• Rozz@lemmy.sdf.org
      5·
      5 days ago

      I read the better ones my wife recommends to me although she reads the genre much more than me. Also there are a few other husbands in our friend group who do the same. If I read too much romantacy in a row I wonder why my normal fantasy doesn’t have sex scenes for a little while.

      • dumples@midwest.socialEnglish
        6·
        5 days ago

        Fantasy is funny like that. Its either all chaste and sexless or extremely smutty. I like a mix

    • dumples@midwest.socialEnglish
      3·
      5 days ago

      I am a man and have read a few romance novels all of which were in the romantasy genre. I have enjoyed them so far. As a demographics go, I think its mostly female and queer orientated. At least for the more modern books. They are having their moment. I know of a few romance specific book stores opening in larger cities.

      • A_norny_mousse@feddit.org
        4·
        5 days ago

        I really enjoyed the first few seasons of the TV show, esp. the romantic/erotic scenes which differ from everything else I have seen in that respect, and evoked real emotional responses in me.

        But at some point I realised the story was written by a USian who had never been to Scotland, and suddenly I could not unsee the Scots being appropriated as stand-ins for America’s fight for freedom and all that historical US exceptionalism claptrap.

  • Clay_pidgin@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
    3·
    5 days ago

    There’s a podcast spun off of Reading Glasses called Reading Smut that covers these kinds of books. The podcast was fun, and I read my first “romantasy” recently.

    I like my speculative fiction and fantasy more about world building than character driven, usually, so I haven’t really seen much of this stuff.

      • Clay_pidgin@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
        1·
        5 days ago

        Apparently it’s a highly popular genre, but because it’s often smutty people are embarrassed to talk about it, so it flies under the radar. If that podcast mentions good FF in particular, I’ll let you know.

  • SchrodingersPat@lemmy.world
    3·
    5 days ago

    I’m a guy who is pretty new to the genre and I found the Bromance Book Club series by Lyssa Kay Adams invaluabe. The premise is that rich men in Nashville Tennessee formed a club where they read romance books to help their relationships. Each book tackles a different trope in the genre, which was great for someone like me who didn’t know the tropes. They are also great examples of positive masculinity and equal partnerships.

  • dumples@midwest.socialEnglish
    2·
    5 days ago

    I started reading some romantacy books over the last years and I really enjoyed it. I love fantasy novels for the world building and interesting themes. Adding some romance in there adds some extra spice and focuses on more character driven. Overall I would recommend

      • dumples@midwest.socialEnglish
        1·
        5 days ago

        I’ve been kind of basic bitch so far since this is new for me. So these are likely the most basic suggestions.

        I enjoyed The Empyrean Series (Fourth Wing, Iron Wing and Onyx’s Strom). There are dragons, war, forbidden love all good elements. I thought it was only a trilogy buts its planned to be like 5 books. So I feel like Onyx storm felt like it had some filler portions but that might change as more books come out.

        I also read the Ending Fire Trilogy which was sold more as a romance than it actually was. The first book was good and the two other two were okay. I feel like there was more potential than it actually succeeded.

        I didn’t love A Court of Thorns and Roses but I hear the others in the series were good. I feel like I could guess the romance subplot and the main story from the get go. People do love to the series. I guess I am not that much into fairies.

        I actually found these books by looking at Dipsea’s Blog for their romance recommendations. I was trying to better understand the female gaze and they had some good recommendations.