The best author websites all do the same quiet thing: they make the writing easy to find, easy to trust, and easy to buy, and they get everything else out of the way.
Most authors who sell books, land agents, or grow a mailing list do not have a busy site. They have a clear one. A cover, a way in, and one obvious next step.
Below are ten author websites built by working writers on Pixpa, grouped by what they write and drawn from a wider set of writer portfolio examples.
This is about the sites, not the shelves behind them, so each comes with the one design choice worth borrowing for your own.
What Makes a Great Author Website
A great author website leads with your work, not your CV. It shows the book or the writing first, gives a reader one clear path (buy it, read a sample, or join the list), and tells them who you are in a line before it tells them in a paragraph.
Most of that first impression lands in the hero section, and the page loads fast and reads well on a phone, because most readers arrive from a link on their phone.
Each site below earned its place on four things: how well the design serves the writing, how clearly the work is organized, whether the site does its commercial job, and how it holds up on a small screen. Not on prettiness, on the real problem it solves.
Novelist and Book Author Websites
Books sell on mood before they sell on plot. A book author's site has a few seconds to put a reader inside the world of the work, then a clear way to buy it or hear about the next one. These four do it in different registers.
MJ Flynn
Fiction: slow-burn romance and magic.
MJ Flynn opens on a full-bleed photograph of antique book spines in deep greens, burgundies and navy, with a single line of elegant serif over it: slow-burn love, dangerous magic, twists that keep you turning pages. The design sells the reading experience in one sentence before you have seen a single cover.
The color scheme is restrained, a dark hero over a white page with one magenta accent carried through every button. Lower down, a scrolling teaser strip of hooks from the books and a newsletter block keep a reader moving toward the next release.
Borrow this: open with one line that sells how your book feels to read, not what it is about. That sentence does more work than any synopsis.
Danielle Berggren
Fantasy fiction and worldbuilding.
Danielle Berggren builds a site that feels like stepping into the fictional universe itself. A gold, ornate celestial motif sits over a deep purple and blue nebula, and the small-caps serif and dark palette carry the tone of the series through every page, from the menu to the blog.
The site does more than set a mood. A themed newsletter, a store, and a running "From the blog" feed all sit under a navigation organized around the world she has written, so a reader can follow the universe, the books, or the news without hunting.
Borrow this: if your fiction has a built world, let the site's art direction be that world, so a reader is standing inside it before they have read a word.
Anne C. Eriksen
Historical non-fiction. Norway.
Anne C. Eriksen, publishing under her own aceriksen forlag imprint, runs a clean, literary site in black and white, with the book covers as the hero and a single amber accent for navigation. The monochrome is a deliberate match for the subject, historical stories of women's lives and emigration, and it lets the covers and archival photographs carry the page.
The serif typography reads like a small imprint rather than a personal blog, and the practical parts are easy to find: a clear ordering path, an "also now in audiobook" strip, and a straightforward about and contact structure. It is a book-selling site that looks like the books.
Borrow this: match the site's visual tone to your subject. The monochrome and archival photographs here signal serious history before a reader opens a single book.
Alexander Heil
Children's sports fiction, a handball series. Germany.
Alexander Heil's four-book children's series, Julian und die Handballprofis, treats the homepage as a shoppable catalog. Each cover gets its own panel with a bright orange buy button and a short endorsement, so a parent or a club can go from browsing to ordering in one move. The palette is high-energy: dark charcoal bands, clean white sections, colorful covers, and orange calls to action.
The branding is aimed squarely at the reader. A bold, graffiti-style series logo and sporty type speak to kids and handball families, and a video plus a quote under each book add the social proof a children's title needs to reach the adults who actually buy it.
Borrow this: if you sell a series, make every book individually shoppable, its own cover, its own buy button, its own line of proof, rather than one general shop link.
Poetry Author Websites
Poetry is the hardest thing to sell and the easiest to show. A poet's site works best when it puts an actual poem in front of you and gives you a reason to come back for the next one.
Waterside Poems
Poetry.
Waterside Poems pairs a natural, muted palette with a typewriter-style monospace font that signals "writer" before you read a word. A photograph of the poet writing outdoors sits next to a simple invitation to read weekly poetry pieces and hear about new projects.
The whole entry is built around one action, joining the list, which is exactly right for a poet publishing in instalments rather than in a single launch. The restraint is the point: no clutter, one path, a clear voice.
