I'm not familiar with it, but there is a "document general" product type built into ZC which may be of help for what you want to do.

Check these tutorials: https://www.zen-cart.com/tutorials/index.php?article=61 and
https://www.zen-cart.com/tutorials/index.php?article=34.

From the sound of it, you could create an "Our Authors" category and the "products" in it would be their articles.