Is it because we are all secretly himbo weregoldfish and forget that it’s literally top post when sorting by “best?”
On a separate note, I am very disappointed in everyone’s hydra-erasure. All heads deserve equal water pressure.
Do better, sweaties.
Hello!
I’m working on my debut MM romance; a novel about the life of Tom, a tall Anglo-Croatian rugby player with a moderate-severe anxiety disorder (haven’t yet decided if the moderate-severe anxiety is due to being Anglo, due to being Croatian, due to being tall, or due to being named Tom) and definitely a little bit of hypersexuality (because SuperWhoLockian fanfic taught me that’s required for MM readers).
Tom of course (of course) meets Etienne. Etienne is French, beautiful and one of the best rugby players that Tom has ever seen (and Oxford commas are overrated). Etienne also has a reputation for being difficult, egotistical and a bit of a hedonist*; basically, he just has a reputation for being French*
This combination should make you think they will be having all the sex, right? But surprise! Subversion!
The novel itself is a slow burn, with lots of yearning and missed moments between the two MCs. It will explore issues such as mental health (anxiety and ptsd) and trauma, identity and reclaiming cultural identities, drug use, sex and homophobia within high level sports. It’s character led, rather than plot lead because plots make terrible main characters. Whilst the novel is based around the world of European and International (not to be confused with European since Europe isn’t international) rugby, Etienne and Tom spend the whole time playing cat and mouse with each other (since mice definitely yearn for cats and feel like every escape is a missed connection); to their own devastation. Devastation might be because of inappropriate use of semicolons.
Currently I’m still working on the manuscript, but I’m finding I’m losing steam and getting writers block more and more (because I’m trying to get rich off of forcing pop culture phenomena, excessively muscled thighs, buzzwords, and vibes together with absolutely nothing else involved). So this is where I have some questions;
-What kind of tropes do you like to see in MM? Is a slow burn where the characters don’t have sex a turn off? Because despite both of their characterizations making a fast burn sexually make more sense, I’m a cishet woman with no clue how anal sex works so I’m going to avoid writing it. Either that or I’ll just base it all off what Rina Kent writes.
-My biggest worry is that this will be like Heated Rivalry, and my friend has said it seems to be very similar to HR. Is this a problem that most sports romances will have? As we all know, HR invented sports romance (gay, straight, and why choose) so there really can’t be other options out there, can there?
-Are flawed, traumatised, non-perfect characters a turn off? They are for me, which could be why I am struggling to keep writing. And don’t worry—the trauma and flaws don’t affect the beauty of their muscular thighs. Or any other part of their character besides the periodic reminders that they are Flawed, Traumatized, and Non-Perfect (since I only know about flaws and trauma from reading the aforementioned Rina Kent).
-Is it an issue to just throw in semicolons wherever I feel like it? Or is artistic punctuation a turnoff?
I will be looking for ARC and beta readers once edits are done and I actually finish my first draft.
After all, once I’ve gotten potential readers to tell me exactly what they want (since all MM readers have homogenous preferences—homo is right there in the adjective!), there shouldn’t be anything difficult (like shoehorning a bunch of random tropes into a novel and having it still having it read as cohesive) standing in my way from profit!
Credit for winner graphic goes to u/OctoMorwen, who is far better to me than I deserve. ❤️
Slow burns tend to be the most requested of the relationship speeds each week, so they’re definitely popular. And personally I love tension and yearning. Being me, I saw potential for data-gathering and couldn't resist.
As far as what counted as a slow burn--“slow burn for specific MMCs but not all MMCs” was included. People were free to nominate anything they felt they could justify as being a slow burn. It was a judgment call of everyone involved, though feedback was collected about all nominations for slow burn status.
With 23.8% of the vote, the winner is Ironside Academy by Jane Washington (Plier).
The rest of the finalists were as follows:
All the Pretty Monsters by Kristy Cunning (Gypsy Blood) (19.6%)
Bonds that Tie by J Bree (Broken Bonds) (15.7%)
Fifth Nicnevin by Marie Mistry (Beyond the Faerie Gates) (14.2%)
Arcanaeum by Marie Mistry (Liminal) (13.9%)
Scent of Us by Eliana Lee (12.8%)
Lessons Learned
I worried at first when I started this competition that I had picked a dud, because there were (relatively) so few nominations. There were concerns about not being sure if something counted as a slow burn. That was fair, and if there are future competitions about subgenres/settings/etc. I’ll do my best to make sure things are clearer. Slow Burn was definitely thrown together on impulsive and vibes because I had felt no desire to do a competition following Favorite MMC Type, so when the inspiration hit I hit the floor and ran with it.
The idea of requesting a limited number of nominations per person, while ultimately lifted during nominations here, is something that might come back again. First, I try to limit the number of entries I have in the runoff rounds to make sure each of them can be seen. Second, while even I refuse when asked (when it’s not a poll) to pick an absolute favorite in RH-related things, there comes a point where it feels like people are nominating everything they can think instead of things that are actually their favorites.
Though this is a why choose subreddit, so maybe some people really do just have that much room in their hearts.
Finally, I liked having the “does this count as [x]” round for all nominations, though in the future I won’t try to combine it with the runoffs round. I’d rather people nominate more things (in good faith) that can be decided on later by the subreddit than hold back. I also like limiting the number of times I have to make a judgment call about inclusion in competitions, since it shouldn’t be about what I think.
Next Steps
I still have some numbers waiting for me to analyze with the conclusion of the Completed Books competitions—this post will be focusing on authors who did well in multiple competitions. I’ll get around to it eventually. On the subject of eventually, I swear I will actually do a post that lists all the competitions and links to the different rounds one day (and could even use that so people can follow and I’ll comment when a new competition starts).
As far as future competitions, I have some general ideas that have been floating around that are both book-specific and general, but nothing so specific that I can definitely state that it’s next. The most solid idea would be something like favorite tension and spice (kinks/sexual acts/favorite types of scenes that have any kind of physically sexual/sexual tension element to them)^(1). Alternatively, something related to types of plots (like mentioned below). But I had thought the next book-specific competition would be Favorite Contemporary, so who can say for sure.
I’m also a little fonder of the idea of “overall favorite” using the top 6 from the four length-based competitions.
If anyone has ideas or asks, please feel free to share! My only condition is that it not require more knowledge than can be obtained from a blurb if it’s about specific books (so no “favorite book for plot twists”, but “favorite types of plot twists” or “favorite things to happen in the plot” could both be general concepts).
Here’s what’s been done before.
Also, if y’all have any comments about things that worked well, or that didn’t, or that could be better—please let me know! I know this competition didn’t follow the same strict scheduling that I normally keep to, and I appreciate everyone being patient with me about it.
^(1)If something involving sexual acts is done as competition, there is going to be a strict exclusion on anything with dub-con or non-con. While I’m not judging those who do like those in their books, for my own comfort I no longer do analysis involving them.
Now on to the fun part!
DATA AND COMMENTARY
Notes:
1. Unless otherwise specified, when I speak of “starting” rankings, I’m using the rankings after the runoffs. For the top 36, these also get referred to as seeds; each of the top 36 will have an overall seed as well as a qualifier seed (for example, Tempest of Shadows was the second seed in qualifier B, and the eleventh seed overall).
2. Since Favorite Books competitions generally have had lower participation than other competitions, I included only those competitions for the participation comparisons.
3. I tried to be consistent with formatting. Sometimes that breaks because I feel it will be more readable a different way. At least I’m consistent in the same section (I hope?)
Sections (in case you want to skip to your favorite part)
2. Tough Choices
3. Surprises and Upsets
Participation
Categorical Performance
Best-Performing Authors
7. Big Movers
1. OVERALL THOUGHTS
I hope this was as fun for everyone else as it was for me. Yes, there were a lot of repeated favorites in the finals, but honestly I care less about the winner than about what I learn from each competition. And I know there are people who look at these competitions as fodder for their TBRs, so I hope people keep participating when it’s possible, or even probable, the ultimate winner will be one that won a competition before.
Even once it started looking likely Ironside would win, there were times where it looked like the rest of the finals could go any direction. Even after the gap started to wide, it still felt close.
2. TOUGH CHOICES
Qualifier E. Goddamn Qualifier E.
I’m not saying there weren’t other tough qualifiers (both Blake Blacks were in Qualifier C, for instance). But E had two Elizabeth Dears (one of which is a subreddit favorite and had its second book released right before the qualifier and the other of which was fourth in Favorite Completed Trilogy), three finalists from Favorite Long Series, and another subreddit favorite.
I’d apologize but, like I have told y’all before, those matchups are y’all’s fault, not mine.
Neither C nor E were ultimately close between the winner and second place. However, for C there were only 9 votes between second and sixth place (153 total votes) and for E there were only 12, with 4 between third and sixth place (184 total votes).
3. SURPRISES AND UPSETS
Note: When I say “seed,” unless I specify “seed in the round,” I am referring to the seed the entry had when being placed in the qualifiers.
