u/Woodland-Queen289

I have read multiple posts praising Dante while calling Vivian a “pick me” like 😭🔪🔪.. But anyway..I do believe the hate is opposite.. Dante was what 36 in King of Wrath yet his actions made him seem like a 21 year old getting the permission to have a drink for the first time and raging on his gf.. like Vivian is such a diva and her marriage with Dante irl would have ended up in divorce for sure. Whereas I believe that Kai and Isabella's marriage, Maya and Sebastian's marriage, Christian and Stella's marriage, and Brooklyn and Vincent's marriage would be the happiest marriage in real life. Dante needed more character development. I said what I said.

Disclaimer : This post will not be everyone's cup of tea. If you can't handle something that you like being bashed. STOP RIGHT HERE and DO NOT READ ANY FURTHER. Don't try to change my mind..

Let's start :

1. The following books have the laziest writing in the whole Rinaverse :

A) Empire of Desire

B) Empire of Hate

C) Sweet Venom

D) Hunt The Villain

E) God of Malice

2. Sebastian Weaver is underrated and deserves more recognition and criticism.

3. Cole Nash is a careless father for not sensing that his daughter is being forced into the marriage. If he was as smart as insinuated in the RES and LOG.. he would have caught it in a few hours.

4. Levi is an exceptional father to all his children.

5. If Aiden had the gun Adrian would have been dead.

6. Adrian really did a number to Lia and ruined the mother-son bond by not making sure Jeremy knew why his mother wasn't there. (I know that it's impossible to change someone's mind but he still could've tried.)

7. Marcus Osborn is one of the best MMCs Rina Kent has ever written and my alternate personality would have loved him.

I am going to be making a detailed post about it once I get a few perspectives.

About me : I always loved reading books and wanted to write even when my grammar was weak as a 6 year old. As I grew older , I still loved reading books and would buy fairy tale-ish books , books like Alice in Wonderland, The girl who drank the moon etc.. Years later , when I bought my first ever smutty novel... I chose the most it was {Haunting Adeline}. I absolutely loved it at that time because it was scandalous and I liked that... (Not my most proudest moment.) I really acted like typical pinterest girl. I did not know CNC or non-con. My older friends would criticize Zade Meadows and the stupid plot I would jump into his defence and I didn't acknowledge it as assault.. and now 5 years later I hate the plot and the fact that fans don't really acknowledge it as non-con and insists on calling it CNC. I really believe we should educate ourselves about stuff before picking up a book to read. I my case I had to give the books to my friend.

Thoughts?

I am not here to discuss about the Red Queen and Powerless situation there are multiple threads and videos discussing about this exact predicament. I am just gonna talk about my observation surrounding YA multiple books. I have talked about the problems with booktok books , the decline in the quality of books etc.. you can check out. In this post I am gonna talk about my very controversial observation.

We all know that the Red Queen Series is based on a society where red blooded people are opressed by the silvers and the protagonist is a young girl named Mare Barrow. After Red Queen Series was released and got popular and after that this the oppressed, oppressor, magical dynamic got popular. Alot of writers took red queen as an example and tried their best to copy it. The story building and the premises. Personally, I disliked Red Queen Series because it was too boring for my liking.

I have finished the book and I like Vaughn and Yulian as a couple more than I had liked Gareth and Kayden. But to me the book was underwhelming in a way. {Kiss The Villain} had more plot and emotional complexity than {Hunt The Villain} had. I loved Yulian's character and he and Cyrus had such a sibling-y sibling bond. I loved that. That being said VAUGHN was Kirill and Sasha's son and his book was underwhelming.

Disclaimer : This is my opinion and if you don't agree you don't agree. Don't try to change my opinion and also don't rage comment.

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I finished GoM and I have thoughts. First up the worst thing Glyndon has ever done is not pushing Killian off the cliff when he asked her to marry him. Killian is a psychopath but for some reason his character was not nearly as complex as everyone says it has to be. Glyn is one of the real FMC in the Rinaverse. She feels insecure, compassionate, kind, lonely, she is suicidal but her emotions are not well developed. She didn't get the character development that let's say Brandon did. Glyn's character development could have been better. I believe Dark Romance books is also a type of romance so there should be more chemistry. Glyndon simply was too good for Killian and her character wasn't that deep. But the fact is neither was Killian's character. Babying Killian to the point of saying what Landon did to Killian was bad...even though Killian literally assaulted his sister is so stupid. Killian didn't even put in any efforts apart from cooking for her and not killing Devlin. Glyndon deserved a better MMC. Not just because Killian assaulted her but because Killian never got any consequences for that. Glyndon easily forgave him. And the fact that Glyndon was assaulted and she was pretty nonchalant about that. Maybe it was to show that Killian didn't do any damage to her? Idk it's very much possible.

