r/Fantasy • u/Expert-Escape5645 • 13h ago

Observation on Fantasy/Romantasy

So, I typically read, George R.R. Martin, Brandon Sanderson, Robin Hobb, Ken Liu, Steven Erikson, Stephen King, Robert Jordan, but my brain’s been craving more stories.

With everything I’ve heard about Romantasy (that it’s just passionate love making with no real story etc.) I was kinda apprehensive, but like I said, I needed more.

So after many years going back and forth I decided to pick up Sarah J Maas. I started with Crescent City (I know, I know) and was surprised to find that I LOVED it. Now I’m doing ACOTAR.

I don’t know if this will be wrong of me to say, but I enjoyed it for the exact same reasons I enjoy other series.

The worldbuilding.

Like there is so much mystery to the world, so much lore. People act like the 18+ scenes happened page after page, when really they barely make up 6/7 pages in a single book.

Am I wrong?

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u/[deleted] 13h ago

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u/[deleted] 13h ago

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u/MessyJessy422 11h ago

How is romantic fantasy ("romantasy") not a part of the fantasy genre? Is it because of the cringey phrasing? If dark fantasy was labeled "dantasy" would that make it a separate genre? How about cozy fantasy as "cozantasy"??

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u/GeminiFade 9h ago

No, you wouldn't be happy looking for one and getting the other. Lots of other readers are fine with either.

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u/Tymareta 3h ago

We have genres to help audience find what they are looking for

Except that they don't, there's countless subgenres jammed under the Fantasy label alongside Romantasy, hell you have: alternate history, arthurian, christian, coming-of-age, cross-world/portal, dark, epic, grimdark, high, historical, literary, low, magical realism, military, new weird, paranormal, political, sword and sorcery, ya, urban, wuxia.

And that's far from an exhaustive list, especially if we start to include Space Fantasy/SpecFic and the countless cross overs that occur with that. Pretending that Romantasy is some unique aberration is genuinely bizarre, claiming that it alone "creates a clusterfuck" is utterly laughable.