Memory Lane Part 4: The Modern Era

By 2010, screen were getting bigger and bigger, but at the same time folks were going mobile. So, we had to evolve to designs that could be easily viewed on both large and small screens. We streamlined our look too, moving away from the multi-color genre variations and we have stuck with more of a blue-themed design.

Our logo has changed over the years too, from lower case to mixed case, with and without our book graphic. Today, it's with the book, all CAPS!

It has been fun reminiscing about our page designs. For us, we wanted a spot in our blog to memorialize the changes.

If you have feedback about our look and feel, features you want added, please leave a comment here or on the FictionDB Facebook page, or FictionDB Twitter works too.

Our 2011 design with a simplified logo, more book graphics on the homepage.

The 2013 look. Similar, but different.

The 2015 design. We're back to the mixed case logo.

2016, a cleaner look, and we added back the book graphic to our logo, and all CAPS!

2020 ... and here we are today! Happy reading, folks!

Memory Lane Part 3: The Mid-2000s

By the mid-2000s, folks were getting bigger and better monitors for their computers. So, FictionDB had to evolve. Now that there was more screen real-estate, we could fill it in with more book information.

Here is our homepage from 2006. Key additions:

• We added a graphical element to our logo, a stylized book with a color gradient pages that are fanned out.
• In addition to our book tracking features, we used to offer a book selling marketplace too. Wow, almost forgot about that!
• Many more quick links to take you deeper into the site, where most of you spend your time anyway.

And, as before, we kept the color themes for each genre. Who else misses the candy-colored buttons?!

As computer screens got bigger, little things were on the horizon -- the iPhone was about to be launched later in the decade. We were so used to designing for larger screens, then all of sudden we had to be prepared for the mobile web too. We'll discuss this next time ... happy reading, folks!

Memory Lane Part 2: Colors, Colors, Colors

Around 2000, we worked with a graphic designer to make FictionDB look splashier and more professional. This was the height of the dot.com boom and we were riding along with it.

The FictionDB homepage went to a bright yellow with blue accents, along with a beautiful swoopy navigation bar, and we created a more stylized logo too. This was the era of VGA (640 x 480)and SVGA (800 x 600) cathode ray tube monitors. Remember those?!

FictionDB in blue and gold.

And then we went nuts with all of the genres. Each genre had its own color scheme. The romance sections were pink, Mystery was a blood red and SpeculativeDB was a Halloween-esque pumpkin orange.

What do you think? I miss these days.

We'll take a look at the mid-2000s designs in a few days. I hope you're enjoying our walk down memory lane.

A Trip Down Memory Lane -- Part 1, Before the Turn of the Century

FictionDB has been on the web for over twenty years now! Can you believe it? Since we're all in isolation/quarantine, we felt like now would be a good time to memorialize some of our early website designs in our blog.

Have you been with us since Day One? Here's a quick trip down memory lane ...

Back in the day, late-1999, we used to call carve out our database by genre. RomanceDB, MysteryDB, SuspenseDB, etc. But, because Romance dominates the paperback marketplace, we launched with RomanceDB in November, 1999.

Here is the earliest FictionDB.com home page that was published. Cool fonts, right?

And, this is what the page looked like when you drilled down into RomanceDB. I love this time machine.

We'll post our early 21st Century designs later this week!

The FictionDB Blog is Back in Action!

Wow, it has been years since we have posted anything to our blog. We have focused on the other social media platforms that are out there the past few years, mostly Facebook and Twitter. But, with everyone working from home, we felt that our friends and fans wanted more content from us, LOL. So many social media channels, so little time!

For now, why don't you head on over to our Facebook page and see what is going on there. For the past three weeks or so, we have been posting questions about your reading habits. It has been to get so many comments to our posts.

Here is today's question ... feel free to comment here or on FB. Stay safe, stay healthy!

Your favorite genre(s)? Mystery/suspense, romance, speculative, horror, others?