3.a. Nominations Surprises
Like I mentioned earlier, I was worried initially about lack of interest in the competition due to limited numbers of nominations, and the nominations stayed open for significantly longer than previous competitions. I assume some hesitancy could have come from not being sure if something qualified as a slow burn, and hopefully in the future the knowledge that there will be a process for determining eligibility will make people feel more secure if they’re uncertain about making a nomination.
I’m also (newly) trying to limit the nominations I make in competitions that aren’t personal favorites “because I know other people like it.” A potential (and interesting) area for analysis is the things that aren’t nominated that I assumed would be, after all, and there was plenty of that here. (Note: while I know why-choose tags aren’t the end-all and be-all, I’m still using them for illustrative purposes.)
1. Bonds that Tie, second place in Favorite Long Series, was one of the last nominations made (and it’s hard to think of that as not being a slow burn for multiple MMCs).
2. Blackened Blade, which was one of the most-summoned books in 2024 on the subreddit, wasn’t nominated (tagged as slow burn on why-choose).
3. Beasts of the Briar, one of the RH that’s made it into mainstream bookstores, wasn’t nominated (tagged as slow burn on why-choose).
4. Deadwood, which won Favorite Completed Trilogy, wasn’t nominated (tagged as slow burn on why-choose).
5. Cursed Legacies, which won Favorite Completed Quartet, wasn’t nominated (tagged as medium burn, but I thought I remembered at least one MMC taking a while to get on board, which would count).
There are more, of course, including some where there were so many posts about them people were wondering about street team use, but since I hit reddit’s word limit with Favorite MMCs, I’m trying to be as succinct as possible.
So what happened?
Did people consider nominating them but not sure they counted? Did people forget about them? Were nominations just around Easter and therefore everyone was busy? Do people legitimately not consider them slow burns?
There’s no way to say for sure (though I’d love any speculation y’all have). But it’s interesting.
And I like it when things are interesting.
3.b. Runoffs Surprises
Runoffs for book-specific competitions tend to be clustered at the bottom; feelings about specific books aren’t as universal as they are about non-book-specific things (though clustering still happens in those competitions).
Despite that, the second round of runoffs saw very little voting. In the previous book-specific runoffs between 36% and 85% of nominations received more than 3 upvotes (not counting the one that comes automatically for the comment being made); in this competition it was 18%. Previously highest numbers of upvotes were between 15 and 32; this time it was 6. (In fact, the runoff post had twice the number of upvotes as the highest-voted entry).
Numbers were also on the lower end during the first “does this count” runoff for the entry’s main comment. I couldn’t say if that was due to people voting for entries to count as a slow burn but not liking them or thinking that voting for it to count as a slow burn counted as liking it. Since other parts of the rules for that round (requiring at least one person to explain why they felt something wasn’t a slow burn) didn’t happen, either explanation was possible, or another explanation I haven’t considered.
The consequence of this? More ties at the bottom, including a 9-way tie for the final 4 spots in the qualifiers. I had to make some calls, which is why some fan favorites (Havoc Killed Her Alphas and Dark Side in particular) were left out; I don’t get a vote in the runoffs except for tie-breakers, and I’m just not as fond of some books that other people love.
In more positive news, there were only two downvoted entries in the runoffs.
3.c. Finalist Stats
Average Round Seed for Finals (Average Overall Seed for Finals)
Slow Burn: 2.17 (10.67)
Completed Long Series: 1.00 (3.50)
Completed Quartet: 2.17 (9.67)
Completed Trilogy: 1.00 (3.50)
Standalone/Completed Duet: 1.00 (3.50)
Commentary
While Slow Burn and Completed Quartet might look similar, the circumstances were very different. Quartet required three tie-breakers, two of which were due to inclusion of ineligible series and one of which was still tied at the end of the tiebreaker (so I had to remove my vote); if that had not been necessary for the former two the top seeds would have gone on to the finals.
Even without that, Slow Burn resulted in the highest average overall seed for finalists.
3.d. Surprises and Upsets: Qualifiers
Yet another perfect example of why the runoff round exists—Bonds that Tie wouldn’t have made it into the qualifiers without it due to being a later nomination.
Technically there were three upsets: the third seed in qualifiers D, E, and F won.
That being said, was I surprised by any of those results? Not really. Qualifier D didn’t have an obvious challenger to Arcanaeum. Fifth Nicnevin had outperformed both Path of Temptation and Age of the Andinna in a finals (though specific poll make-ups can make a significant difference). Jasmine Mas is very popular among her fans, but previous polling has shown that her works are divisive; J Bree (whatever you think about her as an author) is a reverse harem staple.
3.e. Surprises and Upsets: Finals
Technically Ironside winning could be considered an upset, since Arcanaeum performed the best in the qualifiers. But that feels like a stretch.
Four of the entries in the final were in the Favorite Long Series final together. Difference between first and second and different between second and third in Long Series and here in Slow Burn were comparable (10/11 and 12/11 respectively). And it was even the same three in those slots. But this time All the Pretty Monsters beat out Bonds that Tie.
Is it due to being AtPM being a better slow burn? Is it because of the other two entries in the finals? Can’t say for sure, but it’s interesting.
Also, is it likely Marie Mistry being double-represented hurt her chances of victory? Entirely possible.
4. PARTICIPATION
Error bars represent the maximum and minimum number of participants.
4.a. Voters in the Qualifiers
See chart in attached images
Average [range]
Standalone/Completed Duet: 84.8 [71-114]
Completed Trilogy: 81.5 [69-99]
Completed Quartet: 67.8 [57-104]
Completed Long Series: 96 [87-114]
Slow Burn: 155 [129-184]
4.b. Voters in the Finals
See chart in attached images
Standalone/Completed Duet: 94
Completed Trilogy: 195
Completed Quartet: 97
Completed Long Series: 163
Slow Burn:
Commentary
I worried at first when I started this competition that I had picked a dud, because there were (relatively) so few nominations. And then I worried again when there were so few votes in the runoffs.
Apparently I shouldn’t have?
I don’t know if it’s because of the mix of lengths, the inclusion of unfinished series, or getting a rest from competitions for a while, but people came out for this.
I separate book-specific and non-book-specific participation because generally the book-specific competitions see less turnout. Even with the significantly higher averages for the qualifiers for Slow Burn, it’s below the averages for the most recent other competitions by at least 20 votes.
The finals, on the other hand, were the most I have had for any poll I have done on this subreddit, including the one-off about favorite subgenres.
Am I suspicious? I don’t think so. None of the results were out of the ordinary for how the books have been talked about on the subreddit.
Am I confused? A little, not gonna lie.
5. CATEGORICAL PERFORMANCE
5.a. Subgenres
For the first time, we had a straight historical romance nomination. I waffled about whether to lump that into contemporary, since I didn’t have historic (hah) information on it as a subgenre. But ultimately I decided that not having the historic information is historic information; no one protested when historical romance wasn’t included in the favorite subgenre poll.
Also, to solve the problem of magical OV being fantasy or OV, I put anything with magic (excluding scent bonds or any other aspects solely from designations in an OV) into the fantasy subgenre.
5.a.1. Representation
See chart in attached images. Post-apocalyptic/dystopian is referred to as Dystopian for brevity.
** ** |Preference |All Entries |Qualifiers |Finals
Fantasy |53% |67% |72% |83%
Human Omegaverse |20% |12% |11% |17%
Contemporary |18% |18% |17% |0%
Dystopian |7% |0% |0% |0%
Sci-Fi |3% |0% |0% |0%
Historical |0% |2% |0% |0% Commentary
Fantasy was still the most popular, but human omegaverse and contemporary performed comparably to preference for them (at least until the finals for contemporary). Fantasy doing best here is in line with fantasy doing best in the competitions for longer series; I think if there was a competition for favorite fast burn representation would be more along the lines of what we saw for Favorite Standalone/Completed Duet.
5.a.2. Average Rank by Subgenre
See chart in attached images
Fantasy: 21.5
Human Omegaverse: 27.0
Contemporary: 30.3
Historical: 42.0
Commentary
Again, fantasy performed the best, then omegaverse followed by contemporary. (When both are represented, contemporary has never had a lower average ranking than omegaverse in a competition.)
5.a.3. Best Performer by Subgenre (Rank)
Fantasy: Ironside Academy (1)
Human Omegaverse: Scent of Us (6)
Contemporary: Adamson All-Boys Academy by CJ Stunich (16)
Historical: Their Ward (42)
Commentary
No surprises here. Maybe a little that Adamson was the top contemporary, but there weren't any others that obviously sprang to mind.
5.b. Series Length
While some of the unfinished works have an announced series length, I categorized them separately as “Unfinished” both because things change and because I didn’t feel like going and doing the research to confirm them.
