Sophie is sensing good vibrations for the romance genre!
At last, some good news for the romance genre. As regular readers of this blog will know, the Libertà hive is well and truly in romantic fiction’s corner. We have all written it, love reading it and in general think it adds to the gaiety of nations and the wellbeing of our lovely readers.
And we get seriously annoyed when the genre is denigrated. And yes, it has been, far too often.
For that, I think Lord Byron has to carry the can a good long way. “Love to a man is a thing apart, tis woman’s whole existence,“ forsooth!
The man was just a Bad Picker. Then he blamed everyone but himself when his own love affairs got heavy.
Some of the worst offenders have been commentators with similar Byronic hang-ups, in my view. And no, not all of them were men. Some of them, I suspect, were trying to impress a certain sort of masculine culture with their high intellect and low emotional reactivity. Sigh.
Anyway, we were firmly waved aside when we tried to attract media attention to the celebrations for the 50th Anniversary of the UK’s Romantic Novelists’ Association back in 2010. Attitudes had not changed right up to the 60th either.
Good News on Romance Statistics
Ever since Covid, however, I have felt the tectonic plates shifting after a long, long time. The blight seems to have started after World War 2 — indeed, it was one of the reasons the RNA was set up by Denise Robbins, Barbara Cartland and the forceful Alex Stuart in 1960. I’ve covered this before, most recently here.
But during lockdown people began to read more and, clearly, many of them fancied stories with happy endings! Statistician guru Alex Newton of K-lytics reported this month that “Search interest on Google for “romance books” doubled over the last five years.”
For anyone unfamiliar with K-lytics, Alex Newton, founder and CEO, brings a statistician’s skills to following trends in e-books sales, analysed to considerable depth. His reports are like having your own research department to call on, one which monitors the market place all the time. In following the Romance genre on Amazon Kindle, for instance, K-lytics added two new sub genres in June 2025 and four (and a half, by expanding an existing one) in December.
Interestingly, 55% of the most sold Kindle books of 2025 were Romance.
Most authors of these top-selling romance titles are self-published (58%) or began as an indie author (another 17%)!
Encouraging, no?
Greatest Love Story?
Spurred on by the imminence of Valentine’s Day, the New York Times produced 3 separate articles in which Romance novels were considered with sympathy and affection. Woo hoo!
The first one was triggered by the new Wuthering Heights movie. I loathe the book and won’t be going to the film, so I only glanced at the review, which seemed to be debating the proposition that WH was the greatest love story ever told. (ME: Nah. Nasty stuff about a pair of obsessives with horrible habits and a bad case of the glooms.)
However, I was there just long enough to see that a reader (Oh, romance readers, I love you so much) had suggested that a far more perfect love story was that of the Pixar’s WALL-E.
ME: Yess!!! It’s a three hankie movie if ever there was one. And oh, the joy of that happy ending.
It has everything, a love story needs: imbalance between the power and sophistication of the couple; strong reactions on first meeting; conflicting objectives and loyalties; big moral choices; learning about each other and themselves; self sacrifice; devotion; not to mention a completely believable society messing with their heads as well. Above all, that ending. Be still, my beating heart!
Lovely Media Attention to Romance Genre
In fact, this is going to be a love letter to the New York Times. I signed up for it over a year ago, when I realised how turbulent the world was likely to become, and I wanted to learn about it from people, as it were, at the coal face. I’ve been impressed, depressed, and scared out of my wits as a result. But I don’t regret it. No point in sticking your head in the sand.
And their coverage of romantic fiction around Valentine’s Day was not only exemplary but a delight.
First there was Romance 101. NYT’s book department has a resident romance expert, Jennifer Harlan, and she’s lovely. Her video explaining the current terms of art in the romance genre was exactly what I needed, after reading Alex Newton’s sub genre breakdown.
Yes, I admit it was a bit lowering to need it, but her enthusiasm carried me along and left me immensely pleased with myself to have caught up. At at least for the moment.
But the crowning glory was a portmanteau article by Olivia Waite, titled Classic Romance Starter Pack. It is deliberately personal, the recommendations are both clear and great fun, and I shall undoubtedly follow up several, when I have time. And there are 125 people who pitched up to agree, disagree, contribute their pennyworth and even – the classic – ask if anyone remembers a story about a pirate that she can’t remember the title of but has never forgotten, though the book is lost. (There’s a button at the top of the page, just under the title, which shows the number of reader comments. Click on that.)
It feels like sitting down with a bunch of friends.
Conclusion
Yes, I know all isn’t right with the world. But just for a little while, I really enjoyed myself writing this and thinking about past fun, three hankie HEAs, and the happy prospect of more to come. And think about all those wonderful romance readers out there, too. We romantic optimists are not alone!
Sophie
Thank you very much for that burst of sunny optimism, Sophie. Very much appreciated at the moment! It is great that sales of romance books are increasing and that the genre is being taken more seriously now. Long may it continue.
A small thing, in the great scheme of things, Sarah, especially given this morning’s international news.
On the other hand, at dark times the smallest patch of sunshine is something to be grateful for. And I am.
Good news is always appreciated – and it’s always wonderful to see more people realising just how wonderful romantic fiction. I do kind of wish that more people appreciated historical romance as that particular sub-genre seems to be taken quite a drubbing lately…
Oh Julie, I wish historical romance was more appreciate, too. Reading tastes do seem to go through cycles, so lets hope it bounces back again soon.