A Romantasy Epidemic

The most popular book genre in 2023 was Romantasy, and if you were confused about what it was when it originally started to be talked about, now I am pretty sure that, if you landed on this page, you probably know what I am referring to.

Romantasy is exactly what it sounds like, a hybrid genre between Fantasy and Romance that takes place in a Fantasy setting, but the main plot is driven by a classic romance pattern, and not some kind of epic battle or external conflict.

A Court of Thornes and Roses, by Sara J. Maas, is what made this genre popular and highly requested, to the point that it became an official literary genre of its own, gaining its own section of Goodreads and online bookstores, and now there are plenty of romantasy books being written.

 One thing, though, that makes me question the role of this genre, is its oversexualization of the romance part. Many of these books are rated based on the amount of “spice” they contain, also known as smut, which is explicit sexual content.

Now, there is already a genre for that, which is erotica, but it seems like this word is not used for spicy fantasy books, which brings us to one of the biggest issues I have with this genre: it is somewhat addressed to everybody.

There are Romantasy novels marketed as YA, when in reality they are Adult books, containing smut.

Does this mean that there are no YA Fantasy romance books? No, Romantasy can be YA, since it is basically romance with a fantasy setting, and there plenty of romance novel that are YA, or even for kids. But it is a genre that, as of right now, and developing from an adult book, is mostly for adults, and not children, and is often filled with explicit content.

I feel like, in the past few years, our society has started to look for ways of connecting socially that actually do not involve people. We have gone from looking for our significant other and trying to make friends, to romanticizing characters and even dreaming about their sexual life.

This Romantasy epidemic is definitely a wakeup call, in my opinion. And even though there are obviously people who do not use Romatasy to escape but just enjoy the read, I can’t help but worry about what this says of our society. Why do we need a genre that dresses itself of this cutesy and dreamy mask, when in reality is just fantasy erotica?

I supposed it is because it feels kind of shameful to read erotica, but no one nowadays has any shame in saying that they read extremely spicy Romantasy books.

Giving to something a different name doesn’t change its substance, but it seems like it makes it more acceptable to the public eye. Which, I don’t know about you, but to me it feels like a pretty sketchy and dangerous way of doing things, because anything now can be turned into something different and acceptable just by changing its name.