It is not too bright in my opinion, the story header text's color does not contrast well with white. Go here to see if you colors meet the WCAG guidelines for contrast and brightness. I do find it strange that you only have side borders on the top and bottom. When I click on a link, the color doesn't change for visited links. I think the body text might need to be darker, you might want to analyze that as well. I like the layout, it is clean and simple.
Too bright for my taste, however it's laid out very nicely. I like the colors, yes, but it's just a little hard on my eyes. Other than that, great job!
I think it looks good... but I think the text could be a little bit darker on the white background. Perhaps, the whole blue and gray could be a bit darker. It is a bit hard to read.