--- title: "Book writing software for a novel in Vietnamese" description: "Write and typeset a Vietnamese novel: stacked diacritics that do not collide, twelve book faces that carry the full set, and a print-ready PDF for a Vietnamese printer." source: https://usegalley.com/book-writing-software-vietnamese --- # Book writing software for writing a novel in Vietnamese TL;DR Vietnamese stacks a tone mark on a vowel that already carries one, and that stacking is where fonts fail. Twelve of the fifteen book faces carry the full Vietnamese set and the other three are hidden on a Vietnamese book. There is no hyphenation, so set it ragged right. Tiếng Việt ## Cách viết một cuốn tiểu thuyết bằng tiếng Việt Galley là nơi bạn viết tiểu thuyết và làm ra cuốn sách. Bạn viết từ câu đầu tiên trên một trang sách thật: khổ sách của bạn, lề của bạn, phông chữ của cuốn sách in. Mười hai phông chữ sách mang đầy đủ bộ dấu tiếng Việt, tất cả đều có giấy phép tự do nên bạn được bán những gì mình in ra. Cuối cùng bạn có một tệp PDF sẵn sàng cho nhà in và một tệp EPUB hợp lệ. Giao diện bằng tiếng Anh; cuốn sách bằng tiếng Việt. ## Why Galley is the right book writing software for a novel in Vietnamese Vietnamese uses the Latin alphabet, which is exactly why tools get away with failing it. The problem is stacking. A Vietnamese vowel can carry a diacritic of its own, like ơ or ê, and then a tone mark on top of that, giving ế, ộ, ữ. Two marks, one letter, and the font has to draw the combination rather than piling one glyph on another. A face that carries every character in Latin Extended and stops there will render Vietnamese as a stack of collisions, or drop the tone entirely, and in print you cannot tell what happened until you look at a proof. Twelve of the fifteen book faces carry the full Vietnamese set. The other three are hidden on a Vietnamese book, so you cannot pick one by accident and find out at export. Two things Galley does not do, said plainly: **there is no hyphenation for Vietnamese**, so justify with care or set the book ragged right, and **Amazon does not list Vietnamese in any format**, so the print PDF and the EPUB are the whole product. Everything else is the same app: a [true book page](https://usegalley.com/features/make-the-book) at your trim, the [story bible](https://usegalley.com/features/story-bible) beside the manuscript, a print-ready PDF and a valid EPUB. ## How Vietnamese gets typeset **Stacked diacritics are drawn, not piled.** That is a property of the face, and the language filter is what keeps you on faces that have it. **Leading matters more than in English.** Two marks above a letter need room, and a Vietnamese page set at English leading looks cramped. The [typeface page](https://usegalley.com/docs/book-design#typeface) has the per-face leading Galley uses. **There is no hyphenation.** Justification is off by default and ragged right never needs it, which is the right default here. **Sorting is Vietnamese**, so a cast list comes out in the right order rather than folding the tones away. **Italics work**, and the shelf carries a real italic throughout. ## The typefaces you get for Vietnamese Twelve faces carry the full Vietnamese set, all under the [SIL Open Font License](https://openfontlicense.org/). **Lora** handles the stacking cleanly and reads warm at body size. ![Sample sentence in Lora](https://usegalley.com/images/specimens/lora-vi.png) **Source Serif 4** sets an even page and has careful diacritic placement. ![Sample sentence in Source Serif 4](https://usegalley.com/images/specimens/source-serif-vi.png) **Newsreader** was drawn for long-form reading and holds up small. ![Sample sentence in Newsreader](https://usegalley.com/images/specimens/newsreader-vi.png) The rest: EB Garamond, Crimson Pro, Cormorant, Literata, Spectral, Alegreya, Vollkorn, Gentium Book Plus and Charis SIL. **Vietnamese is the one script on this shelf with no gap worth naming.** It sets in Latin type, and the faces above are the same ones a Vietnamese publisher would choose, provided they carry the stacking. The [typeface documentation](https://usegalley.com/docs/book-design#typeface) lists every face by language. ## Exports for a Vietnamese novel - **Print-ready PDF** at your trim, mirrored margins, real gutter, font embedded. - **EPUB 3** with your cover, tagged `vi`. - **Store-ready EPUBs** for Kobo and Apple Books. - **Word and Markdown** for a biên tập viên or an archive. - **Manuscript format**, double-spaced. - **A proofreading PDF** two pages to a sheet, and a **large print PDF**. - **A watermarked copy per beta reader**. The Amazon-shaped tools switch off on a Vietnamese book and say why. ## Vietnamese punctuation Vietnamese sets speech with a dash at the head of the line in most fiction, and with the curly pair when quoting inside a paragraph. Both are characters you type. The [dialogue punctuation rules](https://usegalley.com/resources/dialogue-punctuation-rules) and [dashes, hyphens and ellipses](https://usegalley.com/resources/dashes-hyphens-and-ellipses) sheets