I have been a a romance reader since almost 2 years ago. A thing that I’ve noticed is for the past six or seven months especially after crack my back drama most of the new sports romance books have been bad. It may just be me running into a problem or a slump a piece of my guess is over saturation. The tall hockey player ,the amazing F1 driver ,champion football player ,or extraordinary basketball player archetypes have become lackluster to me. I feel like authors have stopped actually caring about the complexity of the character and decided to focus on what a massively white woman erotica romance reader cares about which is mostly the body of the male lead and how petite the female lead is. Especially in the NFL or NBA romances almost every single popular romance book of this kind is white men or white woman when a good percent of these leagues are black or Hispanic. I don’t think it would be hard to incorporate maybe a Polynesian or Indian character into a book but time and time again authors fail . Even when going to office romances I run into the same problem does every female you have to be a five six white girl who wears red lipstick and heels but with nothing more to them I wouldn’t mind the whole thing if it had complexity but it doesn’t. For instance if the female lead wore red lipstick because her grandma always wore it and her grandma was her inspiration it would be awesome. I’m so tired of only white leads in these books where the girl has to be as pale as porcelain no taller than five six or five seven or were the male lead has nothing more to him than a somewhat nice body and a team backing him . How is it romance when there’s no love is in it most of these influencers promoting the book don’t even like the books. It’s all erotica what’s the point of it being a romance section of sports romance section an office romance section a medical romance section if its all just porn made for one audience? I have it related to a female lead and almost a year and that’s solely because she was over 5’7 as a 5’9 girl I enjoyed that they acknowledge that not every female lead was 5’6 or 5’2. This is mostly a rant but the book community has an awful white supremacy problem along with no character complexity become a norm . It’s horrendous
Might be worth it for you to check out r/romancebooks
The very best place on the Internet if you are a romance reader.
I don’t really remember the last time I read a romance about solely thin white people - decently written diversity is out there if you know where to look! Have you tried the Brown Sisters series? If you like sports based romance, Take A Hint Dani Brown has a Pakistani ex-rugby player MLI.
Do you have any more recs ?
The Brown Sisters Series is AMAZING!
I personally couldn’t give a little rat’s ass about representation (and I am from a couple of minority groups myself so trust me, I am allowed to say that) So that argument doesn’t hold much water for me. But moving on, I’ve given romance books many chances, and time and time again found that the writing is bad, the characters are underwhelming, and everything is very shallow. I have nothing against incorporating romance into a novel, but the genre is a giant cringefest. And I don’t think my not enjoying romance has anything to do with me being male. It’s genuinely a very lazy, surface level genre.
Do you only like sports related romances?
I personally cannot read romances like that. They fall flat for me extremely quick & feels like I’m just reading something about everyday life.
My romances have to have fantasy & great world building. Someone who is an absolute master at this is JR Ward. She is very diverse & writes about many different types of characters. When I read other series, I have to tell myself not to compare writing styles because her stuff is just that good.
I also just started other series as well, some of the authors are Katee Robert, Scarlett St. Clair, & Laura Thalassa.
Because most books of any genre suck.
A lot of bad writers are trying to cash in on the booktok romance boom, especially in the subgenres you mention. There’s a lot of self-publishing in those areas which has way lower quality control than traditional publishing, as anyone can just hit “publish” on Amazon. I’m in Facebook author groups with these people so I can tell you first hand lol.
Jesus Christ I never thought about the publishing part either
maybe try some other genres of romance it sounds like your reading basic boring throw away romances, something more in depth might be fantasy romance, supernatural romance, historical romance. There is a reason i dont read books like your describing and its because they are all the same.
Maybe an unpopular opinion:
I think a lot of romance is pandering to the stereotype of a “feminist”. The women are so independent that they don’t want to lean on their romantic interest. In the real world, that’s completely unrealistic. You can be a career woman, a mother, both… but if you don’t rely on your partner to help you through challenges big and small, is it really going to work in the long run? Women can maintain their independence AND be vulnerable with the person who is supposed to love them. It doesn’t have to be either/or.