I've seen this mostly on threads - an author who under the name Lauren Ashley was pulled a couple years ago for plagiarism, has now resurfaced writing DD/lg books as Tori Woods. Her latest got through the ARC process and put up on Amazon before anyone realised that the MMC is fantasizing about a 3 year old.

She claims it's all misunderstanding, but has been arrested for CSAM.

Image Description: In big text, all caps: “Content Warning” preceded by the following: “There are topics in this book some readers might be sensitive to. You're about to read MM, dubcon, unaliving bad guys, close-call sexual assault (with no gRape), kid-napping, stepbrother lovin', and FF scenes that occur before the harem builds. If any of these things trigger you, please plan on skipping the scenes or finding something else to suit”.

I’m just fucking ✨mad✨. The book is an example, but my rant is on a broader focus.

TL;DR: there isn’t a reason to consider marginalized identities as sensitive, triggering, sexual, or adult topics—whether in media or real life. We should strive for neutral discoverability that respects all readers and their autonomy rather than alienating marginalized groups to protect the comfort of non-marginalized communities.

Definitions: What is a Content Warning, Trigger Warning, Theme, and Mature Theme?

Content warnings (CWs) are a broad umbrella about possibly sensitive topics and intense material. At its core, they are content that needs to be warned about.

Examples:

• Graphic violence
• Self-harm
• Sexual assault

Trigger warnings (TWs), which originated between the 1960s to 1990s through feminist movements and psychology/psychiatry, focus more narrowly on preventing traumitization. They are warning about triggering topics.

Examples:

• Kidnapping and abduction
• Islamophobia
• Antisemitism
• Transmisogyny
• Animal cruelty or death
• Demonization of mental illness

Themes mean that an element has a significant narrative focus. It doesn’t just “exist” (EX: An Afrolatina character), but it’s examined meaningfully (EX: the Afrolatina character struggling with colorism and identity).

Examples:

• Pacifism
• Environmentalism
• Heritage
• Marriage

Mature themes (MT) function largely as a rating category content deemed not suitable for children. It doesn’t need to be graphic, just too complex for children to comprehend deeply.

Examples:

• Graphic Sex
• Drug use
• Violence
• Profanity

How these concepts differ.

• TWs are CWs, but not all CWs are TWs. CWs aren’t warnings specifically related to trauma and are largely for items of discomfort or aversion.
• MT normally isn’t part of CW and TW’s dom/sub relationship. They’re typically with their found family of MPAA/MPA and ESRB ratings (PG, PG-13, M, NC 17+, etc). Even so, mediums outside of films and gaming have used the term to describe “mature” themes.

Let’s review!

• Content Warning (CW): broad warning for possibly sensitive content or content that can cause discomfort.
• Trigger Warning (TW): narrow focus traumatizing subjects.
• Themes: meaningful narrative focus on an element.
• Mature Themes (MT): rating shorthand for content isn’t suitable for children.

We are now on the same page, yes? 🥰

If someone defends queer identities, ethnicities, disabilities, and religions as needing to be content warned, trigger warned, or given a “mature theme” categorization, I’m whacking you with my chancla.

The cheek, the nerve, the gall, the audacity, and the gumption.

Warnings Can Go Too Far

Sometimes, there’s this bizarreness I see in some romance material: warnings and mature theme categorizations slapped onto marginalized identities, such as bisexuality, demiromanticism, MLM relationships, trans people, autism, or some flavor of non-penis-in-vagina (PIV) intimacy. These aren’t neutrally tagged as elements; they were listed as content that may trigger you.

Right next to dub con, rape, and assault.

Meanwhile, neurotypical people, endosex people, cisgender people, hetero identities, man-woman relationships, and PIV get a free pass. No warnings. No nothing.

Anyone want to ELI5 why? 🤔

There is a long, brutal history regarding the sexualization and adultification of marginalized identities that has followed us into modernity, whether we like it or not. Non-PIV intimacy is routinely hypersexualized and delegitimized in comparison to PIV, including “sex” definition homogeneity and BDSM and kink demonization. Non-PIV intimacy being anomalized as inherently too graphic, sexual, or adult is contributing to sex-negative rhetoric that shames sexual expression and creates arbitrary criteria on what type of sexual expression is “normal” and “natural”.

When {Breeding Clinic by Alexis Osborne} had that list of “mature themes” include demisexuality and anal and “sword crossing”, but PIV and heterosexuality weren’t included—

tutting aggressively

If you find that it’s reasonable to prescribe specific identities, experiences, and configurations as triggering, sensitive, sexual, or graphic topics or content warnings—what does this look like when applied to reality?

In the words of that opening line from Round 1 from Pentagon’s (😭) bonus track, let’s find out!

• Before you go inside that Walmart, I see three Muslim women inside. If that’s not okay, we can go to a different Walmart. [There are several people there with markings for Ash Wednesday.]
• Love to recommend you a vet for your pet! But he’s gay and married to a man. Is that okay? Will you be okay with that, or…? [Your past vet was a man married to a woman and you didn’t even know he was married until he brought it up.]
• [We go see a movie and in the movie’s warnings, it says “Contains graphic sex, profanity, and black people”. 98% of the cast is white.]
• You have kids? I’m not sure if you should take them to the fair. It’s not all that safe there and it’s just going to confuse your kids and give them ideas. One of them could be snatched up there too. [shows you a flyer for a family-friendly Pride festival which gives clear hours when the festival will be 21+. A local security firm, masses of trained volunteers, and the American Red Cross will be working as well. Your kids are 17 and 15.]

DM, I would like to do an Eldritch Blast to vent my anger 🥰

Now those examples might seem not at all in the same vein as content warnings about MLM or Hinduism in a book—but they are. Because you are still actively warning about and moralizing specific identities and experiences while finding other identities and experiences barely worth a footnote. You are picking and choosing what needs permission to exist normally and naturally and what doesn’t.

How is that fair or okay?

