romantasy is the bane of my existence

[Music] Romany the child of two parents who couldn't be more unlike and [ __ ] they are fighting all the time it's without doubt one of the hottest sticks within contemporary book publishing Romany is a sub genre of fantasy where the Romantic element is the driving force of the plot whilst the genres it derives from have long been established Romany in its current form just recently came into being and it seems it is here to stay for now the Romany tag lives rree on Tik Tok and Instagram and it has even been added as a specific category to the good reads Awards in 2023 with fourth wi being its first winner the Romany genre is also the pain of my [Music] existence in theory I like both romance and fantasy even though I don't find myself enjoying a lot of contemporary Romance Books however both romance and fantasy stories are good if written well and I want to preface this by saying I'm not an elitist whil I do think that literary Classics are Classics for reason I like myself all sorts of books it's the mix for me also guilty pleasures exist if the book hits for some reason it hits I just binged Max and Hall the prime original series based on the book save me from Mona Casten was it cringe and kind of bad absolutely did I eat it up and and kick my feet in excitement yes however with a lot of romanti entries that for some reason get extremely hyped and overrated I keep asking myself why is this stuff so popular are we reading the same books over the course of reading a bunch of these Romany books I have gathered a lot of thoughts and before we begin I want to State a disclaimer this video will be filled with cynicism and I will probably say a lot of things that are able to offend people who like the popular romanti books that I will mention if you love these books and if hearing negative things about them doesn't do you good please don't watch this video just skip it you have free will and don't need to upset yourself also I want to emphasize it is absolutely fine if you like these books that doesn't make you inferior as a person in any way it is a taste thing after all reading is supposed to be fun I honestly wished I like these books I like fun it's more fun to read things you like this is not a hate video against book talk in general nor people who like Romany it's about Romany as a genre and the books within it since I dislike most of the popular entries of a sub genre to a genre that I like and care about despite its flaws I want to talk about why and make some silly jokes not every single book is bad and the same and I know the points I will make don't apply to every book but I have read them often enough to be bothered so please don't take this too seriously and please don't send me death threats we are no enemies to L us so no need for death threats let's start the rise of new adult Romany in the 2020s is kind of what young adult dystopians used to be in the 2010s I feel like a lot of readers of ya dystopia have even grown up to become new adult Romany readers if you think about it a lot of those could have been sci-fi romance since the romance aspect already used to be very prominent back in the day and I'm not talking about The Hunger Games which is timeless Masterpiece the way these books were reduce down to love triangle and marketing still makes me mad similarly to a lot of those novels especially the ripoffs after the trend has had already hit its peak for me it is extremely apparent that the whole world building is merely a vessel to convey a romance wish fulfillment story that falls apart once the author has to explain it properly beside that to their core they are un original lackluster and uncreative all besides shiny premises I feel like with Romany we've come full circle now one of the biggest things that have been passed down genetically to the Romany genre from the romance genre is its obsession with tropes and prompts as if to check them off from a list kind of like the text in front of Fanfictions do you want any enemies to lovers friends to lovers grumpy X Sunshine fake dating and Far Far weirder stuff that I won't get into a lot of books nowadays seem to be written around tropes and prompts to their core these books collect a few tropes and have some lackluster characters act them out and then it goes straight to marketing it seems however that enemies to lovers is the ultimate seller undoubtedly the biggest entries feature the strob and I kind of understand that because I'm myself like the concept I like a good enemies to love story but it needs to be done well and I feel like a lot of the really popular enemies to lover Romany books kind of killed the Trope and I will talk about why I think so later in the video I read a bunch of high-profile book talk hyp Romany books with that Trope that be for example a CT of THS and roses and a cord of mist and fury fourth Wing the cruel Prince Divine Rivals and The Serpent of wings and night these delicious delights our deceitful demise a harrowing of crowns and scepters these uh vicious Victors a sping of spleens and splodges a raking of reams and Rose and I must say from all right to boring to straight up ass I have had it all though I must say that these books do have positives and I have started all of