5.b.1. Representation
See chart in attached images
** ** |All Entries |Qualifiers |Finals
Standalone |10% |8% |0%
Duet |10% |11% |17%
Trilogy |16% |14% |0%
Quartet |12% |8% |0%
Long Series |35% |42% |67%
Unfinished |16% |17% |17%
Commentary
Previous polling indicated an order of preference for trilogies, duets, standalones, long series (5+ books), and then quartets. Clearly that doesn’t align with how we feel when it comes to slow burns.
Fantasy and long series might be a bit of a chicken/egg for why they’re so represented when it comes to slow burns. We like fantasy in general, and we seem to like slow burns that are longer. But do we like them because they’re fantasies that happen to be long, or do we like long series and fantasies make for better versions of those?
5.b.2. Average Rankings
See chart in attached images
Standalone: 34.2
Duet: 26.2
Trilogy: 25.1
Quartet: 33.3
Long Series: 16.4
Unfinished: 25.5
Commentary
I really don’t know what we have against RH quartets as a subreddit, but the bias remains strong.
Standalones could have suffered because while it’s possible to do a good slow burn standalone, it’s a lot rarer. There are also many more standalones out there, so people could easily not be as familiar with the options.
Surprising to see that duets, trilogies, and unfinished series were essentially equivalent. I know at least three of the unfinished series are planned trilogies, though, so that could explain it. Something about the pacing works for us.
5.b.3 Best Performance (Rank)
Standalone: Runaway Omega (26)
Duet: Scent of Us (6)
Trilogy: Psycho Academy (8)
Quartet: Splintered Bond (22)
Long Series: Ironside Academy (1)
Unfinished: Arcanaeum (5)
Commentary
Would Runaway Omega still have been the best standalone if Havoc Killed Her Alphas had been chosen in the runoff tiebreaker? That's the only one of these that surprises me, because I hadn't heard as much about it.
6.c. Series Status
Best performer is not discussed because it can be extrapolated from section 6.b.3.
5.c.1. Representation
See chart in attached images
** ** |All Entries |Qualifiers |Finals
Finished |84% |83% |83%
Unfinished |16% |17% |17% Commentary
Remarkably stable proportions. I don’t have an explanation for it, but it’s beautiful to look at.
A preference for completed series is definitely present, though, which matches discussions about how some people won’t read incomplete series.
5.b.2. Average Rankings
See chart in attached images
Finished: 24.0
Unfinished: 25.5
Commentary
While some people won’t read them, unfinished series proved to be well-liked by those that do, with not much different between its average and that of finished series.
6. BEST PERFORMING AUTHORS
6.a. Authors with Multiple Nominations
Three Entries: Auryn Hadley
Two Entries: Blake Black, J. Bree, Merri Bright, Kristy Cunning, Elizabeth Dear, Marie Mistry, Jane Washington
6.b. Performance by Authors with Multiple Nominations (Average Rank) [Highest Rank]
Commentary
Historically I only included authors who had multiple nominations and all nominations were in the qualifiers. But Kristy Cunning was tied for a slot in the qualifiers and lost the tiebreaker, so she was included as well.
No real surprises here. The only one of whom I haven’t heard consistently good things about the writing quality is Bree, but her reverse harem has been around for a while and Bonds that Tie is the gateway read for many who come into the subgenre.
Fun fact—all three authors who had two works in the same poll (Mistry, Dear, and Black) had their two works be at most two places apart in the final rankings.
BIG MOVERS
This section is to examine the entries that moved the most places up or down between the specified rounds
Nomination Round Results to Final Results:
Winner: Bonds that Tie by J Bree (moved up 39 places)
Loser: Discordia University by Cassandra Featherstone and Veil Diaries by BL Brunnemer (moved down 16 places)
Nomination Round Results to Runoff Results
Winner: Bonds that Tie by J Bree, Forgotten Angel by Merri Bright, and Path of Temptation by Auryn Hadley (moved up 24 spots)
Loser: Discordia University by Cassandra Featherstone and Veil Diaries by BL Brunnemer (moved down 16 places)
Qualifier Seed to Final Results
Winner: Bonds that Tie by J Bree and Shifter Guardian Academy by Elizabeth Dear (moved up 15 places)
Loser: Braided Fate by Brigid Kemmerer (moved down 23 places)
Commentary
When one of the most popular reverse harem series is a very late addition to the nominee list, it makes sense it’s going to do a lot of moving.
Shifter Guardian Academy actually started at 17, went up to a qualifier seed of 32 due to a low placement in the runoffs, and then went back down to 17.
I gave up on reading Featherstone when she required knowledge of three different series to keep going with any of them (I rarely like what I read of her, and how much I liked the one wasn’t worth how much I disliked the two). It’s a thought that’s purely tangential to her falling, but I do wonder how that (and her reputation for not finishing series and for tea-filled authors notes) is going to serve her long term.
Ranks 1-6
Note: Rankings are based off the results from the finals round
1. {Ironside Academy by Jane Washington} (Plier)
2. {All the Pretty Monsters by Kristy Cunning} (Gypsy Blood)
3. {Bonds that Tie by J Bree} (Broken Bonds)
4. {Fifth Nicnevin by Marie Mistry} (Beyond the Fairy Gate)
5. {Arcanaeum by Marie Mistry} (Liminal)
6. {Scent of Us by Eliana Lee}
Ranks 7-36
Note: Rankings are based off percentage of votes during their respective qualifiers (it’s imperfect because of the different numbers of voters and popularity of the top choice, but it’s the best I can do)
7. {Tempest of Shadows by Jane Washington}
8. {Psycho Academy by Jasmine Mas}
9. {State of Grace by Collete Rhodes} (Run Riot)
10. {Her Vicious Beasts by EP Bali} (Her Vicious Beasts)
11. {Age of the Andinna by Kristen Banet} (Gladiator's Downfall)
13. {Path of Temptation by Auryn Hadley} (Price We Pay)
14. {Pizza Shop Exorcist by Dakota Brown } (The Price of Possession)
15. {Forgotten Angel by Merri Bright} (Lost Feather)
16. {Adamson All-Boys Academy by CM Stunich} (The Secret Girl)
17. {Shifter Guardians Academy by Elizabeth Dear} (Clash of Claws)
18. {Hannaford Prep by J Bree} (Just Drop Out)
20. {Scent of Victory by Greer Hudson} (Citius)
21. {Demon's Muse by Auryn Hadley} (Kiss of Death)
22. {Splintered Bond by Merri Bright} (Pack Reject)
23. {Switchboard Duet by Heather Long} (Talk to Me)
24. (tie) {Nora Jacobs by Jackie May} (Don't Rush Me)
{(un)Lucky Succubus by LL Frost} (Succubus Bargain)
26. {Runaway Omega by Ember Nicole}
27. {Dying Gods by Elisha Kemp} (Drown the Sea)
28. {Rise of the Iliri by Auryn Hadley} (BloodLust)
29. {Coded Connections by Blake Black} (Soul Code)
30. {Lightbringer by Evelyn Flood}
31. {Rogue Riders by Blake Black} (Broken Breath)
32. {Braided Fate by Brigid Kemmerer} Warrior Princess Assassin
33. {Darkstone Academy by Bliss Devlin} (A Kiss of Salt and Sea)
34. {Ascension Rising by KR Rainbolt} (Of Glass and Lavender)
35. {Cardinal by Mia Smantz} (The Cardinal Bird)
36. {Stream Heat by Helen Scott and Zoey Shelby}
Ranks 37-54
Note: Rankings are based off the total number of upvotes received, compensated for downvotes, during the runoff.
37. (Note: lost tiebreaker for 36th qualifier seed) (tie) {Dark Side by Kristy Cunning} (Four Psychos)
{H3RO by JS Lee} (Idol Thoughts)
{Havoc Killed Her Alpha by Marie Mackay}
{Rivers and Roads by Everly Falls} (Unsteady)
{Stoneraven Alphas by Essie Suter} (Shadow Chaser)
42. (tie) {Broken Ashes by Nikita Parmenter} (Muted Voices)
{Dark Confessions by Kris Butler} (Dangerous Truths)
{Discordia University by Cassandra Featherstone} (Veiled Flame)
{Flirting with Monsters by Eva Chase} (Shadow Thief)
{Rebel Academy by Rosemary A Johns}
{Star-Crossed Series by Sage RelleAnne} (Her Day to Die)
{Their Ward by Kitty St Clair}
{Veil Diaries by BL Brunnemer} (Trying to Live with the Dead)
Hello, it’s me, Mid-at-Best Entitled Man. You should know me best as the author of {[BLATANT SELF PROMOTION]}, but you might also recall me as blatantly using reader spaces to be a creep find other women to use in barely described self-congratulating marketing attempts form connections with fellow readers. Particularly if they’re women and too desperate to recognize that they should run far and fast.
Well, despite things not working out like I would have preferred with the latter, I have decided to give it another go.
In case my previous post history might paint an unfair picture of me as a skeeze a man looking for connection should I be judged by those who just don’t understand, I’m going to make a brand new account, and the first thing I’m going to do is find a subreddit full of readers who are obviously down for absolutely anything based on what they read a friendly and welcoming community. Like where people read about constant fucking because there are so many penises to take care of.