You don’t need to “content warn” about a Hindu anymore than you content warn about a Christian. A character being acespec isn’t a “mature theme”, just like heterosexuality ain’t. A woman loving another woman is not a “sensitive topic”, just as a heterogendered relationship. Anal and oral sex are not “adult content” anymore than PIV sex is. Because none of those are inherently dangerous, traumatic, disturbing, upsetting, sensitive, or “mature”.

When you warn about identities, you are pathologizing them as contaminating and harmful, especially when you shelve them in the same “triggering” or “sensitive” warning as sexual assault and rape.

That’s not giving a casual heads-up. That’s creating a binary that endosex cisgender able-bodied neurotypical white man-woman heterosexual, heteroromantic, heterogendered relationships with PIV sex are a default and whatever does not conform is a red flag. That is adhering to the rhetoric many use against marginalized identities in order to remove us from conversation.

Neutral Discoverability > Warning for Identities

“But I still think you should be told what’s inside a book! I have personal bad experiences with [things here]!”

✅

That’s why tagging and listing identities, configurations, religions, intimacies, and ethnicities is the best neutral and inclusive way for discoverability of elements.

Tagging and Listing

Here’s examples of neutral ways to list out a books contents that aim to respect reader autonomy while also respecting identities:

Subtitles

• Sapphic Omegaverse
• Achillean Guideverse
• NBi BDSM Romance
• Interracial Romance / BWAM

Listing

This book has:

• transmasc protagonist
• drag queen domme
• black female lead
• Jewish drag king
• forcefemming
• sadomasochism
• anal sex
• white agender character

Introduction/Foreword

The book that I write has characters and experience of a wide range. You’ll find a trans bloodthirsty gramma with shadow magic knitting a blanket for her grandson’s intersex boyfriend. I probably should have toned down all the tentacles and hand holding, but it was needed for plot reasons. But there’s some experiences in here that stem from my own life. The main couple’s femme son experiencing misogyny from his moms is one I faced with my androgyny with my queer parents.

This makes the content visible to people looking for those identities and experiences in a neutral way. It doesn’t imply that these are sensitive, triggering, or upsetting content. And in an industry that still prioritizes and gives hyper visibility to endocishet, white, vaguely Christian/Catholic, neurotypical, able-bodied protagonists and non-BDSM non-kinky dom-top-masc man and sub-bottom-femme woman relationships—we need this discoverability!

Why is this more neutral and inclusive than content warnings? I think content warnings give informed consent. You’re confusing what content warnings are.

Content warnings means warning about content. To warn means “to give notice beforehand of evil or danger; to put on guard; to caution, to advise that something should be avoided”.

In warning about the existence of non-Christian religions, 2SLGBTQIA+ people, POCs, the disabled—that’s not a neutral stance giving informed consent anymore. That’s telling you that these identities are ones readers need to be on guard of, that people should be cautious about; that readers may want avoid them. That’s misinforming you that those identities are advisories.

Discoverability should extend to dominating and hypervisible identities.

To me, it’s a good practice to still tag identities that dominate the industry or are hypervisible. This helps destigmatize marginalized identities. It supports parity, normalization, identity neutrality, and reader autonomy as well.

I’m grateful I found a book with a nonbinary love interest who presents trad-masc and uses he/him pronouns. The tagging gave me autonomy in reading what I want! But even though the main character is an endocishet white woman, her identities should also be tagged to further enhance discoverability, accessibility, and autonomy rather than assuming her identity would be some default and thus not needing to be discoverable.

Equal tagging = equal footing = people get to engage with the art they want.

Hanlon's razor: “Never attribute to malice that which is adequately explained by ignorance.”

^{It says stupidity but anyways.}

I’m not attributing malice where ignorance can be explained because I don’t know them from Gaia. I don’t want to invalidate people who have had bad personal experiences that lent themselves to confirmation biases, yet they still don’t mistreat others.

But I’m not sure what other way I can stress that it’s offensive for someone to think that the nature of a sapphic relationship equals graphic sex, or that arospec needs the same warning as rape and assault. That sets a dangerous precedent that identities are content to be warned against and specific identities are inherently as vile as rape and assault. That allows people with malicious intent to take advantage of an ambiguous classification and weaponize it for their discriminating agendas.

If you still find it reasonable that some identities should be warned about, I have a few questions:

• How do you explain to your queer friends you find their orientations are on the same level as sexual predation and violence but you being endocishet is normal and fine?
• How do you explain to your Jewish friend that them existing as a Jew is something you warn people about, but you as a Christian should be accepted anywhere and everywhere?
• How do you explain to someone with DID or autism or BPD or they require mobility aids—that them existing is socially upsetting and uncomfortable for people to be around? But you being able-bodied and neurotypical are socially safe and sound.
• How do you tell your friend that them being in an interracial relationship is a mature topic that may need to be avoided in conversation? But you as a white person are married to another white person and that right there is safe for everyone.

Life and art intersect. How you frame the existence of identities is not absolved from criticism just because it’s about a book’s contents. And this is deeper than books.

Many activist organizations have fought the MPA/MPAA, the Hays Code, and other organizations for their enforcement of explicit categorizations for queer and POC content that were less explicit than endocishet, white content. We saw how many weeks ago of queer authors who were targeted in the deindexation of NSFW content due to an Australian hate group and payment processors—and some queer authors spoke about how their work was SFW yet yoinked.

It’s been so widely and historically normalized to adulify and sexualize marginalized and less visible identities in every medium—especially by artists who aren’t themselves those identities—that people correlate normalization to justification without any deeper examination. And I can’t deny that a lot of intersectionality is lost among the book community as POC, queer, and disabled readers and artists feel unwelcome to speak up in “diverse” and “safe” spaces that still largely cater to endocishet white able-bodied neurotypical voices.

But I will fucking die on this motherfucking hill* that we don’t deserve to be content warned, especially not in the same goddamn breath as rape and assault.

Be neutral. Support autonomy. Respect everyone.

