As an author, it has become increasingly apparent to me that a WordPress theme can make or break a blog – and for writers, clean white themes enhance the written word, as well as provide a clean canvas for supporting images or book cover photos. WordPress themes for authors should be also elegant and allow your blog posts room to breathe. Here is a list of 7 themes that are easily customizable for authors and that also help to reflect an author’s unique voice and brand. First, I will mention the characteristics of an ideal theme.
Characteristics to Look for in WordPress Themes for Authors
For writers, a WordPress theme should help readers focus on the content instead of competing for their attention with flashy sidebars. Your aim is to attract people and get them to read through the entire length of your work. You need to use a theme that makes it easy on their eyes. The ideal themes would be those that:
- Have a clean type/font.
- Have a clean background or are easy to manipulate.
- Have narrow columns.
- Do NOT require images.
Now, here are the top 7 themes for authors in no particular rating order:
1. The Erudite
This is a free, open source theme for writers. The Erudite is most suitable for writers who are keen or attracting readers, not just site visitors, traffic, CPMs or click-throughs. The theme is simple and even leaves the words placed on the virtual page naked and alone so that there is nothing competing with them for the reader’s attention. There is nothing to cause a distraction that would divert their attention from your writing. The Erudite theme was specifically created for writers with the main focus on typography rather than images and design.
WordPress for Writers has some specific layout options to make passionate writers happy. There’s a possibility to add large article images and beautifully styled quotes. You can also start article series, add author images. All this goodness is wrapped up in a fully responsive design. WordPress For Writers takes makes your texts look smart and allows you to do what you do best: write.
The coder of this theme is Curt Ziegler whose tagline is ‘creating sites that breathe’. Smart Portfolio is a beautiful theme that does breathe a lot. The theme is a perfect solution that satisfies the needs of an author as it is more than just a blog, and essentially a complete content management system. Changing the ‘portfolio’ item on the menu to ‘books’ is all that is required and you are ready to go. With Smart Portfolio, writers enjoy a good aesthetic, pleasing icons, line length, footer, tagline area, contact form, and technical support. Once the writer personalizes the theme with their own pictures and content, they will have a classy site that readers will love to use.
4. Typominima
Typominima is a free typography based WordPress theme. It has some beautiful brushed and elegant fonts that all together might fit for the writer inside you. Typominima enables blog authors, writers and publishers to express themselves online in a clean and free of fuss environment.
5. Minimal
This theme falls in the category of a clean and minimal WordPress theme. It is suitable for blogs and portfolios. The platform gives content the kind of presentation that will make it stand out; the kind it deserves. Features of Minimal include:
- Customization options on a backend.
- Custom Fading Taglines.
- Custom widgets: Social Media, Stylish Recent Posts.
- Styling options.
6. Manifest
This WordPress theme is ultra clean and flexible, sporting a modern and minimalist design. Those qualities make Manifest a suitable choice for creative blogs, portfolios and galleries among others. There are 10 predefined skins for you to choose from, along with over 40 eye-pleasing fonts. The theme is clean and streamlined theme so that the focus can be on the content. Manifest has a single column, a 500 pixel wide layout, no sidebars and no widgets.
7. Melville
Melville is a theme that reflects great attention to typography. It is a seamless blog theme that is ideal for authors who want their work to genuinely have a simple and elegant feel. It’s down to bare essentials, bringing all the attention to your content and only your content. Your readers will find your site relaxing and user-friendly.
References:
http://voiceinthedesert.org.uk/weblog/2011/09/16/10-best-wordpress-themes-for-authors/
http://wpbest.com/themes/woothemes/canvas/
http://wpmu.org/featured-wordpress-theme-the-erudite/
http://tech.journalism.cuny.edu/documentation/wordpress-themes-for-writers/