Next Chapters is a hidden gem of a niche publishing company housed on the first floor of Gannon University’s Center for Business Ingenuity. 

The service as a whole is a website that offers an abundance of information to help experienced and amateur writers become published. 

It is completely free to register at www.nextchapters.com and figure out if this is a path feasible for your artistic journey.  

This is a completely organic concept and a fresh company, having only been an established entity since November. The business opened to the public March 15.  

What makes Next Chapters so innovative is that it is a website where writers can submit chapters, as many or as few as they would like, where their work can be added to or finished by anyone interested in the characters, plot and other literary elements they have created.  

Essentially, a book that begins with one author can end with hundreds of contributors, and everyone is compensated for their share of the work if the book makes money after being completed and published.   

The creator, CEO and president of Next Chapters is Erie native Tim Vickey.   

“It’s a concept that has never been done before,” Vickey said. “We are a disruptor in the publishing industry.” 

“Random house would either lose their mind or give me so much money when they find out about it.” 

Vickey said that his big push to starting this company after years of thinking about it began with a tragedy.  

“Eighty percent of Americans have that bucket list to write a book,” Vickey said. “I want to write a book before I die.” 

“My mom, one of the last things she said before she passed away was ‘I wish I wrote that book’ which kind of resonated with me. That’s what got me from just kind of dwelling on the idea for a decade to let’s turn it into a company.” 

Vickey said right after this happened in his life, Gannon reached out to help him find a place here for his company, which seems like a divine-intervention kind of opportunity.  

As the company is still in its alpha phases, Vickey is wearing all the hats right now at Next Chapters. 

“With any small business, you’re looking at the staff,” said Vickey.  

“Any entrepreneur will tell you you get to be CEO, CFO, CTO, lawyer, consultant, graphic designer, writer, marketer, you name it.” 

Although a lot of the responsibility is on Vickey’s shoulders, he does contract out a lot of responsibilities, and he is open to taking in interns, student staffers and Gannon graduates to be a part of his team as the company expands. 

His ultimate goal is to help those who want help to become published, get published. He strives to help and provide a stress-free process.  

You don’t have to be an experienced writer to write for Next Chapters, and you don’t even have to want to make money from a story. It is a free platform for authors of all kinds to save and submit their work. 

The platform is also open to those pursuing editing as well.  

If you want to know which of the five types of writers you are, the website offers a 12-question quiz to help you figure it out to help get you started. 

Next Chapters staff members offer feedback on your work; they will proofread and edit it. Or, if you are not a writer but want to be an author, they can provide ghost writers to help you bring your idea to fruition.  

Vickey said that he is willing to sit down with any author at any time to help them guide their story. After all, this is his dream job nearly 30 years in the making. 

The website has an FAQ section to help with any concerns future publishers have. But if you don’t see your question, there is a section where you can send in your question, and they will get back to you as soon as they can.  

By signing up for their email list, you can also receive writing tips and updates from Next Chapters.  

“I’m looking for people wanting to tell stories to come and try their hand at novel writing,” Vickey said.  

“And at these early stages of the writing platform being live, I am doing what I can to help out that first wave of users coming to the site with a little incentive to create content and get things moving.” 

Regardless of where you are at in your authorial process or story-telling journey, or what you plan to do with your talents, the small team at Next Chapters wants to help you accomplish your dream of publishing your work.  

“I want to take all of those burdens and drawbacks of writing out of people’s lives and let them be an artist,” said Vickey.  

 ALI SMITH

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CHARLIZE HARDING

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