Authors, get ready for your close-up.

HarperCollins Publishers is launching a daily Facebook Live program that enables readers to interact with its writers through real-time video and written questions, helping authors expand their reach beyond local bookstore events.

The book publisher is the latest company to experiment with the social network’s real-time video tool, which was introduced broadly in the U.S. earlier this year. HarperCollins and other major publishers are putting greater emphasis on building closer ties to consumers through social media and email to help boost sales. HarperCollins, like The Wall Street Journal, is owned by News Corp.

“The beauty of Facebook Live is that we can produce it in our studios or authors can do it themselves directly from a Facebook app on their smartphones,” said Lisa Sharkey, senior vice president and director of creative development at HarperCollins. The goal, she said, is to bring writers and their fans closer together to help sell more books.

Other companies that have used Facebook Live to promote their work include Walt Disney Studios and Amblin Entertainment, which broadcast a Facebook Live video featuring Steven Spielberg a couple of months ago in support of the director’s upcoming movie “The BFG.”

The HarperCollins Facebook Live presentations will last from 15 to 45 minutes, and the publishing house expects to post a schedule of the weekday events on its HarperCollins Facebook page as well as its Book Studio 16 Facebook page, where it houses many of the videos it produces.

The video discussions will be seen on those pages as well as individual author pages, and will be available for later viewing.

Many bookstores view author appearances as crucial to getting people into their stores. Ms. Sharkey said that the publisher’s Facebook Live program won’t make those visits less important and that some writers will be live steaming directly from bookstores while on tour.

For example, Dorothea Benton Frank, whose new novel “All Summer Long” was published by HarperCollins’ William Morrow imprint, created a video via Facebook Live during a recent visit to a bookstore in Columbia, S.C. By Friday afternoon, less than 20 hours later, the video had been viewed 6,400 times on her Facebook page.

“When I’m on tour I can’t be everywhere,” said Ms. Frank during an interview. “This is a great opportunity to talk to readers all over the country.”

Write to Jeffrey A. Trachtenberg at jeffrey.trachtenberg@wsj.com