them without bias maybe not you to a varying degree these books also had qualities that I liked unfortunately there were just very little considering the total count of pages I had to read to finish these I gave each of them a fair chance okay [ __ ] with a aad since romance is arguably a very big aspect of these books let's see who we got as our romantic love interest in akota you've got recent who is a darkhaired extremely handsome dude who appears to be very moody and also antagonizes and threatens our main character constantly and even trugs her in order to take advantage of her in fourth Wing you've got Zaden who is a darkhaired extremely handsome dude who appears to be very moody and also antagonizes and threatens our main character constantly by constantly telling her that he would kill her in the cruel Prince you've got Carden who is a darkhaired extremely handsome dude who appears to be very moody and also bullies and threatens our main character constantly by telling her she deserves to die because she's a human and in Divine virals you've got Roman who is darkhaired and a handsome dude who appears to be very moody and also antagonizes well he obviously Falls for our main character in the first quarter of the book so I don't really know about him but you've got the gist I also found this photo hilarious so I wanted to share it these love interests especially the first three are all roughly the same person I find it absolutely astonishing how little creativity there is with writing a solid compelling love interest in an enemies to Love Story without giving them this energy and every single time I myself and seemingly everyone else too imagined them as a bunch of [ __ ] super models with angular faces extremely defined Jaws full lips and eyebrow lifts you know how there's a thing about men writing woman or a woman written by a man and then you've got stuff like her titties bounced in unison and she had big boobs or small waist and big hips or [ __ ] like that and we agree that that's bad right this stuff is rightfully being criticized I think however we should also call out men written by romance fantasy authors it's equally as degrading to looks and a specific beauty standards in a similar fashion they get reduced to their body height their sharp cheekbones and their big dicks but really it's almost every character in these books that is overly handsome reading these books makes you think you are playing with Barbie dolls one prettier and hotter than the next except that Barbie dolls nowadays are way more diverse I mean this is supposed to be fantasy everything is possible with less explanation needed and still everyone here is a [ __ ] white or slightly T super model also same as with the YA books no oldies are allowed well yeah the F people are [ __ ] ancient but they don't look old okay they look an appropriate new adult kind of way so it isn't weird that the main character is like 19 and they with a 500y old man this might be just me after all but how does anyone find this romantic the men are all extremely buffed with a noticeable emphasis on the big dicks this is who we all are into you would think these characters have edges but no the main character girly being small and human and fragile is not an edge that is simply playing into the man big woman small aesthetic and it doesn't even have consequences because the main character will still for some reason overpower all of her antagonists because of main character syndrome I hate this life I hate being an orphan and I hate being 19 years old and most of all I hate being a human I wish I had been born 300 years ago before magic was wiped from the Earth by the Great War of magic of 300 years ago you think the Great War of magic 300 years ago could wipe out all the magic think again sweetness okay cool Magic's back whatever what does that have to do with me what does this have to do with you everything you're the chosen one that the prophecy is spoken of you're coming with me me the chosen one that the prophecy is spoken of no I'm human I remember when the first photos for the cursed it ends with us movie started emerging and people on Tik Tok were like ew it's so ugly cast other people and make them wear prettier things my guys this is a story about domestic abuse are you good moreover Lily blossom bloom is described to sell the ugliest flowers anyone has ever sold and you seriously think that this girl wears stylish things but I want her to look like this when he pushes her down the stairs but I digress the main gires in these books are headstrong in a way that sometimes makes them act reckless in a really stupid way and then the only reason they don't suffer from the consequen of the actions is because they are wearing huge plot armor and don't come to me with the Farah is a strong female character I will never forget how s Jar's character assassinated tamin from the first AA book so phah could get together with recent who canonically has a bigger di than the former so it it was never going to last guys Tamlin a completely lackluster boring character in the first book suddenly becomes a possessive [ __ ] to our main girly so that recent can save her and show her that she has Free Will and is able to choose for her own first of all I love how