Neutrality is boring. It doesn’t skew positive or negative. It has no objective stance beyond, “This exists. Okay. The end.” It, instead, forces you to draw your own conclusions.

And that’s the most wonderful and respectful stance to take.

Categorizing elements neutrally optimizes respect for autonomy. You get to decide if you personally feel that something is harmful to you rather than someone making the choice for all of us. And no one’s identities are negatively affected in that process.

This doesn’t mean trigger warnings and content warnings should disappear. But because they have been used in negatively moralizing diversity, there needs to be constant reformations in warnings and their criteria based on context and impact.

I want readers to read what they want. We should protect and defend reader autonomy. And we can do that without alienating marginalized and less visible communities, I promise you.

All right.

Bye 👋🏾

Supportive Material

    * Bridgland, Victoria. “Cautionary Notes: The Science of Trigger Warnings.” Association for Psychological Science - APS, 19 Oct. 2023, www.psychologicalscience.org/news/utc-2023-oct-trigger-warnings.html.
    * “Content Warnings | Centre for Teaching Excellence.” Uwaterloo.ca, 21 May 2024, uwaterloo.ca/centre-for-teaching-excellence/catalogs/tip-sheets/content-warnings.
    * Filipovic, Jill. “We’ve Gone Too Far with “Trigger Warnings” | Jill Filipovic.” The Guardian, The Guardian, 20 Sept. 2017, www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/mar/05/trigger-warnings-can-be-counterproductive.
    * Garnar, Martin. “Trigger Warnings: History, Theory, Context , Edited by Emily J. M. Knox.” Journal of Intellectual Freedom & Privacy, vol. 3, no. 2-3, 2018, pp. 12–13, journals.ala.org/index.php/jifp/article/view/6738/9332.
    * George, Vishal . “The Psychology of Trigger Warnings.” Behaviouralbydesign.com, 2018, www.behaviouralbydesign.com/post/the-psychology-of-trigger-warnings.
    * Motion Picture Association of America. ““G” Is for Golden: The MPAA Film Ratings at 50.” Motion Picture Association of America, Nov. 2018. 🔗 [**PDF**](https://www.motionpictures.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/G-is-for-Golden.pdf)
    * The Vocal. “A History of Trigger Warnings, and the Price and Diversity of Pain.” Medium, 17 Mar. 2016, medium.com/the-vocal/a-history-of-trigger-warnings-and-the-price-and-diversity-of-pain-ac8e796d0d70.
    * Trigger, Language. “Inclusive Language: Trigger & Content Warnings.” University Housing, 11 Feb. 2025, www.housing.wisc.edu/2025/02/inclusive-language-triggers-and-content-warnings/. Accessed 26 Aug. 2025.
    * University of Michigan. “An Introduction to Content Warnings and Trigger Warnings Overview.” University of Michigan.  🔗 [**PDF**](https://sites.lsa.umich.edu/equitable-teaching/wp-content/uploads/sites/853/2020/09/An-Introduction-to-Content-Warnings-and-Trigger-Warnings-PDF.pdf)

So let me get this straight. This female lead (FL) who is allegedly this kind, pure, nurturing soul witnesses the male lead (ML) be sexually assaulted—and she claims he cheated or deliberately had this whole scheme to hurt her. She victim blames him by saying he should’ve pushed the woman off him. How he has no excuse because he’s bigger and taller than the woman. Doesn’t matter if he was drugged or drunk or was simply frozen in shock and fear. FL is the real victim here. Everyone comforts her. Even the ML is convinced he tried to cheat on her, having to grovel. They get married. ✨Happily ever after✨.

Imagine this. Main character (MC) is drunk. He’s super drunk. Some person assaults him and MC is too far gone. ML saves him, but then he gets mad that the MC was assaulted. Sorry, no, he’s mad the MC made himself “too tempting”. So what does he do? Of course he touches the MC to “reclaim his place”. In the morning, the MC has to apologize and comfort the ML. Because of course, the MC was in the wrong and needs to make up for…being assaulted. Sorry, “tempting” others.

Picture this. Omegaverse. FL1 is an alpha from some poor family. FL2 is an omega from a rich family. Class differences. Cool. FL2 gets lured out by a rich alpha young lady and she pins FL2 down and forces herself on FL2. FL1 steps in, and it “looks like” FL2 was enjoying herself—not crying and struggling, as we can clearly see. FL1 runs off. FL2 pushes the alpha off her, distraught FL1 got the wrong idea. She now has to comfort FL1’s insecurities, never mind that FL2 was assaulted. We don’t care about that part.

One more time. The FL is assaulted and her home burglarized. The ML sees this and he saves her…but then he accuses the FL of cheating on him and clearly wanting the other guy. ML abandons her. No one touches the FL got assaulted, oh no. Couples need to simply be there for each other, don’t you see? Even the bestie thinks the FL is overreacting and maybe a bit at fault because she simply didn’t see how crazy the ML went. He just said those things out of being scared. That’s all! And they all lived happily ever after 🥰

🌈✨13th reason✨🌈

I’ve had so much fucking bad luck lately, ISTG, where assault, including SA, is ruled as cheating or “temptation”, and somehow, no one ever sees this as a flaw. These aren’t even dark works either; they’re “humor” and “drama”. I don’t get that. Wouldn’t it be considering a bad thing to victim-blame? Wouldn’t it be a bad thing to conflate assault, which is thoroughly and inherently non-consensual, with the autonomous act of cheating or being disloyal?

I just— I’m lost. I don’t understand.

You (author) chose to include assault/SA. That’s fine. But instead of treating them as such, they’re used for the victim to be blamed and has to now soothe their lover’s dismay. And this is…it? We don’t ever see how this is flawed thinking? How it’s fucking weird as shit to make it seem that if your partner is assaulted, all that matters is how you feel and not them?

Please tell me the reason you went down this route. Tell me your creative process in why you thought this is romantic. What did your editors or sensitive readers think about this and did you listen to their feedback? I got all day.