In short Glyndon's character was written in that way so that she matched with Killian's. But Glyndon is the only one who receives the wrath and not Killian. I have said in my previous post, comments etc that none should be shamed for disliking Glyndon. But saying that you hate Glyndon and that Killian is too good for her is misogynistic. And about being spineless, most of the FMCs in Rinaverse do take the shit of the MMCs. They are written in that way only. Some are just sheltered while others are baddas until their MMC orders them or do anything bad to them. Also, the plot of GoM wasn't too strong and plot twist wasn't satisfactory to read. Overall the writing of this particular book could have been better in my opinion.

I am probably going to be receiving a whole lot of downvotes for saying this but I am ready to take the hit.

“Art is subjective” comment is nonsense when the book is created for the sole purpose of being a product and lacks artistic vision.

Nowadays, any romance novel let's say dystopian romantasy, romantasy, YA romance, NA romance, contemporary, political fantasy etc isn't treated as a piece of art but as a product. And this isn't a problem with just booktok books it's common in unpopular ones too. It's a product for sure for the publishing industries and there is nothing inherently wrong with that since their motive is to earn profit (profit motive). But what happens when novels stop being a piece of art and only becomes a product? The answer is we get re-packaged genres , tropes , repetitive storyline , no tension and chemistry between the characters who are supposed to be lovers etc. Whenever any book with new idea gets published or any book that gives a refreshing vibe gets published their ideas soon get used. Authors often use the trendy or popular tropes , similar storyline and aesthetics to write a story because it's easy to market. It's basic consumer psychology that we often get attracted to buy something we know or feel familiar to. Besides it's easier to sell the same concept instead of attempting something new only for it to flop.

Because of that the books that we receive have similar storyline, plot twists and often books get plagiarised (we all know the Red Queen and Powerless situation).

If you ask me “OP, what's the solution to that?” I won't really have a readymade answer ready to be honest. The most I can

Disclaimer : It's my personal opinion, I am not trying to attack on anyone who loves it. I simply couldn't bond with it. Just don't try to change my opinion.

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So around two months ago I picked up one of the most popular books available on booktok. The first was published when I was a little kid and the last one when I was an adult. I am talking about Shatter Me Series. Apparently the best book series of all time.

I hate....hate the FMC especially in Ignite Me and Restore Me. I loved her in the first two books but found her annoying in Shatter Me and Unravel Me but at the same time I could see where she was coming from. But during Ignite Me when she said : She should be the leader, she lost my respect.

Things I hated :

1. Character assassination of Adam.

2. White washing of Aaron Warner.

3. Juliette as supreme commander of North America.

4. Juliette with powers like Lethal touch, Shield against weapons, superhuman strength but couldn't protect herself.

I don't know what's waiting for me in the last two books. I really liked Aaron before his whole personality became about Juliette, I love Kenji Kishimoto because he is so real, I loved Adam and James too.

These characters had so much potential.

What I think could have made the series better :

1. Juliette remaining as a spokesperson who was the symbol of rebellion.

2. Showing us the world and Juliette's progress. This series really suffers from a storytelling issue where everything is mentioned and told not shown.

3. Focusing on the actual good concepts like evil government destroying history, knowledge or any sort of one's individuality to control the population. The Government fear mongering people.

4. More villain apart from Paris, Evie and Ella's bio dad.

5. Aaron actually struggling to have people trust him. He was literally the son of the supreme commander of North America, the one who is part of the re-establishment, more people should be weary of him.

I want to read the two books and actually I even have watch me. Am I cooked?

Disclaimer : This is simply my opinion and others can just just disagree with me.

My favourite read is King of Pride by Ana Huang. I have read this during 2024 during my writer's block. (After something bad happened to me and I couldn't pick up any hobby for two years.)

Isabella and Sloane are my twins. After KoW , I thought I should just stop reading al together but I had a few books left and I started reading KoP. I liked the book so much that after I finished I was desparate to find anything like that. I went to shops, bought books and when I couldn't find any character remotely similar to Kai Young. I started making my own fanfiction on him and hence got out of my writer's block.