it's a man teaching a woman that she has free will to end it with a different man plus last time I [ __ ] checked the same reason draged her to make her dance in people's laps without her consent because of a dark plan of his a true feminist icon what a great story fellas is it feminist to give head to your husband while people are dying because you're in the middle of a war and also talking about questionable empowerment stories I know you exist I know who you are yes on the surface these main characters are all strong willed Brave and headstrong but they are also all the same besides that they have no other personality trait silver ombre hair is in a character trade Violet and I think that's ultimately because just like in dystopian YA books they serve as the reader self insert in a book written to serve as wish fulfillment I think ultimately the wish or the fantasy that is being fulfilled in the majority of these stories goes despite being a regular girl or girl with skills below average to succeed no matter what and defy All Odds and with that to earn the absolute devotion of an extremely handsome man that seems to be unattainable to every other person they are like stale bread that the reader can project themselves on I don't know how people can care care about these characters truly I don't care a bit about most of them and that's also because I don't trust the writing enough to have the feeling that there's something unique or interesting to uncover with these characters even though I have to read about them for hours I don't think there's a lot to them despite some shallow features I don't get to uncover interesting things and know uncovering that the B love interest is just a misunderstood goodie that is not one of them because it has been overplayed to death his name name was Damian or zavon or Jack of the night or something else that sounded dark and mysterious he was a villain but you know not like really he lived alone and he hated everyone and he probably hadn't gotten laid in like at least a hundred years he had black hair and eyes like a stormy sea and a tattoo on his face probably and he was super Broody when he wasn't spending long hours glaring at stuff in the middle distance he was ordering Mortals to have their heads removed or pushing people away or spoiler alert secretly fostering k no one could figure out why he was so evil until Elanor came along let's talk about the enemies being enemies so much hate they absolutely despise each other right wait what they are both feeling intense sexual attraction from the first moment let's start with the unnecessary and one-sided bullying always coming from the man and being directed at the woman are they really enemies when the girl is usually like fine with the guy and just continues to endure his anakes all day it's like oh he's kind of an [ __ ] yeah girl he acts like a piece of [ __ ] towards you all there is in these books is one-sided bullying because of fantasy racism or threatening someone to kill them because of politics or family matters that they personally don't even have anything to do with it's not like the 19-year-old clearly confused girl so far did anything to you and yet you continue to harass her even though it's very clear that she is an absolute piece of bread the motivations are either really shallow or straight up dump one huge pet peeve of mine is that a lot of these enemies to lovers stories are an absolute fraud I hate the moment where the enemies become lovers and whilst the POV characters has been lusting since the first meeting the other character is suddenly like I wanted you all along ever since I set my eyes on you are you kidding me if you really hate someone if you think they are like responsible for your mothers or brothers or whatever's death you don't lust after them you guys are not enemies you are melodramatic and bad at communicating and then all of the we he isn't such a dick after all he's just either misunderstood traumatized or can show his true nature for some reason wait he's actually a good guy thank God because we can't have real character development that is not allowed this is [ __ ] how about you learn that you actually like each other other's personality and that you have similar opinions and Views despite the world putting you in antagonizing roles I want them to slowly learn how to trust each other and come to appreciate what the other person can do also how about someone who might actually be unlikable gets temped to redeem themselves and grow as a person but no let's just have them communicate like absolute [ __ ] morons for 300 pages and then make out what I noticed is apparently there needs to be f physical and sexual attraction from second one and then during the course of the book you will have the most random plot devices to make the characters like horny or to test their horniness [ __ ] dragons that make out with each other and because you are connected to them you also need to make out or a vampire who needs to drink your blood which results in you unfortunately getting sexually aroused and want to make out or you drink blood because it has healing property and that also makes you horny that's how fantasy goes nowadays baby didn't you know fantastic things are just there to make you