Borrow this: choose a typeface for what it signals, not just for legibility. A typewriter face reads as "writer" before a reader takes in a single line.
Rina Deshpande
Poetry, illustration and yoga.
Rina Deshpande, known as RinaThePoet, leads not with a photo of herself but with an illustrated, hand-lettered poem, so the first thing a visitor meets is the actual work. The layout is editorial and calm: serif headings, plenty of white space, and a clean two-column rhythm of image and text.
She writes across poetry, teaching and yoga, and the navigation keeps those lanes separate rather than blended into one feed. A store, a contact form and a clear "work with me" section turn interest into a next step without a reader digging for it.
Borrow this: lead with a piece of the actual work, an excerpt or a poem, so a visitor judges your writing rather than your bio.
Writer, Translator and Multidisciplinary Author Websites
Plenty of people who write also paint, translate or work on stage, and the risk is a site that feels like two portfolios stapled together. These keep a wide practice coherent.
Elizabeth Nelson
Writer, artist and playwright.
Elizabeth Nelson opens on a single, arresting image, a paper-flower bouquet in coral and yellow against a deep teal wall, with her name, the line "writer. artist. playwright.", and one "welcome" button to enter. It is a splash page, and it works because the image sets a mood before the work begins.
The palette does a lot of the work, warm coral against cool teal, and the thin lowercase sans keeps it quiet and contemporary. For a multidisciplinary maker, that one line of identity does more than a paragraph of bio ever could.
Borrow this: one strong image and a three-word identity line are enough to be the whole front door, as long as the image is unmistakably yours.
Faith McClure
Visual art and writing.
Faith McClure gives the whole page to a single dense, figurative painting in deep blues and reds, framed by generous white space and a quiet lowercase sans wordmark. The chrome all but disappears so the work fills the screen.
The navigation is where the multidisciplinary practice is handled: separate sections for images, multimedia and writing let a visitor choose the strand they came for, instead of scrolling one mixed feed. The restraint keeps a busy body of work from feeling chaotic.
Borrow this: if you work across forms, split them into named sections in the navigation, so each visitor self-selects instead of scrolling one mixed feed.
Historische Übersetzungen
Literary and specialist translation. Germany.
Historische Übersetzungen opens with a single oversized word, ÜBERSETZER (translator), set in a heavy grotesque sans that fills the screen. It is typography as identity: one word, one job, stated at scale before anything else. The austere black, white and gray palette, with no accent color at all, suits serious text work for museums, publishers and academic presses.
Below the statement, a portrait and a plain description of the specialism do the reassuring, and a "notes of a translator" blog plus a Polish-language toggle show range without clutter. There is no store, because the product is the service.
Borrow this: at scale, one word can be the entire layout. If the type is strong enough, strip everything else away and let it stand alone.
Elif Sezen
Poetry, writing and visual art. Turkish-Australian.
Elif Sezen works across poetry, writing and visual art. The homepage sets a single vivid work, a field of red plant forms opening around a glowing blue orb, against a deep navy backdrop patterned with tone-on-tone leaves, and places the artist herself inside the composition rather than tucked onto an about page. A refined serif wordmark and letter-spaced serif navigation keep the whole thing literary.
The distinctive move is placing the author inside the hero itself. Rather than a headshot filed on an about page, Elif stands within the composition, in front of the work and against the same patterned backdrop, so a reader meets the person and the art in a single glance. A tidy serif menu, Works, Publications, News and Contact, keeps everything else quiet around it.
Borrow this: put yourself inside the hero, part of the composition rather than a headshot on a separate page, so a reader meets you and the work in the same glance.
What the Best Author Websites Have in Common
Look across all of them and the same handful of decisions keep coming up. None are about taste. They are about getting out of the writing's way.
- One clear entrance beats a crowded homepage. MJ Flynn's single line over a dark hero and Elizabeth Nelson's one-image splash pull a reader straight in, where a wall of covers and links would just hand them the job of sorting.
- The mailing list is the author's real asset. Waterside Poems, MJ Flynn and Danielle Berggren all build the page around joining the list, because for a working author the next reader matters more than the next click.
- Make the buy obvious. Alexander Heil's handball series puts a buy button and an endorsement under every cover, and Anne C. Eriksen keeps ordering one click away, so admiration turns into a sale without a reader hunting for it.
- Show the work, not a description of it. Rina Deshpande's illustrated poem and Anne C. Eriksen's covers put the actual thing on the page, so a reader judges the writing, not the layout.