I’ll wait.

How assault is utilized in fiction is a controversial topic, and I don’t mean to open up a can of wet cat food. But I can’t help but wonder why utilize assault if you weren’t intending to take accountability for it? Why use it to celebrate victim blaming or “historical accuracy” (which, dial it back and let’s think a little more about what constitutes as historical accuracy first)?

Do you have blinders and biases on what’s considered assault or victim-blaming? Do you have preconceived notions on what the mythical “perfect victim” should look like that this acts as a barrier to what victims or survivors or assaulted people can and do look like? Do you have a formed opinion on what perpetrators of assault should look like that you can’t imagine what they do look like?

I know this is fiction, and I’m not going to take media as the 1:1 philosophy or moral an author has in real life. I can only judge what’s on the page and the creativity behind it. I can maybe make assumptions on why an author uses assault in a certain way based on how societies and cultures define and treat assault, but that’s it. I’m sure my questions sound discombobulated and unnecessary. And I’m not advocating for the removal or censorship of assault in fiction either.

But just… Damn.

Why use a concept when you don’t know how nor want to take responsibility for it in the execution?

I just 🫠

I’ll delete this if this is too off-topic or niche or something; I’m just mad.

Sorry for the edit. I feel bad now.

⚠️PSA to those who requested to chat with me due to this post⚠️

Thank you for sharing your thoughts and experiences, but I’m not a licensed therapist or a clinician. I won’t be replying nor accepting chat requests that contain personal experiences as I am not qualified to help and cannot provide appropriate support. Sorry I sound rude 🥲 I just wanted people to know why those specific messages won’t be answered individually, especially after hours have passed. I will be deleting them.

My mass reply is:

Assault is a heavy and complex topic, in fiction or in real-life. It can happen to anyone by anyone and in many manners of ways that a nation’s laws or a culture’s rules may not outline or define. It isn’t fair or right that people cannot or do not want to understand the breadth of assault and this makes millions of experiences subjected to being silenced or minimized or ridiculed.

This post isn’t to advocate for the removal or censorship of assault in fictional works, as stated before. It’s solely a criticism on how assault and victim-blaming are utilized in fictional works. While I’d prefer victim-blaming to be a flaw or that assault is treated as assault—and/or trigger warned—I also can “don’t like, don’t read”. Artwork deserves criticism and discussion—it’s transdisplinary and political after all—but not censorship. Please feel comfortable in not finishing any media that upsets you, and know you have the right to criticize art, but in parallel, the work should still exist and we can simply disregard it. I can’t and won’t judge other readers for what they read and I won’t declare an author’s real-life morals without extensive, verified evidence. I can only control what I consume. Same to you. Use your autonomy as best you can.

I hope you find a safe, supportive person to share your thoughts and experiences with, be it a friend or relative or a clinician. It just can’t be me.

Here’s my cat. I hope her little pose and exposed belly can at least make you smile a little. She looks so ugly 💜

Since we're all romance readers here, I just want to caution you all about {The Favorites by Layne Fargo.} It is being pushed and marketed as a Romance. An epic love story. They're putting it in Romance subscription boxes, and unsuspecting Romance readers are going into this expecting an "epic love story" but instead ends up being triggered.

But please, please heed: This is NOT a romance book.

Yes, the author sets up the start of the book as a romance, but then the rug is pulled out from under you. All the rules of romance were disregarded and it just felt like a big FU to the genre.

If you decide to read this, do it when you're in the mood for General Fiction. Not romance.

For those innterested in a summary with spoilers...

Kat and Heath are childhood soulmates. When they were kids, Heath learned to skate so he could spend time with her. He was in foster care (I think, don’t remember that part clearly), and they were about to move him, but Kat begged her dad to take him in so she wouldn’t lose her skating partner.

Her dad later died. Her older brother, a drunk who hated Heath, kicked Heath out to sleep outside. Kat would sneak him food, a blanket, or sneak him in the house when her brother was away.

In their teens, they went to some kind of convention, and Kat met her idol, Sheila Lynn,one of the best and most decorated figure skaters. She also met Sheila’s kids, twins, Bella and Garrett.

Sheila complimented Kat’s talent and invited her to her summer skating program. Excited, Kat convinced Heath to go, and they ran off without telling her brother. At the boarding house, Kat got close with the twins, but Heath had a harder time adjusting.

Eventually, Bella convinced Kat to stay full-time in the training program, and Sheila allowed them to move into her home. Heath was a good skater but not as good as the others there, and Kat wanted to win. Bella realized this and convinced Kat to skate with Garrett instead.

One night, Heath overheard Kat admitting to a friend that she thought Heath was holding her back from being a better skater. He ran off and disappeared for three years. During that time, Kat paired up with Garrett and became a powerhouse skater, winning gold medals and achieving everything she wanted.

Until Heath came back out of the blue, insanely good at skating and paired up with Bella.

By this time, Bella and Kat were best friends.

Heath started deliberately using Bella to make Kat jealous. He and Bella began winning a lot together. Then, when a big championship finals came up, Bella deliberately tripped Kat on the ice, giving her a concussion. But Kat was determined to skate anyway. During her performance, Garrett dropped her, and she cracked her ribs. Blood everywhere.

Heath, her undying soulmate, rushed in, scooped her up in his arms, and carried her off the ice like a white knight.

While she was in the hospital, he made her think no one came to visit her. Kat, feeling abandoned, asked him to take her back to their old home because she felt like no one cared about her.

Some time passed, and Bella and Garrett showed up at Kat’s house. Bella convinced Kat to return to skating. The scene with Heath carrying a bleeding Kat off the ice had become this big thing, and people were crazy about them together. So, Kat went back to skating with Heath as her partner this time.

They blew up and became super popular. Paparazzi followed them everywhere. Their performances became more sexual and risqué. People were obsessed with them as a couple. They were “The Favorites.”

Heath proposed to her on the ice.