So, potential targets fellow romance readers, has anyone tried something close to reverse harem in real life? Like a threesome/group situation or throuple? And if you have, would you be willing to share in explicit details so I can engage in my voyeurism kink with you without your consent use it for marketing research feel like a welcome member of this community?
Has everyone here seen the Himbo Diagram enough times to have it memorized? Maybe.
Am I going to pass up an opportunity to include it? Absolutely not.
Week: May 4th, 2026-May 10th, 2026
Once again, I decided to make a list of things that got multiple recommendation requests last week, with the following rules.
BY THE NUMBERS
Overall Statistics (Percent Change from Previous Week)
Note: “Help me find this book” and reviews/recommendations are not counted for the total recommendation request category
Total recommendation requests: 110 (11%)
"Help me find this book!" requests: 23 (77%)
Spoiler requests: 13 (160%)
Book Reviews/Recommendations/Rants: 14 (-33%)
Requests for “like specific author”: 0 (NaN—0 last week)
Requests for “like specific book/media”: 18 (80%)
Requests for books by specific author/in specific series: 0 (NaN—0 last week)
Audiobooks: 2 (-33%)
Book Slumps/Hangovers/DNF streaks: 7 (0%)
Total number of request categories: 154 (-1%)
Unique requests (only asked once): 88 (-15%)
Average categories per request: 3.09 (2%)
Genre as Percentages of Requests (Percent Change from Previous Week)
Fantasy: 23% (7%)
OV: 13% (-16%)
Contemporary: 4% (-10%)
Dark: 6% (-10%)
Cozy/light: 5% (50%)
Sci-Fi: 4% (260%)
Spice/kink callouts: 16% (-10%)
CATEGORIES
25 Requests: Fantasy
18 Requests: Spice/kink
14 Requests: OV
8 Requests: Obsessed MMCs, Unhinged characters
7 Requests: Academic, Dark, Unhinged/feral/psychotic MMCs
6 Requests: Angst/emotional
5 Requests: Academy, Children involved (in some fashion), Cozy, “Favorite/most/best [x],” Jealousy, Tension
4 Requests: Abused/traumatized FMC, Adult characters, Age gap, Contemporary, Enemies-to-lovers, “Good [x],” Grovel, Sci-Fi, Slow burn, Slow forgiveness from FMC
3 Requests: Brothers, Daddy kink, Devoted MMCs, Fated mates, FMC is a mother, Funny, MMCs fall first, Multi-PoV, Pack already has an omega, Possessive MMCs, Shifters
2 Requests: Aliens, Bully, Capable FMC, College, Crime/thriller/investigative plot, Drama, Elves, Feared MMCs, FMC hates MMCs, FMC undergoes significant growth and has to work for it, High school, Introvert/shy FMC, Isekai/transported to new dimension, Loser MMCs, Mafia, Male omega, Main characters have non-baby children, Mental health representation, MMCs lose FMC and fight to get her back (not because they screwed up), Monster, Neurodivergent FMC, Pregnancy, Protective MMCs, Secret identity, Soft/innocent FMC, Stalking, Strong/badass FMC, Twins, Unhinged FMC, Yearning/pining
COMMENTARY
General Subreddit:
By The Numbers
Categories
FMC of the Week: Abused/traumatized FMC
MMC of the Week: Obsessed MMCs
Kink of the Week: Daddy
Relationship Dynamic of the Week: Age Gap
Species of the Week (but barely): Shifter
POUPOURRI
Gold Star of the Week
>!Love sauce from his giggle berries sputtered out of the piss slit of his turgid hotdog to coat the crevices of her kitty, pleasing her heart, her moist warm meat sleeve, and all the rest of her girly parts as it oozed out to gild her furry patch like a leave-in conditioner of lust. !<
Struggle of the Week
u/Moonlight_Star_ is captain of the struggle bus. I hope things get fixed for you soon, bitchawool.
Favorite Lines (in no particular order):
I have read a lot of posts on this subreddit, u/NewCollar6433. That is a line I have never seen anything like before. Well done.
It’s been a while, but when I did the “Build an Ideal FMC” competition, we actually wanted our FMCs to have 2+ friends of mixed genders, so you’re not alone, u/Shadowravenspet.
Goddamnit, u/DearReaderItsMe. Now I’m going to be thinking about people not washing their hands next time I read a medieval-setting fantasy.
In my head, u/divinely_darkened, this is the voice of Yzma as a cat in Emperor’s New Groove. I refuse to believe another option exists.
u/JessicaTrent,👏I👏am👏here👏for👏it👏.
(No, actually, I went to copy parts of it and recognized I was copying the whole thing because I couldn’t pick anything that wasn’t worth including.)
Favorite Requests (in no particular order):
Right there with you, u/Holiday_Quality_8610. If the plot requires people to be immature and stupid, I want no part of it.
Now I want this too (I’ve complained before about how cozy should not equal boring, but I feel like witchy husbands could get into all kinds of mischief). Thank you for explaining what my life has been lacking, u/ashez2ashes.
But in books only, right, u/Fair_Paramedic7396?
…right?
I hope you found what you were looking for, u/squirrelsabound. Everyone deserves to have books where they can identify with the main characters! (Also, I have at least one demi-sexual MMC rec and an asexual MMC rec if you’re interested.)
They, and you, absolutely do, u/RudeLetter6523
WANT MORE SCIENCE?
Finals for Favorite Slow Burn is open for one more day. And it’s been exciting to watch!
tl;dr—vote for your favorite of the options listed, even if you haven’t read all of them (or any of them). If you don’t really care for the ones you have read, or if you haven’t read any, you can vote for which one you’d be most likely to add to your TBR or the premise you think looks best to you.
BACKGROUND
Slow burns tend to be the most requested of the relationship speeds each week, so they’re definitely popular. And personally I love tension and yearning.
Being me, I saw potential for data-gathering and couldn't resist. So I'm running a competition for what the subreddit's favorite slow burn is.
As far as what counted as a slow burn--I’m 100% okay including “slow burn for specific MMCs but not all MMCs.” You can have an FMC who hooks up with one MMC in the first chapter of a quartet, and still doesn’t get together with another MMC until book three (hello, Hades), which still results in plenty of that delicious tension. It’s going to be a judgment call of everyone involved. You can still choose not to vote for something that you love but that you feel isn't a slow burn (though feedback was collected about all nominations for slow burn status).
THIS STAGE
We're in the finals, where the winners of the six qualifiers battle it out.
Vote for your favorite of the options; if there aren’t any that you read and liked, you can either sit this round out, or vote for the one that sounds the most interesting of those you haven’t read.
Remember that you are voting for the series as a whole, so if most books were great and one was terrible, that should be kept in mind.
Please feel free to share any feelings you have, positive or negative, about any or all of the books in the qualifiers (The request for not speaking ill of any books in the previous rounds was because I didn’t want someone to feel stupid or like they shouldn’t have said something for proposing a less popular book that someone else felt didn’t deserve to be in the running; all the books that made it to the qualifiers clearly have decent support from the community, so I feel that risk isn’t as much of a concern.)
All other feelings are also welcome to be shared! This is a safe space to, for example, complain about how mean and cruel and sadistic I am for making y’all choose in a why choose subreddit.
Polls will be open for 2 days.
After 2 days, we’ll have tiebreakers if necessary (1 day poll if the winner of the final won by 1.0% or less, including only those options within 1.0% of victory). Then whenever I get around to it there will be a results post with pretty charts (it used to be the same day the finals ended, but I have learned to be flexible and forgiving of myself).
As a reminder: if I hear about anyone attempting to manipulate the results for a specific author or book by encouraging people to vote through author-specific groups, that author will be disqualified from the competition. If it happens a second time, that author will be disqualified from all future competitions of mine. If you see it happening, please reach out to me about it.
Let’s have some fun!
BOT SUMMONING
{Arcanaeum by Marie Mistry} (Liminal)
{Ironside Academy by Jane Washington} (Plier)
{All the Pretty Monsters by Kristy Cunning} (Gypsy Blood)
{Scent of Us by Eliana Lee}
{Bonds that Tie by J Bree} (Broken Bonds)
{Fifth Nicnevin by Marie Mistry} (Beyond the Fairy Gate)
tl;dr—vote for your favorite of the options listed, even if you haven’t read all of them (or any of them). If you don’t really care for the ones you have read, or if you haven’t read any, you can vote for which one you’d be most likely to add to your TBR or the premise you think looks best to you.
BACKGROUND
Slow burns tend to be the most requested of the relationship speeds each week, so they’re definitely popular. And personally I love tension and yearning.
Being me, I saw potential for data-gathering and couldn't resist. So I'm running a competition for what the subreddit's favorite slow burn is.
