LT Novel is a theme for novelists and book websites on free Elementor: a home page that lays the new novel's dust jacket flat, with the synopsis on the front flap, praise and ISBN on the back and the author on the back flap; the opening page set as a book page; the backlist as spines to scale on a shelf; events, book clubs, a monthly letter, a page per book with formats and where to buy, a series in reading order, press bios, workshops, and an event, book club and rights form. A Hello Elementor child theme with bundled fonts, one-page mode and a mobile menu.
Editions
| Edition | Price | What you get |
|---|---|---|
| Free | $0 | The child theme with its design, fonts, header and footer, the About and Contact pages, blog and 404 templates, one-page mode and the mobile menu. Credit link stays. |
| Pro Standard | $29 a year | Every page, sample posts and one-click demo import, credit removal. Downloads, updates and ticket support for 1 year, 1 website. |
| Pro Unlimited | $49 once | Everything in Pro Standard plus the AI kit. Unlimited websites, lifetime updates and ticket support. |
Pages in Free (Appearance → Starter setup): About, Contact, Diary. Pages in Pro (Appearance → Demo import): Home, About, Press and bios, Books, The Salt Orchard, The Harrow novels, Weather at Harrow End, The Harrow Ferry, Harrow in Winter, Events, Book clubs, Writing workshops, Contact, Diary.
Quick setup
- Install the free Elementor plugin and the Hello Elementor theme, then upload and activate LT Novel (Install and update).
- Optional: activate WPForms Lite for the event, book club or rights enquiry form.
- Pro: Appearance → Demo import → Import (Demo import). Free: Appearance → Starter setup.
- Replace the demo content and pictures (below), set your logo and the header button.
Pages in the demo
| Page | Under | Edition |
|---|---|---|
| Home | – | Pro |
| About | – | Free |
| Press and bios | About | Pro |
| Books | – | Pro |
| The Salt Orchard | Books | Pro |
| The Harrow novels | Books | Pro |
| Weather at Harrow End | The Harrow novels | Pro |
| The Harrow Ferry | The Harrow novels | Pro |
| Harrow in Winter | The Harrow novels | Pro |
| Events | – | Pro |
| Book clubs | Events | Pro |
| Writing workshops | Events | Pro |
| Contact | – | Free |
| Diary (blog) | – | Free |
Home page sections
The home page sections, in order, with the name they have in Elementor’s Navigator and their CSS ID (the anchor used by one-page mode and by links such as /#new-novel).
| Section (Navigator name) | CSS ID |
|---|---|
| The new novel | #new-novel |
| The first page | #first-page |
| The books | #books |
| Events | #events |
| Book clubs | #book-clubs |
| About Clara | #about |
| The monthly letter | #letter |
| Diary | #diary |
| Invite Clara | #invite |
- The jacket, laid flat: The home page lays your new novel's dust jacket flat: synopsis and buy buttons on the front flap, praise and ISBN on the back, the spine at its real width and your note on the back flap.
- The first page, as printed: An excerpt section set like a book page, with a running head, the chapter title, indented paragraphs and the folio.
- Your backlist on a shelf: Every book as a spine drawn to scale, as thick as its page count and as tall as its edition, each one linking to its own page.
- A page for every book: Front cover and flap in the book's own jacket colour, the facts from the back, formats with example prices, where to buy and where it is set.
- Series, events and book clubs: A series in reading order with a three-level Books menu, dated event rows, book club questions, workshops and press bios to copy.
- Free Elementor and a ready form: Every page is built with free Elementor widgets on Hello Elementor, with an 'Event, book club or rights enquiry' form made with the free WPForms Lite plugin. Fonts are bundled: no Google Fonts requests.
Menu
The demo import creates this main menu (Appearance → Menus):
- Home
- Books → The Salt Orchard, The Harrow novels (Weather at Harrow End, The Harrow Ferry, Harrow in Winter)
- Events → Book clubs, Writing workshops
- About → Press and bios
- Diary
- Contact
Header button: Buy the new novel (link /books/the-salt-orchard/#buy), changed in Appearance → Customize → LT Novel options.