Then came another big championship final. Right before Kat was about to perform, Bella went up to her and told her about a scandal that hit the tabloids, the truth about where Heath had disappeared to for three years and how he got so good at skating. It got in Kat’s head, and when she and Heath went to perform, it was a mess. A definite loss.

Kat and Heath later had a big fight about it. She stormed out of their hotel room and went downstairs to the bar. There, she confronted Bella about deliberately sabotaging her (again) by telling her about the tabloid piece right before she was about to perform. They argued and parted ways.

Kat hung out with a friend for a bit, who told her she shouldn’t let Heath get away again. Now cooled off, Kat went up to their hotel room, ready to talk things out...

Kat walked into her hotel room and found Heath and Bella in bed together. Yes, on the night she lost her championship, her fiancé cheated with her “best friend,” who had sabotaged her.

Betrayed, Kat ran off. She left the state and returned to her old home, giving up on her career. Neither her love of her life nor her “best friend” reached out to her during that time.

Three years later, Heath left a voicemail saying Sheila Lynn died. Kat went to the funeral, and Heath and Bella were all cozied up on each other.

Kat said her piece about Sheila at the funeral and went back home.

Months later, Bella showed up at Kat’s doorstep. No apology, nothing. She wanted Kat to return to skating. Now that Sheila was gone, the training program wasn’t doing well, and Bella thought Kat’s name would be a big draw if she started skating with Heath again. Kat asked her point black if she and Heath were a thing. Bella said no, but that they’d hooked up once, purely for physical release. She convinced Kat that Heath still loved her and missed her.

Kat agreed to go back.

When she saw Heath again for the first time, there was still no apology, no groveling. Heath was living with Bella but swore they were just friends, roommates.

They started training and competing again. People loved it.

Bella was their coach.

At some point, Kat ended up staying at Bella’s house while she looked for a place. She heard Heath go into Bella’s room. She's hurt by just the sound of their voices in the room together. He stayed there until morning.

A semi-final came up. It was almost time for Kat to perform. She went in search of Bella and found her, weak and pale. Bella collapsed. Heath came rushing in, and Bella grabbed onto him and hugged him like he was her lifeline. “Heath.”

Kat stepped back. She realized what was happening and that Bella needed to go to the hospital. A decision had to be made. In the end, she sacrificed her semi-final performance and told Heath to go and take Bella to the hospital.

When Kat arrived at the hospital, Bella told her what they’d been hiding. She and Heath had been fucking the whole time, and now Bella was pregnant with Heath’s baby.

Bella admitted that she loved Heath but didn’t like being second to Kat with him.

Kat told Heath he was going to be a good dad.

This is where Kat turns and leaves and never looks back on these two sacks of shit, right?

Right?

Nope. She stays with them. Continues to skate with Heath. They make it to a big final in Sochi, and they’re everyone’s favorites. A lot of thriller-like drama happens, Kat and Heath being sabotaged, yada yada. They win the gold, but due to the sabotage, they are stripped of it.

Once again, all of Kat’s hard work goes to shit.

The book wraps up with Kat, Bella and Heath as a weird "throuple" where, ten years later, Kat is in an on-again off-again situationship with Heath, while being "auntie Katie" to Bella and Heath's "fierce" daughter. Oh, and Kat is working for Bella at her training institution.

But don't worry, she tries to convince us (the readers) that she's happy because she gets to "spend everyday with the people she loves most in this world."

*END OF SPOILERS*

So, yeah, that's the "epic love story."

EDIT: I'm getting notifications for comments from several people who really loved the book and are pretty much trying to gaslight me. Saying my take is "WILD", that the book isn't being marketed as romance, trying to contradict events that happened in the book, and saying I'm speaking with malice toward the author and whatnot.

I just had to go check out low-rated reviews to see if I'm losing my mind or something. Because I'm being made to feel like I didn't read what I read in this book. Or I lack comprehension skills.

For those who want to confirm if my take is "wild" or not, or if i'm just being malicious, feel free to check out the one and two star reviews. Feel free to check out what the book is tagged as on Goodreads and sales platforms. What the sale copy lines are.

My intention was not to dissuade anyone from reading the book. But to merely give a heads-up that this is not what it is currently being marketed as, and to not go into it expecting "an epic romance." Because I sure as heck wish someone had warned me.

Image Description: An up-close photo of a black and white cat pressing close to the bars of its cage. It’s resting its upper mouth on a bar which exposes its teeth, and its eyes are big. This gives the illusion the cat is unhinged, but with its cheeks puffy from resting on the bar, it simply looks goofy.

I would let the Saja Boys (Mystery Saja, wassup) be my idol if I got more ✨content displeasing to payment processors✨ like so:

• Nonpenetrative sex. Frottage, ardent pussyeating/asseating, intercrural sex, whatever constitutes as such.
• Consistent dry orgasms that still show a pleasurable physiological experience.
• Female Main Character (FMC) or femme MC (FMC) has a chaotic breeding kink, and they are the ones tying down the love interest (LI) and riding them for all their worth because the LI will get them preganananant. Pregánte? Gregnant?
• All different types of cuddling. Shorter MC is the big spoon and taller MC likes being a little spoon. Chaotic cuddling that looks like a murder scene.
• Men and mascs being shy, whimpering, beautiful messes. Even in queer media, having more romances that allow men who are societally typecast for certain sexual positions due to their race, ethnicity, physicality, or aesthetic diversify how they perform intimacy.
• Women and femmes being the intimacy leader of the relationship. Even in queer media, more romances with women who are typically typecast into specific sexual roles due to aesthetic, race, ethnicity, and so forth having a wider spectrum in their performance of intimacy. Nature will heal if we had more women-led intimacy in heterogendered romances.
• Blow jobs, tossing salad, and pussyeating but from the perspective of the bloweur or the eateur, and them having a euphoric, religious experience slobbering all over someone’s ✨whimpering member✨ or ✨angry nether lips✨ or both!
• FMC (woman or femme) forcefemming the MMC (man or masc), gender nonconforming (GNC) MC, or an androgynous MC.
• Forcemascing.
• Anyone forcefemming/forcemascing anyone, really.
• Softer “brattiness” that includes lighthearted pettiness and humor.
• Stomach fetish.
• Hand fetish.
• FMC enjoys grabbing the MMC’s phat peach.
• Handholding and little touches to the hand. Such as someone brushing their thumbs over their lover’s knuckles absentmindedly while they engage in conversation.
• MC has their own organic, homegrown penis that’s attached to them, and they water it and everything—maybe helicopter it, Iunno I never had one before 😭—but MC still likes using strap-ons to deliver pleasure to their partner(s).
• Stone top/pillow princess dynamics.
• Lots and lots of nonsexual caressing.
• Intellectual intimate moments of lovers having stimulating conversations like getting hyped over birds or having a deep discussion about why HunterxHunter’s Nen is one of the best well thought out power systems in manga.
• Gentle BDSM dynamics that aren’t undermined or othered by more aggressive dynamics, nor is BDSM and kink prescribed as the only way to achieve pleasure and non-BDSM/kink dynamics are labeled objectively inferior. And I say this as a practitioner. What works for each relationship, works.
• Unconventional applications or concepts of kink and BDSM dynamics.
• Intimacy that parallels kink and BDSM but they aren’t labeled as such and that’s okay.
• LI cooks the MC’s favorite meal that their grandparents always cooked for them as a surprise because MC was homesick and MC adores the gesture.
• A hunky, big-tiddied, nice-assed male or masc MC deliberately wears mesh and fishnet and plunging necklines and makeup. They’re breasting boobily and titting downwards. They’re cunt. They’re brat.
• Head Cheerleader MC (man or masc) being an absolute humbled heaux for the Jock MC (woman or femme). Really manifesting this one in literally every type of relationship configuration.
• Role reversal drugging.
• Bitching.
• Cis woman drag queen x trans man drag king who are swingers.
• Masc/fem, fem/fem, masc/masc, GNC/fem—IDGAF, have everyone in the relationship wear killer heels while they pleasure each other.
• Adult breastfeeding (ABF), but shake things up! Trans MMC ABF’ing FMC. Nonbinary MC (XMC or NBiMC) ABF’ing MMC. FMC ABF’ing Trans FMC. Transfem NB ABF’ing their entire polycule. You get ABF’ed and you get ABF’ed—everyone gets ABF’ed!
• Socially awkward, masc-presenting MC who loves wearing lingerie.
• Overstimulation but give it the ole sexy razzle dazzle (👋🏾🤚🏾 those are jazz hands).
• Eggpreg.
• Toxic pretty MCs who love dressing extravagantly end up being humbled big time when the LI makes the MC their bitch.
• Sexualization of ears.
• Thigh worship.
• Dollification kink.
• Heels 👠 fetish.
• If a character has hair, their lover brushes it for them, braids it for them, washes it for them.
• Back scratches. Please.
• Terms of endearment that say “fuck the binary”. Men and mascs being called “lady” or “princess”. Women and femmes being called “sir” or “daddy”. MLM and WLW has this, but let heterogendered relationship configurations do this too!

Be this about a character who had a double mastectomy, underwent breast reduction surgery, makes packers and STPs as a side hustle, does genderfucky cosplays that gives you major gender envy (😭), is a V-Tuber, writes SVSSS and Genshin sex pollen fanfics, is Polynesian, from Brasil, speaks Klingon, is a chronically online Lin Manual Miranda hateur—give me diverse romantic intimacy between all sorts of people so I can watch them perv on each other, or give me an allergic reaction to my cats.

Is this 😃🥼🫴🏾🦋 not the queer art Megami said we should protect?

I literally just want to see more romantic relationships that (1) represent all sorts of facets and dimensions of intimacy, including, sensuality and sexuality; and (2) sheds light on the spectrum of relationship configurations and dynamics and gender, sex, aesthetic, and attraction presentation because this breeds sex neutrality ^[1]. This gives naturalized and normalized representation to so many people in ways. This lets intimacy be personalized to those within the configuration, reflecting the wealth of performances people use to achieve different angles of pleasure.

And that’s fucking gnarly.

I’m aware there are plenty of romances and love stories that reflect what I ask for!

I read them! I buy them! But I want more. And I want these romances to be legally accessible, available, and affordable for whoever wants to read or create them, including accurate and uncensored ethical translations, illustrations, audiobooks, and audiodramas.

Look, we already know the stances of bigots, cowardly corporations, and discriminatory governments regarding diversity and inclusivity. Yet some people who support diversity and inclusivity will advocate for the exclusion of any fantasy or representation when it doesn’t align with their tastes. Regardless that they’re allies or a marginalized identity, they will deny diversity beyond their preferences matters; social pressures, cultural conformities, and political climate oppress and suppress certain representation; and how people around the world don’t have the same privileges of accessibility, availability, affordability, and time with media.

Bruh.

Les4les pup play doesn’t have to be your thing. You don’t have to understand romantic forcefemming. You don’t have to read about a dude who prettily blushes when his girlfriend calls him “princess”. You will never be forced to write about handholding. Your children will not be forced to read romances that include any kink framework. But to uphold diversity and inclusivity, even though you don’t understand the appeal of something, you will still make sure everyone is given the respected, equal, and equitable autonomy and opportunity to engage with whatever media they want.

You don’t have to censor your criticisms or preferences to respect others’*.

You can still be represented in your likes and dislikes because that’s what diversity and inclusivity is about. It’s representing everyone. It’s making visibility of fantasies an equal and equitable right and not a privilege. It’s the embodiment of ¿Por qué no los dos? and kinktomato (Your kink is not my kink and that’s okay).

And maybe the result is people snarking, circlejerking, and satirizing about tentacled handholding on Discord or shading Zerg and ger novels and mpreg on the clock app. Or a sliver of representation in a Drag Queen x Drag King romance makes a person feel seen in a world that has repeatedly told them that their identity or desire or experience is to be kept “out of sight, out of mind”, in order to “pass” as a human being.