As far as what counted as a slow burn--I’m 100% okay including “slow burn for specific MMCs but not all MMCs.” You can have an FMC who hooks up with one MMC in the first chapter of a quartet, and still doesn’t get together with another MMC until book three (hello, Hades), which still results in plenty of that delicious tension. It’s going to be a judgment call of everyone involved. You can still choose not to vote for something that you love but that you feel isn't a slow burn (though feedback was collected about all nominations for slow burn status).
THIS STAGE
The qualifiers are for the top 36 options among all nominations, as determined by upvotes in the initial post and in the runoffs.
Vote for your favorite of the options; if there aren’t any that you read and liked, you can either sit this round out, or vote for the one that sounds the most interesting of those you haven’t read. Remember that you are voting for the series as a whole, so if most books were great and one was terrible, that should be kept in mind.
Yes, I expect this to be hard. No, I did not make the matchups just to be mean—there’s a whole process about where entries will go, and even I don’t get to mess with that (no matter how much I might want to sometimes).
Please feel free to share any feelings you have, positive or negative, about any or all of the books in the qualifiers (The request for not speaking ill of any books in the previous rounds was because I didn’t want someone to feel stupid or like they shouldn’t have said something for proposing a less popular book that someone else felt didn’t deserve to be in the running; all the books that made it to the qualifiers clearly have decent support from the community, so I feel that risk isn’t as much of a concern.)
All other feelings are also welcome to be shared! This is a safe space to, for example, complain about how mean and cruel and sadistic I am for making y’all choose in a why choose subreddit.
Polls will be open for 2 days.
After all of the qualifiers are complete, we’ll have tiebreakers if necessary (1 day polls if the winner of the qualifier won by 1.0% or less, including only those options within 1.0% of victory), followed by the finals, whose entries will be the winner of each qualifier.
As a reminder: if I hear about anyone attempting to manipulate the results for a specific author or book by encouraging people to vote through author-specific groups, that author will be disqualified from the competition. If it happens a second time, that author will be disqualified from all future competitions of mine. If you see it happening, please reach out to me about it.
Let’s have some fun!
OPEN POLLS
Qualifier E is open for another day. The entries are
Age of the Andinna by Kristen Banet (Gladiator's Downfall)
Scent of Victory by Greer Hudson (Citius)
Fifth Nicnevin by Marie Mistry (Beyond the Fairy Gate)
Path of Temptation by Auryn Hadley (Price We Pay)
Knight's Revenge by Elizabeth Dear (Storm the Gates)
Shifter Guardians Academy by Elizabeth Dear (Clash of Claws)
BOT SUMMONING
{Psycho Academy by Jasmine Mas}
{Rise of the Iliri by Auryn Hadley} (BloodLust)
{Bonds that Tie by J Bree} (Broken Bonds)
{Forgotten Angel by Merri Bright} (Lost Feather)
{Lightbringer by Evelyn Flood}
{Runaway Omega by Ember Nicole}
This week’s Trends is sponsored by Britney Spears’ ‘Criminal,’ for reasons which should soon be apparent.
It has been stuck in my head for hours at this point.
Week: April 27th, 2026-May 3rd, 2026
Once again, I decided to make a list of things that got multiple recommendation requests last week, with the following rules.
BY THE NUMBERS
Overall Statistics (Percent Change from Previous Week)
Note: “Help me find this book” and reviews/recommendations are not counted for the total recommendation request category
Total recommendation requests: 99 (-6%)
"Help me find this book!" requests: 13 (8%)
Spoiler requests: 5 (-29%)
Book Reviews/Recommendations/Rants: 21 (50%)
Requests for “like specific author”: 0 (NaN—0 last week)
Requests for “like specific book/media”: 10 (-23%)
Requests for books by specific author/in specific series: 0 (-100%)
Audiobooks: 3 (0%)
Book Slumps/Hangovers/DNF streaks: 7 (-22%)
Total number of request categories: 156 (-1%)
Unique requests (only asked once): 104 (20%)
Average categories per request: 3.04 (-14%)
Genre as Percentages of Requests (Percent Change from Previous Week)
Fantasy: 21% (-14%)
OV: 15% (-12%)
Contemporary: 4% (-58%)
Dark: 7% (48%)
Cozy/light: 3% (-60%)
Sci-Fi: 1% (-73%)
Spice/kink callouts: 18% (-13%)
CATEGORIES
21 Requests: Fantasy
18 Requests: Spice/kink
15 Requests: OV
11 Requests: Criminals
8 Requests: “Good [x],” Mafia
7 Requests: Dark, Obsession
6 Requests: “Best/Most/Favorite [x],” Enemies-to-lovers, FMC with a spine, Obsessed MMCs
5 Requests: Academic, Caretaking (in some way), Funny
4 Requests: Academy, Caretaking MMCs, Contemporary, Shifter, Unhinged/chaotic MMCs, Well-written
3 Requests: Assassin, BDSM or dom/sub vibes, Bully, Cozy, Established pack, Morally grey characters, Protective MMCs, Slow burn, Strong/badass FMC,
2 Requests: Angst/emotional, AO3, Banter, Beta FMC, Condescending/patronizing MMCs, Dominant MMC (in or out of bedroom), Fated mates, Good plot, MC in healthcare, Mix of spice and plot, MMC only nice to FMC, Monster, Multi-PoV, Poor characters, Possessive MMCs, Powerful MMCs, Redemption, Rough, Sports, Tension/yearning, Traumatized/abused characters, Traumatized/abused FMC, Two omegas.
COMMENTARY
General Subreddit:
By The Numbers
Categories
FMC of the Week: FMC with a Spine
MMC of the Week: Obsessed MMC
Species of the Week: Shifter
Kink of the Week: BDSM or dom/sub dynamic
Intangible of the Week: Well-written
POUPOURRI
Confession
I betrayed my obligations to this subreddit as my first and greatest love on this website. I was actually at a point with my research where I wasn’t doing anything and could have gotten Trends out on Monday for the first time in several weeks. But a member of RCJ, u/salt-payment-991, was visiting and I let spending time with him take precedence.
I have repeatedly forced him to read RH, though, so hopefully that gets me out of a few Hail Lube-y’s.
Gold Star of the Week
u/Moonlight_Star_ for asking the important questions (and making sure all possible options were covered, since anyone claiming “I have no feelings on matching hair color between shifted and human form” is a dirty liar). Personally, I think it should be coordinated but does not have to match identically (for example, an leopard shifter could have black hair or golden hair in human form, but the hair doesn’t have to have spots).
It also reminds me of a shifter series I read many years ago where the shifting FMC had to have an understanding of the beings she was shifting into, and if the masses were too different she had to take mass on (she used stones) or leave parts of herself behind briefly.
And on the subject of weird bodily colors--I don’t care what all the Astarion fangirls tell me; red eyes are creepy and not sexy and remind me of rats. Every picture I have seen, usually courtesy of u/PenguinHo, has reaffirmed this.
And ever since l had to model rat cervixes while giving birth as a spring/dashpot system for a homework problem in undergrad, rats are a highly traumatizing subject.
Favorite Lines (in no particular order):
Some might say that the main thing about RH is the loving connection between the FMC and the MMCs and not the creative ways that bodies can be contorted to get everything to fit.
I believe u/GhostSoup666 would like a word with those people.
It’s possible, even probable, that u/Heidi_Hi_Heidi_Lo’s preference was due solely to the age aspect. But personally if I was told I could go absolutely anywhere, I would also say “any location except for high school.”
Violence isn’t funny, u/Overquoted. For shame.
(But also I laughed.)
Favorite Requests (in no particular order):
There’s a special nostalgia that comes from being reminded of a favorite book series, the type you reread over and over again, from when you were much younger that you had completely forgotten about for years. So this request was a favorite less for the content (though it sounds great), and more for the feelings it evoked for me.
Love those. Absolutely love those. Plan on being one of those when I have sufficiently years behind me (because all the gods of RH know I’m certainly not “growing up”).
In my saved description of one of my favorite RH, I talk about how good the relationship is between MMCs who aren’t sexually involved—how intimate and important. Adoring the FMC is absolutely crucial, yes, but end of the day all these people are (hopefully) spending the rest of their lives together, and I love seeing them as a unit.
For some reason I am reminded of how Sabrina Carpenter keeps killing off men who have done her dirty in her music videos…
WANT MORE SCIENCE?
Qualifier D and Qualifier E for Favorite Slow Burn are currently open for voting! (And Qualifier E will forever be my proof that I’m not rigging the qualifier seeding for my favorites. It’s rough.)
I’m way above all you basic readers out there who are genuinely sincere about reading anything.
Like, how lame is that? How will you know if something is good if you can’t get validated by hundreds of people (or more) having the exact same opinion as you.
I demand all my hidden gem reads have a cult-like following, as our Lords and Saviors Who Go By Three Initials declared it should be.
Otherwise there is obviously something wrong with it that can’t just be explained by an algorithm and chance.
Later, sweaties. I have off-season PSL to hunt down while I read my SLY.
tl;dr—vote for your favorite of the options listed, even if you haven’t read all of them (or any of them). If you don’t really care for the ones you have read, or if you haven’t read any, you can vote for which one you’d be most likely to add to your TBR or the premise you think looks best to you.