One-page mode (Pro)
With Pro Standard or Pro Unlimited, tick One-page mode on the home page in Appearance → Customize → LT Novel options and the menu scrolls to these sections: The new novel, The first page, The books, Events, Book clubs, About Clara, The monthly letter, Diary, Invite Clara. To change the labels or leave sections out, see One-page mode.
Used the old LT Novel onepage WordPress theme? It is not sold any more: version 2.0 is one theme for both. Install its Pro edition and turn on one-page mode.
Colours and fonts
Change them in Elementor Site Settings → Global Colors and Global Fonts; the whole site follows.
| Name in Global Colors | Value |
|---|---|
| Marsh (the new jacket, buttons, links) | #1D4B57 |
| Slate grey (soft text, fold labels) | #4A5A60 |
| Press black (text) | #15232A |
| Ribbon (headband and folio marks only) | #C23B2E |
| Salt (page) | #EDF0EE |
| Board (tinted sections) | #DAE2E1 |
| Leaf (book page, form panel) | #F8F8F4 |
| Hairlines | #BFCBCB |
| Night tide (dark bands) | #102E37 |
| Text on dark and on jackets | #EDF0EE |
| Soft text on dark | #A7BCC2 |
| Button hover | #143843 |
| Jacket: heather | #5A3D5C |
| Jacket: slate | #34495E |
| Jacket: frost (dark text) | #C9D6D8 |
| Jacket: moss | #4F5A2A |
| Jacket: ochre | #8A5A14 |
| Name in Global Fonts | Font |
|---|---|
| Display (titles) | Neuton |
| Spine and interface (menu, labels, dates) | Cuprum |
| Body text | Neuton |
| Buttons | Cuprum |
Form
With WPForms Lite active, the demo import creates the form Event, book club or rights enquiry on the Contact page. Fields: Your name (required), Email (required), What is it about? (required), Festival, library, club or publisher (optional), Date or dates you have in mind (optional), Expected audience or group size, Your message (required), The monthly letter. Email subject: “Message from the website”. After sending, visitors see: “Thank you. Clara or her agent will reply within a week; invitations for this season are answered first (sample).”
See Contact form for where messages go and how to change the fields.
Demo content to replace
Everything marked with one of these in the demo is sample content: names, numbers, prices and addresses that you replace with your own (or delete):
(sample)Example pricesexample priceexample.com(555)Clara WendtMarsh Lane BooksHarbour BooksLinden & RoweSpringfield978-0-00-000000-0
- Keep every lt-mm-N and lt-fold label true to the book (spine mm = pages x 0.07); never stretch a spine or a panel to fill space.
- Use ribbon red only for the newest spine's headband and the excerpt folio; never for text or buttons.
- Keep Book 1-3 numbers only on the series reading order; other lists are not sequences.
Only publish facts that are true for your business: real prices, opening hours, reviews and qualifications. Pro Unlimited’s launch checker lists every sample marker left on the site.
Photo guide
The demo uses placeholder pictures. Replace each one in Elementor (click it → Choose image) with a photo of about this size; save photos as JPEG or WebP under about 300 KB.
