audiobook-factory — launch kit

1-liner

Public-domain (Project Gutenberg) → ElevenLabs narration → ACX-ready chapter MP3s. Royalty-share economics.

Tweet hook

60K+ public-domain books on Project Gutenberg. ElevenLabs narrates one for $5-15. ACX royalty: 25-40% per listen.

100-book catalog × 200 listens/mo × $0.05 royalty = $1000/mo passive.

Pipeline 🧵

Reddit

• r/audiobooks: "Open audiobook factory framework"
• r/audible: "Niche public-domain titles still selling on ACX"

Cold-email ICP

Existing ACX/Findaway producers; podcast hosts wanting to expand.

Cold-email template

Subject: 100-audiobook catalog in 60 days

Hi {first} — caught your audiobook portfolio.

Built a pipeline: Project Gutenberg fetch → chapterize → ElevenLabs
narrate → ACX upload. ~$5-15 production cost per book. 200 listens/mo
average royalty: $30-150/book.

100-book catalog: $3-15K/mo passive after ramp.

DIY MIT-licensed; DFY $499/book (we produce). Want to pick a niche?

SEO content

1. "Public-domain audiobook royalty math 2026"
2. "ACX exclusive vs non-exclusive economics"
3. "Niche selection: pre-1928 books still selling"

audiobook-factory

Public-domain & self-published audiobook factory. Project Gutenberg ingestion + ElevenLabs narration + chapter stitching + ACX/Findaway distribution.

Pricing models

• Operator-as-owner (royalty share with ACX): you keep ACX royalties (40% non-exclusive, 25% exclusive)
• DFY narration service $499 per book; the buyer keeps royalties
• White-label SaaS $99/mo unlimited generation

Why it works

• Public-domain catalog has 60K+ books (Gutenberg) + thousands of pre-1928-now-public titles (Gatsby, Mrs. Dalloway, etc.)
• Older self-help / philosophy / classics get strong audiobook listening hours per ACX dollar.
• Narration cost: ~$2-15 per book (ElevenLabs character pricing)
• ACX royalties on a niche-classic with 200 listens/mo: $30-150/mo passive
• Operator with a 100-book catalog: $3K-15K/mo passive after ramp

Architecture

sources.py    fetch from Project Gutenberg (or any UTF-8 text source)
   │
   ▼
chapterize.py detect chapters; split chapters into TTS-sized chunks
   │
   ▼
narrate.py    ElevenLabs TTS per chunk → MP3 chunks
   │
   ▼
stitch        ffmpeg concat → chapter MP3 → full book MP3
   │
   ▼
ACX / Findaway upload

Run

cd C:\openclaw-products\audiobook-factory
python -m venv .venv
.\.venv\Scripts\activate
pip install -e .
$env:ELEVENLABS_API_KEY="..."

# Pull a book
audiobook fetch 1342 --out books/pride-and-prejudice.txt

# See chapter list
audiobook chapterize books/pride-and-prejudice.txt

# Narrate one chapter (smoke test)
audiobook narrate-chapter \
    --text-file books/pride-and-prejudice.txt \
    --chapter 1 \
    --voice-id <eleven_voice_id> \
    --out audio/pride/ch01.mp3

Then on ACX, upload chapter files. ACX requires intro/outro per ACX spec (public-domain books are eligible for "Royalty Share" or "Exclusive 40%").

Roadmap

• Whole-book pipeline (audiobook full --book-id 1342 --voice X)
• Coqui-TTS / Piper local backend (free, slower)
• Multi-voice (different voice per character via Claude character-segmentation)
• ACX-spec audio normalization (-23 LUFS, intro/outro)
• Auto-upload to ACX (where API exists)
• Findaway Voices distribution