BACKGROUND
Slow burns tend to be the most requested of the relationship speeds each week, so they’re definitely popular. And personally I love tension and yearning.
Being me, I saw potential for data-gathering and couldn't resist. So I'm running a competition for what the subreddit's favorite slow burn is.
As far as what counted as a slow burn--I’m 100% okay including “slow burn for specific MMCs but not all MMCs.” You can have an FMC who hooks up with one MMC in the first chapter of a quartet, and still doesn’t get together with another MMC until book three (hello, Hades), which still results in plenty of that delicious tension. It’s going to be a judgment call of everyone involved. You can still choose not to vote for something that you love but that you feel isn't a slow burn (though feedback was collected about all nominations for slow burn status).
THIS STAGE
The qualifiers are for the top 36 options among all nominations, as determined by upvotes in the initial post and in the runoffs.
Vote for your favorite of the options; if there aren’t any that you read and liked, you can either sit this round out, or vote for the one that sounds the most interesting of those you haven’t read.
Remember that you are voting for the series as a whole, so if most books were great and one was terrible, that should be kept in mind.
Yes, I expect this to be hard. No, I did not make the matchups just to be mean—there’s a whole process about where entries will go, and even I don’t get to mess with that (no matter how much I might want to sometimes).
Please feel free to share any feelings you have, positive or negative, about any or all of the books in the qualifiers (The request for not speaking ill of any books in the previous rounds was because I didn’t want someone to feel stupid or like they shouldn’t have said something for proposing a less popular book that someone else felt didn’t deserve to be in the running; all the books that made it to the qualifiers clearly have decent support from the community, so I feel that risk isn’t as much of a concern.)
All other feelings are also welcome to be shared! This is a safe space to, for example, complain about how mean and cruel and sadistic I am for making y’all choose in a why choose subreddit.
Polls will be open for 2 days.
After all of the qualifiers are complete, we’ll have tiebreakers if necessary (1 day polls if the winner of the qualifier won by 1.0% or less, including only those options within 1.0% of victory), followed by the finals, whose entries will be the winner of each qualifier.
As a reminder: if I hear about anyone attempting to manipulate the results for a specific author or book by encouraging people to vote through author-specific groups, that author will be disqualified from the competition. If it happens a second time, that author will be disqualified from all future competitions of mine. If you see it happening, please reach out to me about it.
Let’s have some fun!
OPEN POLLS
Qualifier D is open for another day. The entries are
Demon's Muse by Auryn Hadley (Kiss of Death)
Braided Fate by Brigid Kemmerer (Warrior Princess Assassin)
Arcanaeum by Marie Mistry (Liminal)
State of Grace by Collete Rhodes (Run Riot)
Darkstone Academy by Bliss Devlin (A Kiss of Salt and Sea)
Ascension Rising by KR Rainbolt (Of Glass and Lavender)
BOT SUMMONING
{Age of the Andinna by Kristen Banet} (Gladiator's Downfall)
{Scent of Victory by Greer Hudson} (Citius)
{Fifth Nicnevin by Marie Mistry} (Beyond the Fairy Gate)
{Path of Temptation by Auryn Hadley} (Price We Pay)
{Knight's Revenge by Elizabeth Dear} (Storm the Gates)
{Shifter Guardians Academy by Elizabeth Dear} (Clash of Claws)
For all the times I have recommended {Sugar Baby by Harley Madison}, I have been sentenced to trying to keep a straight face while taking care of my mother’s garden.
(Which is totally a smut garden and had a penis tree last summer. She just doesn’t know it.)
tl;dr—vote for your favorite of the options listed, even if you haven’t read all of them (or any of them). If you don’t really care for the ones you have read, or if you haven’t read any, you can vote for which one you’d be most likely to add to your TBR or the premise you think looks best to you.
BACKGROUND
Slow burns tend to be the most requested of the relationship speeds each week, so they’re definitely popular. And personally I love tension and yearning.
Being me, I saw potential for data-gathering and couldn't resist. So I'm running a competition for what the subreddit's favorite slow burn is.
As far as what counted as a slow burn--I’m 100% okay including “slow burn for specific MMCs but not all MMCs.” You can have an FMC who hooks up with one MMC in the first chapter of a quartet, and still doesn’t get together with another MMC until book three (hello, Hades), which still results in plenty of that delicious tension. It’s going to be a judgment call of everyone involved. You can still choose not to vote for something that you love but that you feel isn't a slow burn (though feedback was collected about all nominations for slow burn status).
THIS STAGE
The qualifiers are for the top 36 options among all nominations, as determined by upvotes in the initial post and in the runoffs.
Vote for your favorite of the options; if there aren’t any that you read and liked, you can either sit this round out, or vote for the one that sounds the most interesting of those you haven’t read.
Remember that you are voting for the series as a whole, so if most books were great and one was terrible, that should be kept in mind.
Yes, I expect this to be hard. No, I did not make the matchups just to be mean—there’s a whole process about where entries will go, and even I don’t get to mess with that (no matter how much I might want to sometimes).
Please feel free to share any feelings you have, positive or negative, about any or all of the books in the qualifiers (The request for not speaking ill of any books in the previous rounds was because I didn’t want someone to feel stupid or like they shouldn’t have said something for proposing a less popular book that someone else felt didn’t deserve to be in the running; all the books that made it to the qualifiers clearly have decent support from the community, so I feel that risk isn’t as much of a concern.)
All other feelings are also welcome to be shared! This is a safe space to, for example, complain about how mean and cruel and sadistic I am for making y’all choose in a why choose subreddit.
Polls will be open for 2 days.
After all of the qualifiers are complete, we’ll have tiebreakers if necessary (1 day polls if the winner of the qualifier won by 1.0% or less, including only those options within 1.0% of victory), followed by the finals, whose entries will be the winner of each qualifier.
As a reminder: if I hear about anyone attempting to manipulate the results for a specific author or book by encouraging people to vote through author-specific groups, that author will be disqualified from the competition. If it happens a second time, that author will be disqualified from all future competitions of mine. If you see it happening, please reach out to me about it.
Let’s have some fun!
OPEN POLLS
Qualifier C is open for another day. The entries are
All the Pretty Monsters by Kristy Cunning (Gypsy Blood)
Splintered Bond by Merri Bright (Pack Reject)
Rogue Riders by Blake Black (Broken Breath)
Viking Omegaverse by Lyx Robinson (Stolen by the Wolves)
Adamson All-Boys Academy by CM Stunich (The Secret Girl)
Coded Connections by Blake Black (Soul Code)
BOT SUMMONING
{Demon's Muse by Auryn Hadley} (Kiss of Death)
{Braided Fate by Brigid Kemmerer} (Warrior Princess Assassin)
{Arcanaeum by Marie Mistry} (Liminal)
{State of Grace by Collete Rhodes} (Run Riot)
{Darkstone Academy by Bliss Devlin} (A Kiss of Salt and Sea)
{Ascension Rising by KR Rainbolt} (Of Glass and Lavender)
Hey guys! Super random but I was searching through my old Google Docs and found a writing prompt I made forever ago, I decided to say fuck it and make it into a book cause I got a bunch of ideas. (But not really, as you’ll see later).
I’ve only written 3 chapters so far but I wanted to ask what you guys want to see more of in the RH books, and at what point are there to many men. I feel like 5 would be perfect but I don’t want that to be to much I’ve read so many of these books that sometimes I feel like I’m running out😆. (Yet no matter how many I’ve read, I still don’t have an idea about what works or what doesn’t.)
Any advice or ideas you guys have id love to read! I really want to be able to make a good RH book that isn’t AI or easily guessable but still a good plot and character development. But I also need people’s approval and energy and creativity in order to do that.
If u guys would like to read the first 3 chapters I can do that too! I’d love the feed back (and the approval)
Unlike that nasty author of {[BLATANT SELF PROMOTION]}, this shouldn’t count as Blatant Self Promotion because I’m trying to collaborate with readers by taking their ideas and using them instead of coming up with my own. And making a post instead of searching is obviously a sign of how much I respect the readers’ opinions, and not that I’m lazy and/or feel entitled to people’s time.
ETA: It’s also unclear if I’ve never participated in this subreddit before or am just hiding my comments and posts in it. Either way, nothing suspicious at all!
tl;dr—vote for your favorite of the options listed, even if you haven’t read all of them (or any of them). If you don’t really care for the ones you have read, or if you haven’t read any, you can vote for which one you’d be most likely to add to your TBR or the premise you think looks best to you.
BACKGROUND
Slow burns tend to be the most requested of the relationship speeds each week, so they’re definitely popular. And personally I love tension and yearning.
Being me, I saw potential for data-gathering and couldn't resist. So I'm running a competition for what the subreddit's favorite slow burn is.