Or maybe you just become an even bigger degenerate. And I will be so proud of you 🥹.

But keep throwing bricks! Keep supporting artists and audiences in their desire for diverse fantasies! Actively listen to good-faith criticisms regarding representation, dehumanization, hyperinvisibility, and hypervisibility of marginalized communities and experiences! Equalize visibility to all identities and experiences and voices! Never deny yourself or someone else the right to be represented! Understand that others do not have the same accessibility, finances, sociocultural environment, free time, or knowledge as you to engage with certain media. Be loud when you see inclusion and diversity is being wrongfully stripped from platforms without warning. And if something isn’t your cup of tea—then don’t drink it!

Resistance to bigotry isn’t only large political and activist acts. It’s also maintaining a community that continuously promotes intersectionality, diversity, inclusivity, accessibility, autonomy, affordability, and good-faith conversation, be that a nuanced discussion, unserious snarkery, or a silly diatribe about how Kovu, Kiara, Kovu’s pathetic bratty loser brother, and Zira from The Lion King II: Simba’s Pride awakened things inside you.

👀

The type of diversity in romance books reflects the political, legal, cultural, social, and capitalist climate around us. What you receive in your romance books is an amalgamation of accessibility, financial circumstance, law, society, and culture. And if you don’t feel that weight, I hope you’ll still help maintain an inclusive and diverse community for those who carry that weight daily.

Enough rambling from this sleep-deprived, fearing-her-upcoming-surgery-haha old maid!

Accessibility, Diversity, and Inclusivity Resources

Helpful Extensions and Apps

• Library Extension is a great extension for Firefox, Edge, and Chrome to link your libraries and see if a book you’re searching for is available. This is international for dozens of countries too, not just U.S. only!
• Calibre is a great e-book manager. r/Calibre is a helpful resource. You can convert most files into EPUBs there too.
• FicHub is an accessibility tool to download fanfic from FFN, fiction press, Adult Fiction, AO3, etc.

Archives

• Archive Today allows you to archive websites and access them. I archive every news article I post for accessibility—it gets around paywalls—and preservation.
• Internet Archive is a given with millions of free media that you can even download. IA is also the U.S. federal depository library | 🔗 Internet Archive Blog.
• WayBack Machine is from Internet Archive as a digital archive of the world wide web.
• The Anarchist Archive preserves loads of records and essays from the international anarchism movement.
• Archive of Our Own (AO3) is a non-profit open source transformative fiction repository. You can read fanfiction and original works there and download them too.
• LibriVox is an audiobook platform with public domain works for free.

Inclusive, Diverse, and/or DRM-Free Media Places

• Smashwords is having their summer/winter sale ending July 31! But you can download EPUBs, PDFs, and such DRM-free.
• Book⭐️Walker is having a sale for it’s Boys Love special sale until August 14, 2025. It sells so much Japanese media.
• DL Site is an e-shop for all-ages and adult indie, transformative, derivative, and original light novels, comics, manga, and games.
• SuBLime hosts BL manga.
• Yen Press publishes novels, comics, manga, audiobooks, and they sell through Amazon, Barnes & Nobles, Books-a-Million, Kinokuniya, Indigo, and Crunchyroll Store.
• Meb Market hosts Thai fiction in both English and Thai.
• Subreddit r/FreeRomanceBooks is what’s on the tin.
• Humble Bundle essentially bundles ebooks, games, software, and the like. I’ve been able to get entire series for manga or classic series for around 20USD—all downloadable and DRM-free.
• StoryBundle is the same as Humble Bumdle with indie works by indie authors, bundling them together at a fixed price, and you can choose to pay the minimum or pay more and get bonus books, donate to charity—all downloadable and DRM-free.
• Tor Publishing Group, Rebellion Publishing, and Baen Books sell their ebooks DRM-free.
• Liberature is the “ultimate list of DRM-free bookshops”.
• Project Gutenberg hosts thousands of free, no-account-needed, public domain ebooks.
• Libro.fm hosts audiobooks that are DRM-free and helps support your local bookstore.
• BookFunnel is a great place to download DRM-free books and authors will do fun book blasts and such for free. Your downloads are emailed to you, but you also can make an account and have a library on there.
• BookBub is like Groupon but for books. There’s book sales, recommendations, freebies, and newsletter.
• Queer Sci-Fi is “a blog and website that’s all about LGBT characters in science fiction, fantasy, paranormal and horror fiction. We’re dedicated to promoting the inclusion of LGBT characters in these genres” (via their website). They have freebies too!
• Royal Road, ScribbleHub, The Medium - just a few places to read various works about all sorts of things.
• r/MM_RomanceBooks has a post for authors affected by the current itchio censorship, so lots to choose from!
• Check out subreddits for sales and deals. r/MM_RomanceBooks does daily sales and book releases. r/Fantasy will have authors let us know an entire series of there’s is all free except the last book, and I’ve gotten loads from their indie sale events.

Virtual Libraries (vis Libby)

• Queer Liberation Library is a free library card for Libby users to be connected to all sorts of queer books.
• Japan Foundation Los Angeles Library is a free library card for Libby users to access loads of Japanese media.

Diverse and Inclusive Databases

• LGBTQ Reads is a great site to search for all sorts of queer presentation in books for all ages, such as agender representation, bigender, etc.
• Melanin Library is an online database for books written by Black authors.
• romance.io by u/silke_romanceio, The Story Graph with subreddit r/thestorygraph, and why-choose.com are great resources for tracking books with Why Choose being great for “why choose” tracking.
• I Heart Sapphic Fiction has a lot of news, resources, sales, and factoids about—you guessed it—sapphic fiction.
• Aro & Ace Books Database is self-explanatory.
• A-spec Books Database is self-explanatory.
• MM Romance Author Directory is great and made by u/jenemb.
• Queer Romance Author Directory - I have not personally used it, but this resource was brought to my attention by a friend.
• Asian Authors Directory is from the Asian Author Alliance. I have not used it, but I had this jotted down as a resource.
• QueeRomance Ink is another inclusive queer romance book database that also does freebies.