- A face on the page helps. Elif Sezen stands inside her hero composition and Rina Deshpande appears mid-work, so a reader connects the writing to a person, not just a wordmark.
- Restraint wins. Faith McClure's near-invisible chrome and Historische Übersetzungen's single oversized word keep the focus on the words. That kind of white space is doing real work, and the calmest sites here read the best.
- Speed and mobile are not optional. Most of these readers arrive on a phone from a link. Heavy images stall and layouts shift, so test on a small screen before you call a site done.
How to Structure Your Author Website by Goal
An author site built to sell books is built differently from one chasing agents or commissions. Decide what the site is for, then structure it around that.
| If your goal is | Build the site around | Easy to get wrong |
|---|---|---|
| Selling books direct | Covers up front, a clear buy or pre-order path, and a store that takes zero commission | Hiding the buy button, or showing no price or format |
| Growing a readership | A named newsletter, a sample or free chapter, and a reason to return | A signup box with no reason attached to it |
| Landing an agent or publisher | A short bio, publication credits, and clean, readable sample work | Treating it like a store with no writing to read |
| Winning freelance or commissioned writing | A few strong pieces with the brief and outcome, plus fast contact | Finished work with no context and a contact form you ignore |
Most authors build the newsletter row first, because the list is the one asset that follows you from book to book.
Common Author Website Mistakes to Avoid
Beyond the mistakes that weaken any portfolio, five are specific to author sites, easy to miss and quick to fix once you spot them.
- A homepage that talks instead of shows. A long "about me" above the fold buries the writing. Lead with the book, the poem or the sample, and let the bio sit one click away.
- A newsletter box with no promise. "Sign up for updates" converts far worse than "read a new poem every week" or "get the first chapter free." Attach a reason to the ask.
- No sample to read. Readers buy writing they have read a little of. A free chapter, a few poems, or an excerpt does more than any blurb.
- A contact form pointed at an inbox you ignore. An agent query or a commission that sits unread for a week is a lost opportunity. Send the form somewhere you check, and reply fast.
- Missing alt text and page titles. Search engines and AI cannot read a cover image. Describe your books and pages in plain words so the right readers can find them, with SEO tools that handle the basics for you.
How to Build Your Own Author Website
You do not need to code or hire a developer. The process is short.
- Start a free trial, no credit card needed.
- Pick a clean template that puts your writing first.
- Add your books or writing, a short bio, and a sample to read.
- Set up a newsletter signup with a real reason to join, and a store if you sell direct.
- Connect your domain, check it on your phone, and publish.
The Bottom Line
The author websites that work are not the loudest ones. They are the ones that get out of the way: the writing first, one clear path for the reader, a mailing list that grows book to book, and a page that loads fast on a phone.
Every site above started with one writer, a few images, and a template. If you have the writing, the site is the easy part.
Author Website FAQs
What is the best website for authors?
There is no single best platform. Pixpa fits authors who want their writing, a store for selling books direct, and a mailing list in one place, with writer-friendly templates and live human support. Squarespace suits those who want the largest template marketplace, and Wix leans on an AI-assisted builder. The right one is whichever gets your book in front of readers with the least friction.
How much does it cost to have an author website?
Pixpa's plans start at $5.40 a month on an annual Basic plan, and every plan comes with a 15-day free trial with no card up front, plus a 30-day money-back guarantee. The current pricing is broken down by tier.
How do I create an author website?
Pick a platform, choose a clean template, add your books or writing and a short bio, set up a newsletter signup and a store if you sell direct, then connect your domain and publish. Most authors are live in an afternoon. Our guide to the best website builders for authors walks through choosing the platform first.
What should an author website include?
At a minimum: your books or writing with a way to read a sample, a short bio, a clear buy or pre-order path if you sell, a newsletter signup with a reason to join, and easy contact. The harder part is curation, and pulling a writing portfolio together is as much about what you leave out as what you put in. Publication credits or an exhibition list help if you are pitching agents, editors or grant committees.
How many pages does an author website need?
Fewer than most people think. A homepage, a books or writing page, an about page, and a contact page cover most authors. Add a blog or a news page only if you will actually keep it current, since a stale feed reads worse than none.
Do authors still need a website if they have social media?
Yes. Social platforms rent you an audience on their terms and can change the rules overnight. A website and a mailing list are the one channel you own, and the one that follows you from book to book.