As far as what counted as a slow burn--I’m 100% okay including “slow burn for specific MMCs but not all MMCs.” You can have an FMC who hooks up with one MMC in the first chapter of a quartet, and still doesn’t get together with another MMC until book three (hello, Hades), which still results in plenty of that delicious tension. It’s going to be a judgment call of everyone involved. You can still choose not to vote for something that you love but that you feel isn't a slow burn (though feedback was collected about all nominations for slow burn status).
THIS STAGE
The qualifiers are for the top 36 options among all nominations, as determined by upvotes in the initial post and in the runoffs.
Vote for your favorite of the options; if there aren’t any that you read and liked, you can either sit this round out, or vote for the one that sounds the most interesting of those you haven’t read.
Remember that you are voting for the series as a whole, so if most books were great and one was terrible, that should be kept in mind.
Yes, I expect this to be hard. No, I did not make the matchups just to be mean—there’s a whole process about where entries will go, and even I don’t get to mess with that (no matter how much I might want to sometimes).
Please feel free to share any feelings you have, positive or negative, about any or all of the books in the qualifiers (The request for not speaking ill of any books in the previous rounds was because I didn’t want someone to feel stupid or like they shouldn’t have said something for proposing a less popular book that someone else felt didn’t deserve to be in the running; all the books that made it to the qualifiers clearly have decent support from the community, so I feel that risk isn’t as much of a concern.)
All other feelings are also welcome to be shared! This is a safe space to, for example, complain about how mean and cruel and sadistic I am for making y’all choose in a why choose subreddit.
Polls will be open for 2 days.
After all of the qualifiers are complete, we’ll have tiebreakers if necessary (1 day polls if the winner of the qualifier won by 1.0% or less, including only those options within 1.0% of victory), followed by the finals, whose entries will be the winner of each qualifier.
As a reminder: if I hear about anyone attempting to manipulate the results for a specific author or book by encouraging people to vote through author-specific groups, that author will be disqualified from the competition. If it happens a second time, that author will be disqualified from all future competitions of mine. If you see it happening, please reach out to me about it.
Let’s have some fun!
OPEN POLLS
Qualifier B is open for another day. The entries are
Scent of Us by Eliana Lee
Tempest of Shadows by Jane Washington (Tempest of Shadows)
Pizza Shop Exorcist by Dakota Brown (The Price of Possession)
Cardinal by Mia Smantz (The Cardinal Bird)
(un)Lucky Succubus by LL Frost (Succubus Bargain)
Nora Jacobs by Jackie May (Don't Rush Me)
BOT SUMMONING
{All the Pretty Monsters by Kristy Cunning} (Gypsy Blood)
{Splintered Bond by Merri Bright} (Pack Reject)
{Rogue Riders by Blake Black} (Broken Breath)
{Viking Omegaverse by Lyx Robinson} (Stolen by the Wolves)
{Adamson All-Boys Academy by CM Stunich} (The Secret Girl)
{Coded Connections by Blake Black} (Soul Code)
tl;dr—vote for your favorite of the options listed, even if you haven’t read all of them (or any of them). If you don’t really care for the ones you have read, or if you haven’t read any, you can vote for which one you’d be most likely to add to your TBR or the premise you think looks best to you.
BACKGROUND
Slow burns tend to be the most requested of the relationship speeds each week, so they’re definitely popular. And personally I love tension and yearning.
Being me, I saw potential for data-gathering and couldn't resist. So I'm running a competition for what the subreddit's favorite slow burn is.
As far as what counted as a slow burn--I’m 100% okay including “slow burn for specific MMCs but not all MMCs.” You can have an FMC who hooks up with one MMC in the first chapter of a quartet, and still doesn’t get together with another MMC until book three (hello, Hades), which still results in plenty of that delicious tension. It’s going to be a judgment call of everyone involved. You can still choose not to vote for something that you love but that you feel isn't a slow burn (though feedback was collected about all nominations for slow burn status).
THIS STAGE
The qualifiers are for the top 36 options among all nominations, as determined by upvotes in the initial post and in the runoffs.
Vote for your favorite of the options; if there aren’t any that you read and liked, you can either sit this round out, or vote for the one that sounds the most interesting of those you haven’t read. Remember that you are voting for the series as a whole, so if most books were great and one was terrible, that should be kept in mind.
Yes, I expect this to be hard. No, I did not make the matchups just to be mean—there’s a whole process about where entries will go, and even I don’t get to mess with that (no matter how much I might want to sometimes).
Please feel free to share any feelings you have, positive or negative, about any or all of the books in the qualifiers (The request for not speaking ill of any books in the previous rounds was because I didn’t want someone to feel stupid or like they shouldn’t have said something for proposing a less popular book that someone else felt didn’t deserve to be in the running; all the books that made it to the qualifiers clearly have decent support from the community, so I feel that risk isn’t as much of a concern.)
All other feelings are also welcome to be shared! This is a safe space to, for example, complain about how mean and cruel and sadistic I am for making y’all choose in a why choose subreddit.
Polls will be open for 2 days.
After all of the qualifiers are complete, we’ll have tiebreakers if necessary (1 day polls if the winner of the qualifier won by 1.0% or less, including only those options within 1.0% of victory), followed by the finals, whose entries will be the winner of each qualifier.
As a reminder: if I hear about anyone attempting to manipulate the results for a specific author or book by encouraging people to vote through author-specific groups, that author will be disqualified from the competition. If it happens a second time, that author will be disqualified from all future competitions of mine. If you see it happening, please reach out to me about it.
Let’s have some fun!
OPEN POLLS
Qualifier A is open for another day. The entries are
Ironside Academy by Jane Washington (Plier)
Hannaford Prep by J Bree (Just Drop Out)
Her Vicious Beasts by EP Bali (Her Vicious Beasts)
Dying Gods by Elisha Kemp (Drown the Sea)
Switchboard Duet by Heather Long (Talk to Me)
Stream Heat by Helen Scott and Zoey Shelby
BOT SUMMONING
{Scent of Us by Eliana Lee}
{Tempest of Shadows by Jane Washington}
(Tempest of Shadows)
{Pizza Shop Exorcist by Dakota Brown } (The Price of Possession)
{Cardinal by Mia Smantz} (The Cardinal Bird)
{(un)Lucky Succubus by LL Frost} (Succubus Bargain)
{Nora Jacobs by Jackie May} (Don't Rush Me)
I want to make it clear. When someone brings up a specific reference about an author behaving badly, I am going to wade in and state that I don’t know what the situation was, and I don’t want to know (and upon it being explained I will still say that I don’t see what point is being made), but I think it’s hypothetical that we expect authors who can come up with all kinds of dark and twisted things in their books to be held to basic social norms.
Surely there is something wrong in their brain for being able to write down all these depraved things. It’s just so unfair for us to demand that they know they can’t do things like arrange a hit-job (social or literal, dealer’s choice) on anyone who ever says anything not glowing with glittering positivity like the radium girls, since their characters can unalive anyone who touches the FMC. It’s inhumane to want them to write about the FMC’s body betrayal syndrome due to the MMC’s having a barbed cock that goes down to mid-calf despite the MMC disemboweling her parents and all of her friends and making bouquets out of their intestines, and yet to also think the authors should do things like put grocery carts away instead of just leaving them there in the middle of the parking lot.
Authors can only write what they know and feel and believe. That’s why dragon-riding only became a thing when the planet of Pern was discovered in the mid-to-late 1900s (though obviously it had come a long way since then). It’s impossible for an author to differentiate fact from fiction.
Readers want weird and freaky shit? Then they must support authors’ rights to be a terrible person because it’s the only way it can be written.
Be better, sweaties.
Since the authors obviously can’t.
uj/ I’ve been sitting on this one for a while, and while it starts with a pretty basic copypasta, it does…meander a little. Still keeping the tag, though.
tl;dr—vote for your favorite of the options listed, even if you haven’t read all of them (or any of them). If you don’t really care for the ones you have read, or if you haven’t read any, you can vote for which one you’d be most likely to add to your TBR or the premise you think looks best to you.
BACKGROUND
Slow burns tend to be the most requested of the relationship speeds each week, so they’re definitely popular. And personally I love tension and yearning.
Being me, I saw potential for data-gathering and couldn't resist. So I'm running a competition for what the subreddit's favorite slow burn is.
As far as what counted as a slow burn--I’m 100% okay including “slow burn for specific MMCs but not all MMCs.” You can have an FMC who hooks up with one MMC in the first chapter of a quartet, and still doesn’t get together with another MMC until book three (hello, Hades), which still results in plenty of that delicious tension. It’s going to be a judgment call of everyone involved. You can still choose not to vote for something that you love but that you feel isn't a slow burn (though feedback was collected about all nominations for slow burn status).
THIS STAGE
The qualifiers are for the top 36 options among all nominations, as determined by upvotes in the initial post and in the runoffs.
Vote for your favorite of the options; if there aren’t any that you read and liked, you can either sit this round out, or vote for the one that sounds the most interesting of those you haven’t read.
Remember that you are voting for the series as a whole, so if most books were great and one was terrible, that should be kept in mind.
