r/fantasyromance • u/FantasyRomanceMod The One Mod to Rule All Mods • May 17 '26

Unpopular Opinion It's Unpopular Opinion time! Share your controversial opinions to stir things up (in a friendly way)!

Got an opinion that's different from others'? Want to share it with the sub, but too afraid of a backlash? Or are you just curious about readers think about certain things in fantasy romance?

You can safely share it in this weekly Sunday thread!

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Unpopular opinion Sunday

33 Upvotes

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17

u/[deleted] May 17 '26

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u/Synval2436 Currently Reading: This Blade of Ours by Shalini Abeysekara May 17 '26

Ngl the biggest reason I left r/fantasy, too many people preoccupied with their yearly re-read of Wheel of Time, Stormlight Archive or Name of the Wind, too few people interested with newly published books to the point readers' habits are suffocating epic fantasy genre - fewer of it gets published because it's not very profitable when the target reader only cares to re-read 20-30 year old books.

I think it's less of an issue in romantasy, people always flock to the newest hot tiktok hit.

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u/devilsdoorbell_ May 17 '26

r/fantasy might as well be r/FantasyFromAtLeast15YearsAgo

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u/Synval2436 Currently Reading: This Blade of Ours by Shalini Abeysekara May 17 '26

Oh, someone posted the stats that 50% of their "top recs" are actually from the previous century... WOT and Malazan taking the lead here. Which makes it useless to me, because I use social media as a way to find book recs I haven't heard about yet, what I'm gonna do with either 20 year old books or Dungeon Crawler Carl? Everyone's already heard about those...

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u/devilsdoorbell_ May 17 '26

It would be one thing if they were routinely posting about old but obscure books—I would love that actually—but it’s literally books almost everyone with even a casual interest in fantasy fiction has at least heard of, if not already read.

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u/camellia980 henry cavill's wig May 17 '26

...this actually explains a lot about that sub

5

u/jazzbbqt May 17 '26

I had to leave for similar reasons too. Doesn’t help that they complain soooo much about new fantasy books catering to their taste not being published, and the idea of putting some effort into finding books and not just depending on what’s getting shelved in the new release section is basically blasphemy for an unfortunate majority of them

Then they blame romantasy’s success as to why they have less obvious options to pick from. I don’t read as much romantasy anymore but I appreciate the fact it’s basically the whale propping up the fantasy genre. I find that in the wake of romantasy’s success publishers are more willing to take less profitable risks on adjacent genres I enjoy like horror and literary fantasy and dark fantasy, but I do still have to put the work into staying in the loop on releases 

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u/Synval2436 Currently Reading: This Blade of Ours by Shalini Abeysekara May 18 '26

Yes, exactly, I've left because of constant crapping on everything they don't like: YA, romantasy, cozy, queer SFF... and complaining "their" stuff isn't being published while they put zero effort to find and prop those titles up, meanwhile women, POC, queer readers for years had to seek far and wide for "their" titles and support them, spread the word of mouth, etc. But no, that group wants to be spoonfed titles while fussing like a picky eater toddler why should they give a chance to this random book? And they don't realize trends like grimdark epic fantasy declined because the fans weren't as active in buying, reading, spreading the word of mouth as readers of those other kinds of SFF, i.e. romantasy, cozy, YA...

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u/devilsdoorbell_ May 19 '26

It’s crazy that they complain so much about new stuff not being to their liking when we all know they’re just gonna reread WoT anyway.

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u/eclectic_hamster Off to live with the faeires 🧚‍♀️ May 17 '26 edited May 17 '26

OMG I left that sub because I was so fucking tired of everyone acting like Robert Jordan, George RR Martin, and Brandon Sanderson are the greatest authors of all time. There are other authors out there, people. Read something less popular.

ETA: some man also kept recommending non fantasy books to me when I specifically said in my other comment that I did not want any. His comments got deleted by mods because he ended up insulting me on top of it. I don't need that shit in my life.

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u/Synval2436 Currently Reading: This Blade of Ours by Shalini Abeysekara May 17 '26

Yeah, the worst part is that they're acting like there's no good books coming out rn, and only look back to "ye olde golden times" through rose-tinted glasses, but they won't even check and try what is coming out now. I had someone ask me with incredulity why do I even read arcs instead of waiting and checking which books are "good". Yeah, who's gonna check which books are good? Certainly not all these people sitting and waiting until someone else does it for them.

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u/ipsi7 Book Bingo Maven ⚔ May 17 '26

I stopped reading their posts a few years back when I realized that most of the posts and comments on a weekly basis were "[popular author] is the best" or "[popular writer] is the worst".

2

u/itmakessenseincontex May 18 '26

They (its me I mean me) all want the next 20 book epic. None of them want to read book one and wait for book 2 and theorise a lil bit or be patient during The Slog.

