“Anybody who claims that one genre is categorically superior to all others must be ready and able to defend their prejudice. And that involves knowing what the ‘inferior’ genres actually consist of, their nature and their forms of excellence. It involves reading them.
” –Ursula K. Le Guin * In 2023, romance fiction was the top-earning subgenre of fiction in the United States. Even if you’re not a romance reader—yet—you’ve likely picked up on the buzz.
Romance readership has grown exponentially since the hellish year that was 2020, and it was not a small market to begin with. New romance-focused bookstores are popping up all over the country, from Portland, Oregon to Deerfield, Florida. While bestselling romance fiction remains overwhelmingly white and straight, Black, brown, and LGBTQ+ authors are publishing more in the genre than ever before.
On TikTok content creators post gleeful odes to their favorite romance tropes, while readers get granular using search terms to locate the story they want. And the enthusiasm for romance isn’t fringe. Rumor has it that Roxane Gay and Channing Tatum have cowritten a romance novel.
Athlete power-couple Sue Bird and Megan Rapinoe will produce a film based on a soccer romance by Meryl Wilsner. Political leader Stacey Abrams recently re-released her romantic suspense novels, previously published under a pen name. And who do you know who is not watching ? Romance genre-fiction is not just having a moment; it’s more like a.
