Website basics

Why a website? As an author, you have to have a home base, a site that provides information about:

• you
• your writing
• the events that you're a part of
• how to contact you, your agent and/or publisher
• (if you chose) your blog
• (if you chose) information for book clubs

Controlling your website
It's best to have a site you can update yourself (rather than paying someone to change a comma, for example).

This is easily done now by using sites such as Blogger or WordPress, which are free. (See the post below—"Setting up a Website"—to see how this is done.)

You can do it yourself, but you can also hire a designer to set one up for you. A 5-page site such as I'm suggesting might run $600 - $700.

Should you have a website for yourself and/or for your book?
If you have more than one book published, I think you have to have one for yourself. And then, you could also have sites for your books.

Some amazing websites have been created about the world of a book. 

See, for example, the website for Room, the novel by Emma Donoghue: http://www.roomthebook.com/

Another amazing book website for The Horse That Leaps Through Clouds incorporates the research done for each chapter: http://horsethatleaps.com/ 

Both of these have clearly been professionally designed. Some authors persuade their publishers to share the cost. In most cases, however, it comes out of the author's pocket. 

Your personal website would then include links to websites for each of your books.

Get your domain name address (i.e. www.yourname.com)
You have to pay an annual fee for this: it's rather like renting your URL, your spot on the Net.

There are many companies that do this (Google "domain name provider"). I use Domains at Cost. Because it's so important, I've set it to renew automatically every year.

Once you have one, hire a Tech Wiz to have your domain name be the URL address connect to your Blogger or WordPress website.