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Book Vault Structure Template

A fill-in-the-blank starting point for organizing an Obsidian vault around a book manuscript.

Top-Level Structure

[your-book-vault]/
├── Book/
│   └── drafts/
│       └── Draft 1/
│           ├── 01-[Part-1-Name]/
│           │   ├── 00-Part-Intro.md
│           │   ├── 01-[Chapter-1-Name]/
│           │   │   ├── 00-Chapter-Intro.md
│           │   │   ├── 01-[Section-1].md
│           │   │   ├── 02-[Section-2].md
│           │   │   └── 99-Chapter-Summary.md
│           │   └── 02-[Chapter-2-Name]/
│           │       └── ...
│           ├── 02-[Part-2-Name]/
│           │   └── ...
│           └── [NN]-[Part-N-Name]/
│               └── ...
├── concepts/              # Atomic concept notes (one per idea)
├── mocs/                  # Maps of Content (navigation hubs)
├── notes/
│   ├── research/          # Research notes per chapter
│   │   ├── Chapter_01/
│   │   │   └── answers/   # Research answers by section
│   │   └── Chapter_02/
│   │       └── ...
│   └── case-studies/      # Case study notes
├── planning/              # Writing reference documents
├── templates/             # Templater templates
├── _author/               # Voice system files
├── _prompts/              # AI prompt library
├── Dashboard.md           # Progress tracking dashboard
└── .obsidian/             # Obsidian settings and plugins

Naming Conventions

Content Type Pattern Example
Part folder XX-Part-Name/ 01-Foundations/
Chapter folder XX-Chapter-Name/ 03-Market-Analysis/
Part intro 00-Part-Intro.md Always 00- prefix
Chapter intro 00-Chapter-Intro.md Always 00- prefix
Section file XX-Section-Name.md 02-Competitive-Landscape.md
Chapter summary 99-Chapter-Summary.md Always 99- prefix

Use kebab-case for folder and file names. Numbers are zero-padded to two digits.

Your Book Structure

Fill in your book's breakdown:

Part Name Chapters Sections/Chapter
1 [Part 1 Name] Ch [X]-[Y] ~[N] sections
2 [Part 2 Name] Ch [X]-[Y] ~[N] sections
3 [Part 3 Name] Ch [X]-[Y] ~[N] sections
4 [Part 4 Name] Ch [X]-[Y] ~[N] sections

Totals: [X] parts, [Y] chapters, ~[Z] sections Word targets: [TOTAL] words (~[PER CHAPTER] per chapter, ~[PER SECTION] per section)

Plugin Purpose
Dataview Dynamic queries on frontmatter fields
Templater Auto-fill templates when creating notes
Novel Word Count In-editor word counts per file/folder
Kanban Visual chapter status tracking
Writing Goals Per-file word count targets

Customization Checklist

  • Replace all [PLACEHOLDERS] with your book's values
  • Decide on number of parts and chapters
  • Set word targets per chapter and section
  • Install recommended plugins
  • Create the folder structure before writing