Yes, I expect this to be hard. No, I did not make the matchups just to be mean—there’s a whole process about where entries will go, and even I don’t get to mess with that (no matter how much I might want to sometimes).
Please feel free to share any feelings you have, positive or negative, about any or all of the books in the qualifiers (The request for not speaking ill of any books in the previous rounds was because I didn’t want someone to feel stupid or like they shouldn’t have said something for proposing a less popular book that someone else felt didn’t deserve to be in the running; all the books that made it to the qualifiers clearly have decent support from the community, so I feel that risk isn’t as much of a concern.)
All other feelings are also welcome to be shared! This is a safe space to, for example, complain about how mean and cruel and sadistic I am for making y’all choose in a why choose subreddit.
Polls will be open for 2 days.
After all of the qualifiers are complete, we’ll have tiebreakers if necessary (1 day polls if the winner of the qualifier won by 1.0% or less, including only those options within 1.0% of victory), followed by the finals, whose entries will be the winner of each qualifier.
As a reminder: if I hear about anyone attempting to manipulate the results for a specific author or book by encouraging people to vote through author-specific groups, that author will be disqualified from the competition. If it happens a second time, that author will be disqualified from all future competitions of mine. If you see it happening, please reach out to me about it.
Let’s have some fun!
BOT SUMMONING
{Ironside Academy by Jane Washington} (Plier)
{Hannaford Prep by J Bree} (Just Drop Out)
{Her Vicious Beasts by EP Bali} (Her Vicious Beasts)
{Dying Gods by Elisha Kemp} (Drown the Sea)
{Switchboard Duet by Heather Long} (Talk to Me)
{Stream Heat by Helen Scott and Zoey Shelby}
I had heard rumors of his existence, but today was the first time I saw photographic evidence.
Naturally, I had to share my suffering delight with all my beloved fellow sloopies.
{Forged In Blood by Sadie Kincaid}
(Explanation of cover photo: technically a request was for “meek but defiant.” This still feels like it fits.)
Week: April 20th, 2026-April 26th, 2026
Once again, I decided to make a list of things that got multiple recommendation requests last week, with the following rules.
BY THE NUMBERS
Overall Statistics (Percent Change from Previous Week)
Note: “Help me find this book” and reviews/recommendations are not counted for the total recommendation request category
Total recommendation requests: 105 (-6%)
"Help me find this book!" requests: 12 (-14%)
Spoiler requests: 7 (-22%)
Book Reviews/Recommendations/Rants: 14 (27%)
Requests for “like specific author”: 0 (NaN—0 last week)
Requests for “like specific book/media”: 13 (18%)
Requests for books by specific author/in specific series: 1 (0%)
Audiobooks: 3 (-25%)
Book Slumps/Hangovers/DNF streaks: 9 (125%)
Total number of request categories: 158 (-1%)
Unique requests (only asked once): 87 (5%)
Average categories per request: 3.53 (-1%)
Genre as Percentages of Requests (Percent Change from Previous Week)
Fantasy: 25% (21%)
OV: 17% (-13%)
Contemporary: 10% (-3%)
Dark: 5% (-33%)
Cozy/light: 8% (22%)
Sci-Fi: 4% (42%)
Spice/kink callouts: 21% (-31%)
CATEGORIES
26 Requests: Fantasy
22 Requests: Spice/kink
18 Requests: OV
12 Requests: Strong/badass FMC
11 Requests: BDSM or dom/sub dynamic
9 Requests: Contemporary
8 Requests: Cozy, Dark/tragic backstory, Dominant MMCs (in or out of bedroom)
7 Requests: Dom MMCs, “Good [x]”
6 Requests: Academic, plot-driven
5 Requests: Abused/traumatized FMC (in her past), Angst/emotional, Dark, Soft/shy/meek FMC
4 Requests: Academy, Grovel, Important/famous/powerful MMCs, Mafia, Sci-fi, Separated childhood friends
3 Requests: Abused/traumatized/rejected FMC (by MMCs), Adult (age) characters, Condescending/patronizing MMCs, Doting MMCs, Enemies to lovers, Forbidden romance, Jealousy, MMCs and FMC have falling out, Praise kink, Series, Shifters, Standalone, Weird/quirky/nerdy FMC, Well-written, Wounded bird FMC
2 Requests: Abused/traumatized/rejected FMC (by MMCs) resulting in breakdown, Aliens, Boss/employee, Bullying, Caretaking MMCs, Cockwarming, Criminal MMCs, Daddy vibes, Dom FCM, Duet, FMC in need of help (varying severity), FMC excited about mates/supernatural, FMC says no to MMCs (at first), Free use, Funny, Gods, Good plot, Historical, Mixed-species harem, MMCs blame FMC for something she didn’t do, “Most/best/favorite [x],” Needy or whiny/pathetic MMCs, Obsessed from list of books, Royalty, Slow burn, Sports, Sub FMC, Upbringing Conflict, Witches, Wolf shifter
COMMENTARY
General Subreddit:
By The Numbers
Categories
POUPOURRI
Gold Stars of the Week
I tried to pick a favorite line out of u/mitty_in_zen_mode’s adventures in getting saved while living her outdoorsy FMC fantasy, but I couldn’t. It’s all spectacular. Everyone should read it.
(In my part of the southern US we call those type of men the Cajun Navy (because they often have traveled with their boats from Louisiana), and they show up after hurricanes and other major floods when people are trapped in their homes. They are beloved.)
Viagraverse. That is all.
Favorite Lines (in no particular order):
Personally, u/BlueRumor2000, I prefer the ones where the FMC still doesn’t know shifters exist, and thinks she’s booping and cuddling a regular animal, and everyone around her is freaking out about it.
Snaps to u/chordaiiii for that very important caveat at the end.
And snaps to u/ashez2ashes for both remembering the importance of lube and that the appropriate bed is an Alaskan king and not a California king.
u/NecessaryEcho759 is a reader after my own heart.
If I didn’t have “sweet baby Jesus of Nazareth and the adult one too” from last week, I would possibly be stealing “for the love of hot fae Lucifer” from u/HellBentIntent.
Beautiful job getting the point across and following through on bringing your vent home (unlike those authors).
Favorite Requests (in no particular order):
Excellent Queen song quote for this—“you call me sweet like I’m some kind of cheese.”
Not to be confused, I am sure, with the “Soggy pathetic boy-failure (acts soft, looks soft/fragile, and would die if FMC left him alone for five hours)” entry from Favorite MMC Type.
Insert “Beast at the formal dinner” scene from Beauty and the Beast.
WANT MORE SCIENCE?
There’s still about 24 hours to vote in the runoffs for Favorite Slow Burn.
Welcome back to the next round of the latest Subreddit Competition: Favorite Slow Burn.
Slow burns tend to be the most requested of the relationship speeds each week, so they’re definitely popular. And personally I love tension and yearning.
I’m 100% okay including “slow burn for specific MMCs but not all MMCs.” You can have an FMC who hooks up with one MMC in the first chapter of a quartet, and still doesn’t get together with another MMC until book three (hello, Hades), which still results in plenty of that delicious tension. It’s going to be a judgment call of everyone involved.
WHY IS THERE A SECOND RUNOFF?
As I looked at the results for the runoffs post I did two days ago, I recognized that people might have been confused about the voting, so I decided I would have that just be the round for “is it a slow burn?” and would do a second runoff for “how much do we like it?”
(I certainly don’t blame anyone for being confused—there were an ungodly number of comments on that post).
…I also had left one of the nominations off the initial round of comments, so. That may have contributed as well.
I do require some follow-up from that round, though!
I said in the post that I needed at least one person to justify why something wasn’t a slow burn, and yet for the four series with where the votes were tied or skewed negative, I don’t have any explanation about why people feel that way. (For one of the duets, I think I remember there being no sex in book one, for instance, which to me would make it a slow burn. For one of the series, I thought I remembered it being one of the OG slow burn RH.)
So if you feel any of the following should or shouldn’t count as slow burn, let me know in the comments! Without explanations so I can make an informed decision, they’re going to continue to be included.
PLAN FOR THIS ROUND
We’re now in the runoff round, where I make sure that everything that was suggested in the nomination round gets an equal amount of visibility for a more fair comparison. Initial rankings did not take into account the possibility of downvotes, since there could unfairly advantage suggestions I made. However, this round will deal with that possibility, and final rankings will be made on calculated number of upvotes instead of total vote counts (total vote count and upvote ratio can be combined to produce an estimate of the total number of upvotes and downvotes. It’s not perfect because vote fuzzing can occur, but it’s what I have).
While I have the initial rankings for everything and those were used to determine what would be included in the runoff round, the order they will be initially posted as comments was generated randomly.
GENERAL GUIDELINES FOR THIS ROUND
Let’s have some fun!
BOOKS IN THE QUALIFIERS (ALPHABETICAL ORDER)
BOOKS IN THE RUNOFF (ALPHABETICAL ORDER)