Btw My ranking : 1. King of Pride

>Kai is the greenest flag in the entire series.

2. King of Sloth

>Reverse grumpy x sunshine is to die over.

3. King of Greed

>Dominic is so slept on.

4. King of Wrath.

>Dante is an asshole and Vivian deserves better.

5. King of Gluttony.

>The storyline was weak. I said what I said.

6. King of Envy.

>Mafia setting is so loosely and poorly done. It needed more complexity.

I have read the {Heartless by Elsie Silver} , {Things I wanted to say but never did by Monica Murphy}. {Off to The Races by Elsie Silver} is what I am currently reading or pushing myself to read. What's bothering me in these books is that the lack of character development. I know I know it's embarrassing of me to expect something extravagant in one single mid size book yet I can't help but feel disappointed.

What I personally love is when the romance book is not just about romance but also about self discovery, development of the characters. I also love when side characters who are meant to be a side character has a defined personality (I have been getting it in my this year's read that much.)

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Disclaimer : This is a total hate post filled with offensive statements. Read at your own risk.

No offense, I feel like people with no critical thinking skills or can't separate fiction from reality should not read anything fictional or watch any movie or web series.

I agree that yes some people tend to be more desensitised or easily influenced but that's not the majority of the population. Infact I know readers who loved reading DR books that are actually well written and they are more empathetic to assault victims than the people who haven't read the books.

If the “you act like what you read” theme was true then I would have become a serial killer who works part time at a zoo , feeds the flesh of their victims to tigers or lions and dissolves their remaining bones in hydrochloric acid or nitric acid. But thankfully I am not.

If an adult who has knowledge, can differentiate between fiction and reality and if needed has had reading counselling then they should just go for it. Read a book , have a mental debate , experience the complex emotions , choose sides in short use your brain.

Important Message :

Please don't do stuff like commenting Zade Meadows on a literal baby's picture because of his heterochromia. And DON'T pin down your female best friend and try to assault her just because she reads DR and probably has rape fantasy. (That's not what DR is for. If you think that way then you should never touch a book.)

So I am very interested in reading books that have the Alice in Wonderland vibe. Whimsical fairy tale-ish. I read the popular books like Heartless by Marissa Meyers , Caraval Trilogy by Stephanie Garber (disappointed to say the least by the Trilogy).

Help a reader out please.

I currently started reading Off to The Races by Elsie Silver and I am 34 pages in and I hate the main characters. Both of them actually. I have the whole series and I don't want to judge the series without giving each one a try. Plus, I have received the chestnut spring series , rose hill series and gold rush ranch series for my birthday gift from my friends and cousins. (They all planned it after seeing me scrolling through others' Elsie Silver collection.) I have alot of reading to do. Basically what I am asking is for you all to give me some spoilers. (I love spoilers and those motivate me to read. I know criminal.)

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Help a reader out.

In my previous post I had asked y'all's examples and opinions on misogyny in romance. And the amount of replies I saw really opened my eyes to a lot of things that I myself swept under the rug (again a classic example of internalized misogyny.) Thanks to all the reddit users for opening my eyes.

Now let's start the main talk.

Disclaimer : This is not a post to shame women for having kinks. I understand that many females consider some things which are wrong , toxic or illegal in real life as kinky or hot. Especially when mentally I am a slut.

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So let's ask ourselves who are the major consumers of romance novels? Women. Who are the major producers of romance novels? Also women.

So it's majorly by the women for the women.

- Misogyny is the hatred of, aversion to, or entrenched prejudice against women.

We can see this in books very often.

Most common examples of that : • Young FMCs.

• Obsession with virginity.

• Women being celibate during their time away or breakup while men fucking the whole girl's hostel like he is an animal in heat.

• Grooming culture.

• Lack of adult FMCs.

• Lack of Virgin MMCs.

• FMC recognise her self worth after a man helps her understand it or helps. (Which is very sweet but why is it always a man's opinion is taken very seriously?)

• Females who like sex but doesn't know how to get off like in this day and age?

• FMC is strong until MMC is involved then she is a damsel in distress.

• FMCs are just angry creatures.

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Psychological reason - Doesn't matter which country we live in , in our daily lives we all have seen examples of misogyny and may have internalized some of it. (Atleast I did. No shame in admitting it) And it's not always our fault in that, it's because of our surroundings, culture, environment that plays a huge role in our development and growth.