cover the general cases. ## How long a Vietnamese novel is Vietnamese publishers quote length in words and printed pages. Vietnamese is monosyllabic in writing, so word counts run high against English for the same story, and the page count projection is the more useful number. The [word count to page count converter](https://usegalley.com/resources/word-count-to-page-count) helps here. ## Trim sizes for a Vietnamese book Six standards, from mass market at 4.25×6.87 inches to Royal at 6.14×9.21. Vietnamese trade fiction is commonly issued around 13×20.5cm or 14.5×20.5cm, which land near the Digest at 5.5×8.5 inches. The [spine width calculator](https://usegalley.com/resources/book-spine-width-calculator) and the [trim size comparison](https://usegalley.com/resources/book-trim-size-comparison) would be helpful here. ## Metadata and the copyright page The [copyright page](https://usegalley.com/docs/publishing#copyright-page) writes itself from the metadata you filled in. A Vietnamese ISBN is issued through a licensed publisher rather than directly to an author, which shapes how a domestic edition happens. ## Translating into or out of Vietnamese A translation in Galley is its own book: its own language, its own typeface shelf, its own ISBN, its own cover, still linked to the original, with the editor split so the original sits read-only beside what you write. There are pages on [writing a novel in Thai](https://usegalley.com/book-writing-software-thai), [writing a novel in Indonesian](https://usegalley.com/book-writing-software-indonesian), [writing a novel in Malay](https://usegalley.com/book-writing-software-malay) and [writing a novel in Korean](https://usegalley.com/book-writing-software-korean). No machine touches the prose. Galley has [no AI anywhere near your writing](https://usegalley.com/blog/no-ai-in-your-prose). ## Self-publishing and traditional publishing in Vietnamese **Self-publishing.** Amazon is closed to Vietnamese, and domestic publishing in Vietnam runs through licensed publishers, so a diaspora edition through IngramSpark or a direct print run is the common route. The same print PDF works for both. **Traditional publishing.** The [submission package](https://usegalley.com/docs/publishing#where-it-goes) assembles the synopsis, the bio and the opening chapters, which is what a publisher inside or outside Vietnam will want to see. The same book exports both. The longer arguments are in [Galley for self-publishing](https://usegalley.com/blog/galley-for-self-publishing) and [Galley for traditional publishing](https://usegalley.com/blog/galley-for-traditional-publishing). ## Where to go next - [Writing software for novelists who don’t write in English](https://usegalley.com/blog/write-a-novel-in-your-language) covers every script Galley sets. - [Book design and typefaces](https://usegalley.com/docs/book-design#typeface) lists every face by language. - [Series and translations](https://usegalley.com/docs/series-and-translations) covers the full language list. - [Book typography basics](https://usegalley.com/blog/book-typography-basics) is the set of rules that makes a page look made. ## Questions people ask about writing a novel in Vietnamese ### Which fonts can set Vietnamese? Twelve of the fifteen book faces carry the full Vietnamese set, including the stacked diacritics. The other three are hidden on a Vietnamese book instead of offered and then discovered at export. ### Does Galley hyphenate Vietnamese? No. Vietnamese has no hyphenation patterns in Galley, so justify with care or set the book ragged right. Justification is off by default. ### Can I sell a Vietnamese book on Amazon KDP? No. Amazon does not list Vietnamese in any format. The print PDF goes to a Vietnamese printer or IngramSpark, and the EPUB goes to any store that sells Vietnamese. ### Do the stacked tone marks come out correctly in the print PDF? Yes, provided the face carries them, which is what the language filter is for. The mark sits above the vowel's own diacritic instead of colliding with it or replacing it. ## Other languages - [Book writing software for Thai](https://usegalley.com/book-writing-software-thai)Write and typeset a Thai novel: character counting because Thai has no word spaces, stacked vowels and tone marks that do not collide, two book faces and a print-ready PDF. - [Book writing software for Indonesian](https://usegalley.com/book-writing-software-indonesian)Write and typeset an Indonesian novel: fifteen book faces licensed for sale, a print-ready PDF for an Indonesian printer, and a valid EPUB. Including what Galley does not do for Indonesian. - [Book writing software for Korean](https://usegalley.com/book-writing-software-korean)Write and typeset a Korean novel: Myeongjo faces embedded in the print PDF, Korean chapter headings, word counting that works because Korean spaces its words, and a print-ready file. Start the book. Galley sets it in Vietnamese from the first sentence to the print PDF. [Launch Galley](https://app.usegalley.com)