horny I guess Carden from the cool Prince comes closest to what I think enemies to L us is but I also think he's an absolute troll that bullies a girl that did absolutely nothing to him out of sheer racism that girl is not antagonizing you at all yet you decide to kick dirt into her food like a [ __ ] child at the playground pick your fights you dumb [ __ ] I'm not at all into this kind of middle school bullying and I also don't find it romantic in the slightest I don't buy this whole act he is annoying and also the book is really really boring this leads me to my next part let's talk about the elephant in the room we all know that a lot of romantasy books have smut in them the only problem with fantasy fiction written by women is that there's a whole subsect of it it is fantasy but it is also Po and you don't know it's going to be because all the covers look the same it's just roast petals and a sword and they don't tell you in the description either it will just say something like Lysa was but a humble Baker's daughter in the Kingdom of fissa so you''ll be sort of innocently reading along and then out of nowhere it'll go Lia felt two toned arms grabbing her from behind and on her lower back she could feel his huge throbbing cot you're like whoa what whoa go on and then you're horny on the chbe smart in books is kind of getting out of hand and the marketing is also targeting much specifically more and more there is a bunch of people on Tik Tok come to refuse to read books without sexual scenes in them it needs to be spicy or they won't read it whilst everyone can read whatever they want I honestly feel sorry for those people you will be trapped to read mediocre to bad books without ever broadening your horizon without ever knowing how it feels to read a truly good book call me oldfashioned but I think like a really good chemistry between two characters can give you as the reader so much more than some just really mid sexine I care about the connection between two characters and I feel like in those smutty Books A lot of the time that really that's really not important it feels like a lot of people don't really care about whether a story is Well written or not which in turn signals to the Publishers that it really kind of doesn't matter little is enough and as as long as a certain set of boxes are checked off and the book has tacky sprayed edges it will sell like crazy I personally think that the sex scenes in these books are not written particularly well and are also kind of redundant if you have read one then you have read them all I don't want to com at people who enjoy reading but it is absolutely fine however I think the way that smut is often incorporated into Romany is the origin of a lot of narrative problems firstly since smart is almost seen as a reward to a lot of readers waiting for it seems to make them more and more impatient until they don't want anything else anymore if you want to write a series of new adult novels you better have Smart in the first book already I mean [ __ ] that I need my instant gratification at least in form of a constant sexual tension from the beginning to build up to the banging but I think this leads to an early ejection if you apologize my langu which it is finishing early and then having to deal with an aftermath where holding up being enemies is not possible anymore and also the pair kind of being in love now and then it gets soie real fast let's [ __ ] go let's go I guess I also hate when people say a book is slow bur enemies to lovers and then they bang in the first book that's not slow bur guys for the wing is a book where this really bothered me the emperion series by Rebecca yaros is supposed to be five books total and our main love interests are already banging it out in the second half of the first book what the [ __ ] are you going to do with them afterwards for four more books well I guess make them fight with each other over random stuff oh and have them miscommunicate I don't know about you guys but an onoff relationship with dumb fights is so romantic you've got five book at your hands take your time that's a privilege develop things make the readers wait for it base the chemistry between your characters off of their personalities and not off of their bodies and when the love interests finally hit it off it feels earned and like a journey where they found each other at the end and then have them bang it out for all I care now if you're actually a person that likes fourth Wing if you genuin like this book let me ask you a question why does Zaden love Violet besides her being so effortlessly mind-bogglingly hot to him like why why does he love her and counter to that why does violet love Zaden there's no real reason she is just the protagonist therefore she is special and important and the bestest boys are going to be in love with her this is writing for instant gratification maybe I'm just too much of a slow bur kind of person but I think you take the tension out of things with the characters almost immediately [ __ ] each other if you want to be more than erotica with fairy dicks let the world and the fantasy story evolve on its own without hyperfocusing on the sexual attraction of the two puppets with boops and the dick I promise there's more to it