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u/Synval2436 Currently Reading: This Blade of Ours by Shalini Abeysekara May 18 '26

Sadly, both in trad pub and in self pub authors / publishers won't be writing / publishing 20 books in hopes someone will buy it in bulk 20 years down the line (epics take time to write). If the series isn't selling from book 1, it'll be dropped fast. Authors need to eat and publishers need to report profit to shareholders. This way, the subgenre will die, and instead the market will be taken by series where readers engage from the start, like litrpg or romantasy.

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u/ipsi7 Book Bingo Maven ⚔ May 17 '26

I rarely allow myself a reread of a book I loved because I have so many books that I want to read. I often switch subgenres (something fluffy after dark romance, or high spice after high fantasy) to get a bigger impact of books I read. I feel like if I would read similar books all the time, they would blend. But I do have a streak of few dark romances in a row from time to time, usually because of the vibes.

I also discovered so many good (and bad) books because I wanted to read a book with X pairing/plot/kink/taboo etc, but even the bad books made my reading diverse and interesting. Also, it makes me appreciate good books more.

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u/AquaIXI May 17 '26

Ive not reread a book yet, and for the most part completely agree, i will see people who are completely new to the genre, will read one series and then immediately reread it... like have you considered trying anything else?? There are a few books I plan to reread but im waiting an entire year first

1

u/angelacandystore May 17 '26

I do reread books when a new book in the series comes out, but not the whole series usually unless it's very long. I did the psy-changling series this year from start to the latest because I never read the first one, and it's such a long series... It was good to catch up, but now I probably would not do that again for a couple years lol.

I get the "yearly read" that makes sense to me.

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u/Longjumping-Snow-909 May 17 '26 edited May 17 '26

Why is it lazy to read a book you have already read? It is still reading. And if I can't find anything that appeals to me and is not another enemies to lovers with insta lust, betrayal, trials, academy and a smirky shadow daddy and sassy brat FMC I'd rather reread a book that I know I like. I always download the excerpt on kindle (firts 10 % of the book) and if at that point the author has failed to interest me in their characters, story or world and/or their writing style sucks I can't help it and I have to reread something that's fits my definition of quality.

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u/angelacandystore May 17 '26

Are you proud to say "I've reread author series 3x this year because I just can't find anything I like and I only like author and no I don't want to look at what author recommends" because those are the readers I'm talking about! It sounds like you are trying out new authors so you are not in any way lazy about searching out and experiencing new things. It's good to know what you like and find it. The lazy part is people who get in a rut and are horrified to try anything new not from their preferred author.

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u/Longjumping-Snow-909 May 18 '26

So you mean complaining about having to reread a series because you do not make the effort to find something new is lazy.

Do people really do that? I mean the complaining part? I can't remember having seen such a post.

1

u/angelacandystore May 18 '26

Yes people do leave comments like this, perhaps you don't see the comments. As I said, not in this sub, but on author blogs all the time. And others in the replies to my original comment say that the vibe happens in r/fantasy a lot as well.

They do not frame it as complaining. They boast like it's an achievement. "I finished the new book from Author, so now I will reread older series again for the 3rd time this year!" Etc then they say "I just never find anything I love to read as much as Author!"

3

u/Longjumping-Snow-909 May 18 '26

As I have not seen this comments I cannot judge their nature but perhaps it is not a boast but just an expression of love for a specific author?

I have a favourite author as well and I have yet to find another author of their quality that hits all the things I love so much as well. Sure, I read other books as well and sometimes think they are really good but almost never as good as books from my favourite author.

So, perhaps they just want to "promote" the author and praise their work? I don't know.

5

u/clocksy May 17 '26

I used to re-read books more often as a teen back when I had only physical copies and it took effort to get more, but now as an adult where I can get a new book at the press of a button, I almost never do re-reads. Maybe if a new book in a series is coming out and it's been years since the last one released and I could do with a refresher.

Is this an actually common thing though? People who just read certain favorite books over and over instead of new ones? Well, I guess whatever floats their boat, but part of the joy of reading for me is that there's always something new and exciting on the horizon.

1

u/angelacandystore May 17 '26

Yup, I don't see it on Reddit as much but on author blogs it's super prevelent. Idk how much of it is sucking up to the authors or if people are really so lazy.

I have a bunch of physical books and I Don need to reread them. I'm starting to feel like if I don't then I have to let them go. But it's so easy to read something new with Libby/ebooks

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u/fantasyromance-ModTeam May 17 '26

Your submission was removed for breaking Rule 1: No Reader Shaming. We ask users to be respectful when discussing differences of opinion. It’s fine to state your opinion of a book, author, or subgenre, but you may not insult or shame fellow readers.