Compose
The Compose tab is where you write outgoing email. It’s a standard compose interface — recipient, subject, body, send — but with a few Ishvana-specific additions that make author correspondence faster. Hawken can draft messages from prompts using your project context. Templates fill in boilerplate so you’re not retyping “Dear [agent name], I hope this finds you well” for the hundredth time. Attachments pull from your project’s existing files (manuscripts, Legendry exports, book covers) so you’re not hunting through your file system for the PDF you need to attach. The goal isn’t to make email fun — email will never be fun — but to cut the time-per-message from “this is going to take me twenty minutes” to “this is going to take me five.”
The tab is reachable from the Email module’s main navigation, from a “Reply” action in the Inbox, or as a standalone “New Message” surface when you want to start fresh.
The compose form
Section titled “The compose form”A standard email compose form with:
- From. The account to send from. Defaults to the active account, or to the account that received the original message (if replying).
- To. Recipient email addresses. Multiple allowed, comma-separated.
- Cc / Bcc. Optional carbon copy and blind carbon copy fields. Hidden by default; click to expand.
- Subject. The message subject.
- Body. The message content. Supports plain text or HTML mode.
- Attachments. File upload area plus a “pick from project” option.
- Send button.
The body editor is lightweight — not the full TipTap editor from the Writing module. It supports basic formatting (bold, italic, bullet lists, numbered lists, links) but not anything exotic. The email format isn’t trying to match your manuscript’s rich formatting; it’s trying to look professional and readable.
Replying
Section titled “Replying”When you click Reply from the Inbox, the compose form pre-fills:
- From — set to the account that received the original message.
- To — set to the original sender.
- Subject — prefixed with “Re: ” (or reused if already prefixed).
- Body — quotes the original message below a cursor position where your response goes.
Reply All does the same but preserves the original Cc recipients. Forward uses “Fwd: ” prefix and quotes the full original message without setting a recipient (you pick the new recipient yourself).
Templates
Section titled “Templates”Click the Templates dropdown and pick a template to insert its content into the current compose form. Templates are reusable email drafts with placeholder fields that get filled in when used.
Example built-in templates:
- Query letter. An agent query with placeholders for agent name, genre, word count, comp titles, pitch, book info, personal note, and author bio. Fills in from your project’s Market Intel and Query Letters subtab.
- Beta reader invite. An invitation to beta read a manuscript with placeholders for the reader’s name, the book title, the expected timeline, and a link to the manuscript file.
- Agent follow-up. A follow-up message for agents who haven’t responded within the expected window.
- Offer response — accept. For responding to an offer of representation.
- Offer response — decline. For declining.
- Reader thank-you. A response to a reader who sent positive feedback.
- Review request. For asking beta readers or advance reviewers to post reviews.
You can also create your own templates from the Templates tab. Custom templates work the same way as built-in ones.
Inserting a template replaces or appends to the current body content, depending on the template’s configuration. Placeholder fields are highlighted so you can scan through and fill them in before sending.
Hawken-assisted drafting
Section titled “Hawken-assisted drafting”The compose toolbar has an Ask Hawken button that opens a small prompt overlay. Describe what you want the message to say, and Hawken drafts it for you.
Example prompts:
- “Write a query letter to agent Sarah Davis for my fantasy novel. Comp titles: X and Y. 90,000 words. Pitch the hook first.”
- “Write a polite follow-up to this email I received last week asking about a timeline.”
- “Write a short thank-you to a beta reader who gave me useful feedback.”
Hawken reads your project context (active project, relevant Legendry, relevant Market Intel) and writes a draft appropriate to the prompt. The draft appears in the body field — you can edit it, send it as-is, or regenerate with different instructions.
Hawken’s drafts are starting points, not finished products. Always read and edit before sending. The agent doesn’t know everything about your relationship with the recipient, so some drafts will be off-tone and need editing.
Attachments
Section titled “Attachments”Two ways to attach files:
Local files
Section titled “Local files”Drag a file from your file manager onto the compose form, or click the attachment icon and pick a file. The file gets attached to the outgoing message.
Project files
Section titled “Project files”A Pick from project option in the attachment menu opens a picker that lets you select files directly from your project’s data directory. The picker is organized by type:
- Documents. Your manuscript files (DOCX).
- Exports. Recently-generated exports (PDF, DOCX, EPUB from Bookmaker).
- Visual assets. Images from your Visual Gallery.
- Character sheets. PDF exports of character sheets.
- Research. Saved research bookmarks or extracted content.
Picking a project file attaches it to the message without requiring you to remember where it lives on disk. For author workflows — emailing a manuscript to an agent, sending a cover image to a publicist, sharing a character sheet with a co-author — this is significantly faster than hunting through your filesystem.
Click Send and the message goes out via the account’s configured SMTP server. The send is synchronous — you see a confirmation when it completes successfully or an error if it fails.
After a successful send, the message is stored in the account’s Sent folder (if IMAP is configured) and also in Ishvana’s local outbox. You can see sent messages in the Inbox tab by filtering to “Sent” or by selecting the Sent folder from the account dropdown.
Drafts
Section titled “Drafts”Compose auto-saves drafts as you type. If you close the compose tab without sending, the draft persists and you can return to it from the Drafts folder. Drafts are stored locally and also in the account’s Drafts folder on the IMAP server (if supported).
Long drafts that you want to come back to days later are fine — Ishvana won’t auto-discard drafts just because they’re old. You delete drafts explicitly when you’re done with them.
Send as a campaign (advanced)
Section titled “Send as a campaign (advanced)”For bulk author outreach — sending the same message to multiple agents as part of a query round, or sending a newsletter-style update to multiple recipients — the compose tab supports campaign mode. Click the campaigns icon to open the campaign composer.
Campaign mode:
- Takes a template and a recipient list. The template has placeholder fields; the recipient list has values for each recipient.
- Personalizes per recipient. Each message is generated with the recipient’s specific values, so “Dear [Agent]” becomes “Dear Sarah” for one send and “Dear Mike” for another.
- Schedules the sends. Messages can be sent immediately or scheduled for later (spacing out over hours or days to avoid looking spammy).
- Tracks send status. Each message in the campaign has a status — queued, sent, delivered, bounced, replied.
Campaign mode is specifically for things like query letter rounds (Query Letters), beta reader invitations, or review outreach. Don’t use it for personal correspondence; the personalization is mechanical, not thoughtful, and over-using campaigns can start to feel like spam.
What Compose isn’t
Section titled “What Compose isn’t”- Not a mail merge for newsletters. Real newsletters belong on a dedicated service like MailerLite, Buttondown, or ConvertKit that handles unsubscribes, CAN-SPAM compliance, open rates, click tracking, and delivery at scale. Campaign mode is for dozens of author emails, not hundreds of newsletter sends.
- Not a scheduled sending service. Scheduled sends are supported but they only fire when Ishvana is running. Closing the app before the scheduled time means the send doesn’t happen. For reliable scheduled sends, use your mail provider’s schedule feature or a dedicated service.
- Not encryption-first. Ishvana sends email via standard SMTP with TLS. PGP, S/MIME, or end-to-end encryption for sensitive correspondence aren’t supported.
- Not a PR tool. The Marketing module has press and influencer outreach features, but the compose form itself is a general-purpose email compose — not a PR campaign manager.