adventure hands everyone the same pre-written branches and asks you to pick a path. Here there are no branches: nothing exists until it is written for you. The story asks about your life, not which door you'd open; it remembers you across whole arcs instead of forgetting you when the book closes; and no branching book ever wrote you a letter. This is what that shelf grew up into — a story with one path, written for one reader: you.
What does it cost?
Nothing, while we're in early access. Honestly: paid story arcs will likely come later — personalized fiction costs real money to write, even when software writes it. If that happens, prices will be stated plainly, and anything already written for you stays yours.
Can I keep my story?
Yes. When an arc ends, the story offers to be bound — a keepsake epub or PDF of the whole telling, cover and all. You can also download your data at any time. What was written for you is yours to keep.
Something unanswered? Write to us — or read a sample chapter and let the story answer for itself.