How the look works
There is no page builder. You fill in your books, chapters, posts and profile, and a theme lays them out: the home page, the book pages, the series in reading order, the chapters, the blog. You choose the theme and a few options, and every page follows them.
Open Appearance, near the top of the side menu. Choose, press Save, and you see “Saved. Your site wears it now.” The View your site button at the top opens your site in a new tab, so you can check it there.
The two themes
- Hardcover: “Elegant and type-led, with your covers up front. Suits literary fiction, historical, and mystery.” This is the one every new site starts with.
- Paperback: “Bold and bright, with shelf appeal. Suits romance, thrillers, and fantasy.”
Both have every feature: series pages, the next release on the home page, chapters for Members, the blog, the newsletter signup and the contact page. The difference is the look, not what they can do. You can see both themes with real books in them.
Switching theme resets the accent colour, the fonts and light or dark to the new theme’s defaults, since each theme has its own set. Your books, chapters and posts are not touched.
The options
Accent colour
The colour of links, buttons and small details. Hardcover offers Oxblood, Ink, Forest and Ochre; Paperback offers Cherry, Cobalt, Violet and Tangerine.
Fonts
Each choice pairs a font for headings with one for the rest of the page.
- Hardcover: Cormorant Garamond with Source Serif, or Fraunces with Instrument Sans.
- Paperback: Bricolage Grotesque with DM Sans, Playfair Display with DM Sans, or Oswald with DM Sans.
Chapters are set in one reading face on every theme, chosen for long reading on a phone, so your fonts change the pages around the story rather than the story itself.
Light or dark
- Match the visitor’s device: light or dark as each reader’s phone or computer is set. This is the default, and the kindest.
- Always light.
- Always dark.
The genre presets
During setup, the step Choose your look asks what you write, and picks an accent and fonts to suit:
- Romance: Oxblood with Fraunces on Hardcover; Cherry with Playfair Display on Paperback.
- Thriller: Ink with Fraunces; Cobalt with Oswald.
- Fantasy: Forest with Cormorant Garamond; Violet with Bricolage Grotesque.
- Literary: Ochre with Cormorant Garamond; Tangerine with Playfair Display.
A preset is only a starting point: change any of it on the Appearance page.
What readers can change for themselves
On a chapter, the Aa button lets each reader choose the text size, the line width (on a larger screen) and light, dark or automatic, whatever you chose for the site. Their choice is kept in their browser, on that device.
What you cannot change, and why
There is no custom CSS, no moving blocks around and no third theme. That is the trade: two themes, each finished and checked on phones, instead of a blank canvas you have to design yourself. If you want full control over every page, our guide to WordPress and hosted builders is honest about when that is the better choice.
Your covers, your photo and your words are the design. A good cover image and a short, clear tagline do more for how your site looks than any setting here; see books and series and your profile.
Still stuck, or found something wrong on this page? Contact support.