In This Corner

Alyson vs. Bella

Alyson Books and Bella Books are targeting similar audiences. Alyson targets the gay community at large (GLBTQ etc.), whereas Bella targets mainly gay, queer, and lesbian identified women.

Alyson’s website is nicely designed, with a simple and elegant color scheme (slate gray, lime green, and white). Out of the kindness of their hearts, the designers of the site placed most of the text of white and light gray backgrounds. The logo is simple and easy to recognize.

One is welcomed to the page by a brief publishers note giving a bit of history, mission statement, and a sort of profile of the press. There is more detailed information that one can read on the “about us” and “press” pages.

There is a section of featured titles that includes the 5 newest releases from the last publishing season. There is a blurb about each with convenient links to the designated book pages. All of the featured books include a link to a sample chapter. The home page also has a list of the “new releases” which includes the titles from Alyson’s front list.

The page is user friendly and easy to navigate.

The titles and prices of each book are conveniently located on the home page of the site, but, for more in-depth searching, there is a list of genre links one can follow to browse the categorized backlist.

The submission page does not give strict guidelines, but recommends that an author search the backlist to see if their manuscript would fit. This seems to me that they respect the intelligence of their readership and their potential authors.

There are quick and easy links on every page where you can add books to your cart and buy them directly from the publisher.

I browsed the site much longer than I had planned to, because I kept finding things to look at. It took a lot of self-control not to order several of the books I had browsed.

There is a general flow to the website. I did not have to think about what to click next, it always seemed like an obvious transition from one page to the next. The site is accessible and pleasing to the eye. It is a site I will visit again, and I will look for the Alyson logo on the spines of books next time I am in the bookstore.

Bella Books’ homepage seems scattered and has little direction. The three main columns of the main page consist of “new books,” “more new books,” and “more new books.” This is repetitive, redundant, and redundant. It forces the eye to move both across the page and down the page simultaneously: which resulted in me looking neither down, nor across, but for a place to escape.

I directed my attention to the almost comical use of a decorative typeface. I don’t know if they were trying to be clever or what, but the typeface that the web designer chose has boobs for O’s. Seriously? Overall, the site design is outdated and cheesy (did I mention the booby-o’s?), and there are way too many pieces of clip art included in the design.

Much of the pertinent information (such as giveaways, contests, and publishing house information) is listed in a box off to the side of the homepage. It is all stacked on top of one another and is a jumbled mess to read.

In the context of the website, the books seem less credible. Also, in the tradition of bad design, many of the books look like they came right of the shelf of the drugstore, yet, the prices are those of trade paperbacks.

I found it curious and confusing when I discovered random links leading to sites that have nothing to do with books, publishing, or queer people. If they are related, they did a terrible job of contextualizing. I clicked on a link of a beach sunset that had the caption “gulf coast getaway” thinking it was a contest they were holding. Upon following the link, however, I arrived at an advertisement for a vacation house for rent in Florida. Is this link actually an advertisement? Why is it here?

If a member of your target audience comes to your site and is as confused and annoyed as I was at the Bella Books site, the publisher is definitely missing their mark.