look I am all for sexual Liberation girly get that ass but I'm supposed to find these stories never narratively appealing am I not there is a fantasy story in these books a mediocre world has been built for me to lose myself in but no for me it feels like things happen so you can read glorified erotica and think wow this is somehow more meaningful than mad Malloy my tender Knight honestly ice Planet Barbarians at least doesn't act like it is more than smut with thi th aliens I mean look at those Beauties they know what they are I kind of respect that I'm looking forward to how many people will read the emperion series until the end I have a strong Divergent feeling with this one I think it will lose itself in its own ambition I haven't read iron Flame the second book and I'm not going to but I have already heard a lot of people fans included say that the second book is not as good as the first one I have also heard a lot of people say it reads as if written by Ai and that really makes you think Did You Know by the way that Rebecca Yos used to be a romance only writer fourth Wing was her first fantasy book and it came to be because her publisher wanted her to write Romany since it is so popular I think personally all of that shows in her writing I actually do curse a little do you also what's your favorite curse word probably Fu at this point I want to talk more about the writing in these books of course they are not all exactly the same but some things seem to be involved with the genre new adult is weird to me because I feel like the writing hasn't evolved in any aspect other than their now sexual scenes and swearing in it it is still written like ya except the characters bang and say [ __ ] it honestly still feels like it is written for teenagers but not the Hunger Games kind of written for teenagers but the other worse kind the cheesy dialogues between characters especially the annoying I hate you banter between the enemy love interest that doesn't feel like two adults are talking to each other the basic writing in this books often suffers from the overuse of Superfluous repetitive writing full of ellipses and M dashes that often plague contemporary books and while it already bothers me as cheap in the letter I think in a fantasy setting it feels extremely offputting The Narrative is filled with bad Exposition through infodumps Side characters which just INF forom as if directly aimed at the reader kind of like 13-year-olds right on whatpad and the switch in the main pair's relationship is so jarring I call it from bullying to Baby Girl first you've got stupid remarks maybe a dumb preschool nickname from the mean love interest maybe one or two one-sided death threats then the unbearable sexual attraction leads to them banging it out enter annoying dirty talk and awkward horny writing you I find this sexy honestly a lot of these could be absolutely interchanged with each other and I wouldn't notice they all have the same character voice afterwards we enter the your mind territory that I find really icky most of the time this might be a personal preference as well but I don't [ __ ] with this possessive almost love bombing kind of relationship at times they are literally mated with each other which I kind of hate because all the relationship building that I want in a romance can absolutely be ignored because they are meant for each other by Fate oh and have I mentioned that these books are mostly very heteronormative and not only that some even play straight up into gender assisten ISM by using words like female and man and females are this and males are that I don't [ __ ] with that personally and I don't find it hot also the whole writing of these books shows very little subtlety in what it wants to convey everything needs to be spoken out loud what is bad and what is good need to be clear there can be no crayones sometimes you will have the most outrageously bad antagonists and also these books are full of plot hols that sometimes start with the very setup of the story from a war college that pointlessly kills tons of perfectly abled soldiers and also as allows them to kill each other for no reason other than that the book seems like it has high stakes now to made up curses that are specifically designed to guide the plot of the book it is so weirdly specific that she is basically writing the book herself ha you fool the only way you can break the curse is if a mortal human being falls in love with you oh really are you serious dude and that human being has to explicitly say I love you and the must be a human who has killed one of your kind and she can only say I I got to write this [ __ ] down or something at least 10 in length of hair and when she says I love you she has to be petting her head and rubbing her stomach at the same time and she has to have at least two sisters and a single father she cannot have a mother who's still alive because that is somehow relevant to the curse for some [ __ ] reason romantasy to me feels like romance that is dressing up as fantasy for fun without committing to the bit it feels reverse engineered it feels like the fantasy world has been constructed to be the frame around the romance especially since in comparison to Fantasy romance typically has a pretty defined Arc