| Picture | Upload size |
|---|---|
| A hand writing in a notebook with a fountain pen, a cup of coffee beside it | 1600 × 1067 px |
| Hands typing on an old typewriter on a dark desk, with loose pages and a coffee cup | 1600 × 1067 px |
| A small audience seen from behind, listening to an author reading in a bookshop with long curtains | 1600 × 1067 px |
| Readers' hands with open books, cups and notes on a rustic wooden table | 1600 × 902 px |
| Old apple trees with red fruit in an orchard on a frosty morning | 1600 × 1067 px |
| Moorland hills under low rain clouds, with light breaking through | 1600 × 900 px |
| Two boats crossing a grey sea in thick fog | 1600 × 1067 px |
| Red wooden houses in the snow on a misty fjord shore | 1600 × 1067 px |
| A woman at a wooden desk reading printed pages with a pencil in her hand | 1600 × 1067 px |
| A walker on a grassy cliff path high above the sea | 1600 × 1000 px |
| Rows of apple trees in white blossom over green grass in spring | 1600 × 1067 px |
AI kit (Pro Unlimited)
The AI kit’s AGENTS.md tells an assistant how LT Novel is built. The CSS classes it relies on (keep them when you edit):
| CSS class | What it is |
|---|---|
lt-jacket | a dust jacket laid flat: a grid of lt-jacket__panel items (bflap, back, spine, front, flap) at real mm proportions; colour from lt-c-<colour> |
lt-jacket__panel | one jacket panel: a coloured lt-jacket__face and its printer's width label lt-fold below |
lt-jacket__face | the printed face of a panel (jacket colour, jacket text colour) |
lt-fold | printer's width label under a panel, e.g. Spine 27 mm, 384 pages; keep it true to the book |
lt-c-marsh / heather / slate / frost / moss / ochre | jacket colour of a book (jacket, spine, mini cover); marsh follows the kit primary |
lt-shelf | the backlist as a row of lt-spine items standing on one shelf edge, drawn to one mm scale |
lt-spine | one spine: lt-mm-N = spine width in mm (pages x 0.07), lt-trim-hb / lt-trim-pb = height of a hardback / paperback; is-new adds the ribbon headband |
lt-cover | a small front cover in its jacket colour (title, kind, author) for book lists |
lt-leaf | a book page for an excerpt: lt-leaf__head running head, prose with indented paragraphs, lt-leaf__folio page number |
lt-book | one book row (mini cover, title, facts, one-line synopsis, link) |
lt-event | one event row (date, place and what, tickets, link) |
lt-order | one book in the series reading order (Book 1-3, a real sequence) |
lt-blurb | a praise quote on a jacket back (always marked as a sample review) |
lt-bio | a ready-to-copy bio with its word count |
lt-pagehead | inner page heading band |
lt-desk | one contact desk block |
lt-price | fact or price row (label + value) |
See AI kit for the prompts, the safe edit tool and the launch checker.
Questions about LT Novel
Do I need Elementor Pro?
No. LT Novel uses only the free Elementor plugin and the free Hello Elementor theme. The header and footer are part of the theme, so you do not need Theme Builder.
Can I use my real cover image?
Yes. The covers are drawn with Elementor containers in your book's colour, so they work without artwork; you can place your cover image inside the front cover panel or replace the drawing with it.
How do I add a book to the shelf?
Duplicate a spine in Elementor, change the title and link, and set its classes: lt-mm-N for the spine width in millimetres (pages x 0.07), lt-trim-hb or lt-trim-pb for the height, and a jacket colour. The AI kit's safe edit tool can do it for you.
Does it sell books?
The theme has no shop. Buy buttons link to the bookshops and stores you choose, and signed copies can go through a local bookshop.
What is the difference between Free and Pro?
Free has the design, header and footer, the About and Contact pages and the blog. Pro adds the home page with the jacket and the shelf, the Books, Events and book pages, sample posts, one-click demo import, credit removal, updates and support. Pro Unlimited adds the AI kit.
I have the old LT Novel. Is this an update?
It is a new version 2.0 with a new design, built for free Elementor. Your current site keeps working; install 2.0 on a new site or a staging copy and import the demo there.
Also for Joomla
LT Novel also exists as a Joomla template: see the LT Novel Joomla docs.
Ask AI about LT Novel
Ask in your own words. The assistant answers from these docs and links the sections it used.
AI answers can be wrong; check the linked section. Never share passwords or licence keys. Open a ticket