Writing 101: Author Bios

We have been in a bit of a slump when it comes to giving advice. This is partially because we've been working on big stuff and partially because (thankfully) there haven't been as many emergency etiquette problems that we've been forced to cover.

To dip our toes back into the water, we're just going to cover something nice and simple today: Author Bios.

A Disclaimer

I say this whenever I give writing advice, but this article is meant to be taken with a grain of salt. We're giving advice to people who are starting out or looking to course correct. We are not the final say with any publishing rules.

This also applies mostly to the indie horror space, which is our niche. Expectations vary depending on genre and market.

A Second Disclaimer

Usually when I, Cat, give writing advice in these articles it's on areas I'm confident in or have a lot of experience in. I'm never fully confident with my author bios, and writing them sort of sucks.

This 101 isn't coming from a place of "I'm passing on my wisdom" so much as it's coming from a place of "I commiserate, let's see what we can do."

It's also, a little bit, coming from a place of a reader/formatter who is becoming increasingly concerned at the unhinged nature of author bios in anthologies. Some will barely be a line and some will take up an entire page--and it's hard to make that look neat.

Author Bios, Not About Pages

I don't know if we'll ever do (or need to do) a separate piece about writing biographies for About Pages, websites, blogs, etc. I did want to clarify though that we're not talking about writing anything for your personal spaces.

When we refer to Author Bios we are referring to the small About sections that would be published in an anthology, and are sometimes required for submissions. A lot of our piece is about how to make the most of your personal space in a group, while still being considerate to your collaborators and shared audience.

Why Do We Care?

Author Bios are a pain to write. They're usually pretty boring to read. It can be a hassle to do, and you might be asking why anyone cares enough to be giving advice on this.

Writing an author bio is a great exercise in figuring out your brand. It's a good opportunity to pitch yourself. And if you're anything like me, it really helps to have one handy that you can copy and paste into submission emails so that you're less likely to procrastinate submissions.

You might not be excited about this part of your writing journey, but the people you work with probably are going to care, and you never know. Your readers might care as well.

Some Rules of Thumb Experienced presses will probably give you guidelines for your author bio like how many words it should be, how many socials to include, and in what format. If they don't, you can follow these loose rules for what most places are generally expecting or will prefer.

• Aim for between 50 -- 100 words. Your author bio will look best if it is clean and concise, and doesn't stick out too much (in format) from other bios it's featured with. This is the same for submitting as it is for being published. You want to stand out in quality, not quantity.
  

• Use those words wisely.

  Tell us the important stuff. What's important to understanding you as an author is going to be personal, but find what informs the reader about your journey while also resonating with you. Is it your education? Your dayjob? Your online fame? Your hyper-specific hobby? Whatever it is, tell us that. When I was writing my first author bio I was told to treat it like a resume and include only relevant information and relevant experience and guess what? My bio sucked for a long time. I didn't have a lot of experience yet and nothing I learned at school lined up with the vision for what I wanted to do creatively.
  

• Keep it to 3 credits. It's not a bad idea to write "[YOUR NAME] author of [YOUR BOOK TITLE] and [YOUR OTHER BOOK TITLE]" or some version thereof. But it can be really easy to overdo your credits when you're listing them. You're probably proud of all your work so you want to list them all. But a reader isn't going to look at your two page long author bio and run off to buy every single one of those books you wrote or anthologies where you were featured. They're going to skim because it's a big wall of text that overshadows any of the personal stuff you said. A good rule of thumb for me is no more than three credits. These can be your most relevant credits to the project, your best selling credits, your favorite, your most recent, or some combination thereof. I usually include Revenge Arc, which I'm best known for, My Most Recent Press Title and My Most Recent Self-Published Title. Don't overthink it, but also don't underthink it. That sounds obvious, but sometimes I'm reading author bios that leave me with questions.
  

  If you're having a tough time narrowing it down, I also suggest leaving out collaborations or anthologies. There are so many good opportunities to shout out anthologies you're a part of and the other talented people you're working with, but this is your time to brag about your work (within reason)
  

• Work in your main landing page. I finish my author bios with something like "You can find out more at catvoleur.com" because that's my website and it's where people can find out more. It's an easy domain, it's relevant to me, and it's a great, single place to direct people to if they have read something of mine they've liked in an anthology. It's also a short little sentence that doesn't detract from the other information or clutter up my bio. If you don't have a website, or you're planning on switching domains soon, it's okay to leave instructions for whatever place it's best to find you online. Linktree is a great, free, evergreen alternative for those of you who are active on socials but not website savvy. (#NotSponsored by Linktree even though that would be amazing. I know I sounded all corporate shill there, I just really like Linktree.)
  

• Keep it down to 2 socials Sometimes a press will ask for you to include your socials with your bio. If they specify "all socials" obviously go crazy. If they specify a number, send them that many. If they don't say anything, 2 is a good rule of thumb. Most authors are more active on one or two platforms than they are on others anyway, and it doesn't take up as much real estate in an "Author bios" section. It's quality over quantity here, so send readers where you genuinely believe you'll be most active. For me that's Twitter and IG. Is that embarrassing to admit in 2025? Yes. But those are the platforms where I still get the most engagement, and so it's where I send readers. Also, remember how I said that Linktree was a great bio-friendly alternative to a website? It is not a bio-friendly alternative to a social media link. A lot of people think they're being clever by including a single Linktree link as their social instead of listing out their most used platforms. If this were a website, they'd be correct because it's a simple, clean way to offer more click through options. But guess what? You can't click through in a print book. If you're a reader thinking about following an author from an anthology and you see that they're on Instagram, and Instagram is where you follow most authors? You'll probably add them through the Instagram app. Maybe you'll do that on the spot because if you use the app there's a good chance you're already signed in and have your phone handy. If you liked an author and see that they're trying to send you to a third party app to look them up to click through to add them on mystery socials that might or might not include Instagram? You'll probably say "I'll do that later" and then forget.

Preference Over Polish

There's a lot of "universal" advice on writing bios that I wouldn't necessarily follow. Ultimately you need to think about your voice, your brand, and what is best going to represent your work. Have a clean bio if you're writing literary fiction. But if you're writing weird bizarro fiction, don't be afraid to get weird.

Make your bio fit your brand, and make it memorable if you can.

I want to say to avoid cliches. Don't say that you went to Miskatonic University in your bio. People are tired of that one. But ... that's also not universal I guess. Some cliches work for a reason, right? Maybe you write nothing but Lovecraft retellings or maybe you're a planar traveller who literally went to Miskatonic University in which case, yeah, put that shit in your bio. What do I know, right?

I guess what I'm trying to get at is that it's your call.

Conclusion

Author Bios suck to write, but they don't have to be terribly difficult. At the end of the day, it's about finding what works for you, your image, and considering the optics from the perspective of potential readers.

Finding what works for you is a little bit of trial and error. It's a lot of asking questions. Since I can't give you the easy answer of what will work for you, I hope that I've given you the right questions to start asking yourself and some fast and loose rules to help you narrow down all the infinite options.