Now not all books have a visible example of misogyny which makes it easier for us to see it in a very "he hates every women but her" way. Common example of that is : MMC considering every single females as potential gold digger upon their first meeting. Also, MMC can do anything while the FMC easily forgives him after one confession or apology. Now kinks play a huge role in this. Because alot of us females have found dominating males hot while others like me find submissive males hot. Now the ratio of the two speaks for itself. We often get MMC who is 18 , 19 , 20 years older than FMC while in vise versa rarely the age gap is above 5. I am not saying they don't exist but the number is lesser. So surely blaming female kinks as a way to shame them for their fantasies and victim blaming them isn't an answer since female kinks also revolves around other things. Women can find anything hot , it's upto her (just don't get totally desensitised please.)

Now this doesn't have a written solution except calling out the blatant misogyny without kink shaming like we call out the blatant racism in books.

Also, until when are we all gonna categorise rage as masculine emotion and sadness as a feminine one. Female characters should be taken seriously in a book, they are not just a sit pretty, exist for the sake of romance character.

Lastly, dark romance and horror erotic are different genre. Not everything that are mistakenly categorised under DR is actually DR.

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Sorry for not being able to go even deeper. Don't forget to add more points.

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I need your opinions on this matter before I make the detailed post on it.

Disclaimer : All the points that I have stated in this post is based on my personal observation. I am not attacking anyone personally , I'm simply calling out the wrong.

1. Nowadays, fandom can't really accept the fact that the books , they are liking may not be someone else's cup of tea.

What they do: If anyone else gives a book or series they like a poor rating or says they didn't like the book the fandom starts to explain the plot or the character as if the reader disliking the book is stupid. Explaining the plot is only okay when someone else is totally wrong about the character , plot , or they don't know the reason behind their actions. A fandom is allowed to defend their favourite books. But at the same time they should also accept that not every book is everyone's cup of tea , just because you liked a book that doesn't mean someone else can't dislike it. I personally call it a “Reader's narcissism.”

2. Criticism and Hate : Nowadays alot of fandoms can't distinguish between hating and criticism. For an instance : Saying a character wasn't ready for certain position with canonical events isn't hate it's criticism. Hate is when a character is when you are calling names etc for not fitting the imagery you had in your head about them. Criticising your favourite character doesnt make someone a misogynist, pessimist, pick me etc. These labels should not be given away to anyone without any reasons.

Personally, I believe that algorithm addiction, dropping literacy rates and addiction of fast paced romance is one of the major reason why the fandoms are like this. Since most of the books that they have been reading have the same tropes, world-building, similar characters, similar storyline, they have no idea why it's boring to some people or why some people dislike the books. Remember, nearly 60 percent of the population can't read like their grade level.

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Disclaimer: Before you come at me, this just MY observation, I am not telling anyone to stop reading the books or doing any sort of kink shaming.

Alot of the books that are being published under the genre have no plot, chemistry between the lovers or any twisted connection.

Most of the books that I have been seeing in my FYP or New York Bestseller are giving awfully written fanfiction, erotica vibes. I have no problem in reading those materials in Ao3 or Wattpad. But when I am spending my money on any particular book I want the characters to be something apart from sex addicts. Literally most of the fanfictions are better written than these dark romance books. Some of the books straight up feel like “written porn with terrible script.”

Also, the books are just dark.

From MY perspective Dark Romance isn't just about smut or Alpha males. It was originally about devotion, obsession, love that feels wrong but consumes you whole, falling in love with someone you are not supposed to, men falling apart for their women, men crossing moral , ethical lines for their lovers and most importantly female kinks and fantasies.

Publishing industry is a business and the authors need to publish more and more books to earn a livelihood but we as readers should just acknowledge that nowadays most of the books are just vibes served cold with a side dish of crimes against women (instead of being crimes against the person harming the women) with a terrible plot. I often feel like the audience in the genre only WANT smut? They don't care about good writing or whether what's wrong (like you can't convince me a MMC sewing FMC's private part shut isn't a line.) And my God of someone calls them out it's kink shaming.

Disclaimer it's just for fun.

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Forget the official couples what if : (what tropes will it be?)

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Alex- Madeline

Josh- Alex

Alex-Jules

Christian- Jules

Rhys-Jules

Ava- Christian

Josh- Vivian

Dante- Stella

Alè- Vuk

Ayana- Jordan

Sloane- Dante

Maya- Kai

Isabella- Sebastian

Isabella- Alex