The Newbies Writers Podcast hosts Catherine Bramkamp (@cbramkamp) and Damien Boath (@newbiewriters )will be interviewing me interviewed me this evening on their show. We talked about some WordPress Tips for Authors. That is the types of authors that write books as opposed to blogs or news stories or technical materials or greeting cards or haikus on twitter.
Question what is the English version of Haiku in the plural form?
I met Catherine myself at the Podcast Awards during New Media Expo in Las Vegas in January 2013. The Newbie Writers Podcast was nominated for an award (competing against Grammar Girl I believe). I’ve been a subscriber and listener of their podcast ever since. I typically listen to it and Twit and Twit’s This Week in Ipad show while I’m getting some exercise riding my bike around the neighborhood. It’s a very entertaining show and the tips have definitely helped me.
Update
After the show, I had a bit of an epiphany and figured out how my own murder mystery fiction book (Peter3d Out) could be tied together. It’s something I’ve been a little stuck on for months, but now see how ‘the murder was committed” and think I see a path forward to help the detective solve said mystery. We talk a bit about my book and my background in the early part of the show and get into some WordPress tips and more towards the latter half of the show.
Checkout the show here, it was the March 23, 2013 episode 76: WordPress it with Brett Bumeter.
Great Articles for Book Authors using WordPress
Before I get into my unique tips, I do want to say that WPMU has some amazingly detailed tips and plugins and setup ideas for writers of books. Frankly, I wish I had found these myself two years ago, but didn’t find them until I was prepping for this interview.
- How to Organize an Online Book in WordPress (Novel or Non-Fiction)
- Essential WordPress Plugins for Book Authors Building a Platform
Some Essential WordPress Plugins, tools and Services for a Book Author’s Blog
WordPress Plugins for Book Authors on WordPress
- Powerpress
- Inbound Writer – Free version is probably enough although heavy writers or bloggers may benefit from the premium version
- Inline Editor – This functionality might be coming to standard WordPress soon. This plugin has not been updated in years and may be a little buggy so exercise with caution.
- Genesis Single Post Navigation – This is just for people running a theme from StudioPress on the Genesis Framework (highly recommend). You may also need this little code added in your functions.php file depending on how you structure your writing, chapters, sections etc in WordPress
- /** * Genesis Single Post Navigation: Reverse link direction */ define( ‘GSPN_REVERSE_LINK_DIRECTION’, TRUE );
- Facebook Comments for WordPress – if possible it’s always better to have your visitors comment and talk with you and about your book in front of their friends!
- After the Deadline (only available now in the Jetpack Plugin)
- Don’t miss the Really Simple Series plugin and the Post Series Plugin both mentioned in the WPMU.org articles above!
Hosting for Book Authors running WordPress
I’m recommending something called ‘Managed Hosting’ which is also known as premium WordPress hosting. Basically, they take care of optimizing your WordPress installation, protecting it, backing it up, keeping plugins up to date and more.
Think of it as paying a little extra so that you never have to worry about your website. You just want to write and not become a server administrator right?
Well these services can help!
On a book writing note, also check out Damien and Catherine’s sites at
- NewbieWriters.com
- YourBookStartsHere.com
- NewbieWritersGuide.wordpress.com
- facebook.com/NewbieWritersGroup/
That last link includes a page where Catherine provides a Start Your Book Kit For Newbie Writers Kit for free!
(click the image to go check it out or send her an email direct)