which is the characters falling in love I think using fantasy as a frame is to have other narrative possibilities than contemporary Romans and to have higher Stakes also to have different possibilities to make make people horny however that means that these are Romans books that could have the page count of a Romans book but instead have the like 400 plus pages of an Epic Fantasy novel also I feel like all of the non-romans related themes do not evolve with the age of the audience so you're left with a world full of War racism magic and there's zero substance or commentary to it it's just a shiny and shallow playground for the romance I think that these books work well for when you don't want to deal with stories that are more hard to grasp and on the surface level give less back to you but I find the gratification of a beautiful piece of writing or a well constructed story with interesting characters way more satisfying in the long run also I feel like a lot of Romany books nowadays are just a quilt of all the ones that came before them they put together stuff that has been done before countless times I know that 100% Original Stories are not realistic and that is absolutely not my requirment but they really feel like they put these things together like a shape sorter there is a reason why you can read these books in lightning speed it reads so much like an early 2010's ya fantasy book but it's a new adult fantasy this is actually very much a thing with I think a lot of books that get really popular on book talk which I think makes sense because the demog graphic there at least when book talk was first blowing up was people who had just started reading who had just gotten back into reading after not reading for a long time and if you haven't read a lot of ya fantasy I think you'd like this book because it's going to seem newer and more exciting to you but if you have read a couple of ya fantasy series this is just like those this is a book for people who don't read a lot and also why they are so beginner friendly that is how they are designed I feel like put crack in these pages I am not here to go like unless you read one piece in the Russian original you don't know what real literatures not at all there is brilliant and thoughtful writing in all genres and levels take for example avatar Last Air bner that show was literally made and written for children and it has way more nuance and interesting characters and Concepts than all of these books together so what does this [ __ ] want then I want the romance to be more of a s plot within a well-crafted fantasy story especially when it's high fantasy with urban fantasy I can cut some slack even though I would still like the writing to be improved but if there is a [ __ ] map in front of the book or a stupid pronunciation guide at the end I want you to commit to the story you're telling and write solid enemies to love us God damn it not this horny bully dirty talk [ __ ] and take your time time with developing feelings rather than telling me that they are all of the sudden heads over heels for another honestly I think the six of crow duology by leeo is a great example on how to do it right these are by the way also popular book talk books so don't come at me for hating out of principle they have six main characters and a lot of romance between them there is pining and also real enemies to lovers that is by the way my least favorite side plot and still I wouldn't call six of crows Romany the romance plots are side plots I know it is technically ya a since some of the characters are like 17 but I think it is better written than most new adult that I've encountered also the romance accompanies the main plot and what each character has to go through individually no dicks are being shoved into your face the characters are not all bodily abled white people and like one slightly 10 person and they have their own wants and fears and interesting backgrounds that don't just revolve around their romantic interest also I feel like with C especially you could age him up to be older than 17 by the way he acts so yeah I think these books are extremely overhyped even though I don't really like that term I find it funny how there are people on Instagram or book talk that act like they are critically engaging with these books I found this video where someone presents polls about whether people think a book is deserving its hype or not and then they give their own opinion but with every single book the answer is not overhyped wow I'm so glad the hype is telling me that the hype is rightful and this is how this yapping session comes to an end what do you think about Romany what is your favorite Romany novel and should I give it a try because it might change my mind comment down below if you like but until next time thank you for watching [Music] [Music]

Channel: the atomic annie

Views: 374

Keywords: books, booktok, booktube, literature, romantasy, romance, fantasy, smut, spice, fourth wing, acotar, a court of thorns and roses, divine rivals, acomaf, the serpent and the wings of night, rebecca yarros, sjm, sarah j maas, young adult, new adult, tropes, the cruel prince, holly black, the empyrean saga

Id: PjmBSTOJSnA

Length: 35min 10sec (2110 seconds)

Published: Wed Jul 03 2024