Misc

• Payhib and SubscribeStar - I know some authors are on those sites for “controversial” content or simply normal queer content.
• Check the author’s website directly! Some authors sell ebooks directly from their website, which gives you an EPUB or PDF, and they’ll do newsletter freebies, sales, and deals.
• Universes and colleges will also have digital archives non-students and staff can peruse without needing a card. Some files comes in downloadable PDF format.
• Highly advise an external hard drive as a back up to your Cloud backup when it comes to your books.

⚠️ Please do your due diligence regarding authors using unethical methods to promote or create their diverse and inclusive books. Do not witch-hunt. Exercise caution. ⚠️

For June, I hope you had a happy Pride 🏳️‍🌈, Juneteenth 💛❤️💚🖤, Eid Al-Adha, Shavout, Men’s Mental Health Month, Best Friend’s Day, Hug Your Cats Day, Father’s Day, Summer Solstice, No Kings Day, and whatever else June entailed for you.

For July, Happy Disability Pride 🌻 and Nonbinary Awareness Week & International NB People’s Day 💛🤍💜🖤!

Anyone have any intimacies or relationship dynamics they’d like to see in romance? Say your piece, add a candle, and join me in my manifestation circle.

I’m Magnafeana, and you’re been watching Disney Channel 🪄

Meditating, manifesting, praying, yassing, labubuing…

🧘🏾‍♀️

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                   🕯

^{[1] Sex positivity uplifts sexuality; it helps in counter-shaming and sexual health; it’s affirming to minority and ostracized identities, dynamics, and experiences. Sex neutrality is pluralistic and more inclusive as it focuses on agency and respect of sexuality and sensuality without promoting or discouraging anything. It naturalizes and normalizes the art, experience, experimentation, participation or lack of participation, and personal history or lack of personal history of or with sexuality without assigning moral, social, or cultural weight.}

TW for racism, specifically anti-Asian racism

I’m half Black/half Asian. When I see racially offensive things in romance books, I always feel so unbelievably terrible about myself. My trust in a romance book to not hurt me, to not demean and traumatize me, to not take away my dignity and my humanity, is something that’s so sacred and intimate to me. So when a book completely violates that trust I bestow on it, I feel utterly horrible and even defiled in a way.

Rainbow Rowell’s book Eleanor & Park really hurt me. I’ve spoken about this before on this sub, but it bears repeating in this political climate. This book is deeply racist and made me feel extremely heartbroken and violated. This book featured a white heroine being incredibly inappropriate and racist towards the Asian hero. She would dehumanize him, fetishize him, and degrade him for being half Korean. At one point, she actually made fun of his eye shape, and as a half Asian person, I was very hurt by this book, as I’ve been made fun of for my Asian features and culture. That book really, really hurt my heart and made me feel humiliated and dehumanized. It made me feel reduced to a caricature, a joke, a fetish. The racism in this book was never once condemned by the writing; it was always romanticized, celebrated, and depicted as ok. This book actually made me cry so hard, because I was so profoundly devastated from reading all of the racist things in it. This book triggered very painful memories I have of being bullied and ostracized for my race.

There was this one line in the book: ”Stupid Asian kid. Stupid, beautiful Asian kid.” And also: ”Park’s eyes got wide. Well, sort of wide. Sometimes she wondered if the shape of his eyes affected how he saw things. That was probably the most racist question of all time.” It’s very, very, very violating to read these things about your own features. That line, as well as countless others in this book, make me feel like I’m a zoo exhibit, because my appearance/heritage is so strange and alien and deserves to be made fun of. It’s a deeply painful and dehumanizing feeling, one I’ve felt my entire life. Rowell will never, ever know how deeply her words devastated me.

I don’t care if authors like her didn’t have bad intentions. Impact matters far more than intent, so even if they didn’t have bad intentions, their books still harmed people. Some of the worst racism I’ve ever experienced was by people who might not have had bad intentions, yet their comments/actions still caused terrible, lifelong trauma to me. So no, intent is meaningless. Casual/covert/accidental racism is still racism. There are way too many people who aren’t aware of covert racism and microagressions and how incredibly harmful they are. So many people think overt, deliberate racism is the only kind of racism that counts, that as long as you’re not killing POC and making explicit racial slurs, you can’t possibly be racist...No. Racism can take on subtle, insidious forms such as othering someone, making racial jokes that reduce POC to a punchline, being silent in the face of injustice, subtly invalidating POC experiences and feelings, excusing/minimizing racism, making microagressions, white fragility, and so many more. Just because something’s not blatantly or maliciously racist, doesn’t mean it’s not still racist and offensive. Subtle, micro-agressive racism is deeply destructive and hurtful, too. It insidiously normalizes and encourages the abuse and subjugation of POC. Things that might seem “harmless” and “only a little bit ignorant” still perpetuate bigotry and uphold racist institutions for POC.

When I think about how I was bullied for being Black and Asian, I don’t forgive racist books. When I think about how my friend was so devastated from experiencing anti-Black racism, I don’t forgive racist books. And when I think about how my mom sobbed for hours after she was mocked for her eyes and called a Chinese bitch who caused coronavirus, I sure as fuck don’t forgive racist books. Because not only do these books cause extreme pain to POC readers, they also normalize real life racism/prejudice against us and have real world consequences to us.

Also, something that I find to be very appalling is the huge double standard with how white authors are treated vs. POC authors. Rainbow Rowell, a white author, wrote a deeply racist, offensive book and never once acknowledged the criticism she got from the Asian community, yet her book is wildly successful, wins awards, gets a movie deal. Similarly, Evie Dunmore, who’s also white, writes a book that’s offensive to South Asians, and the book still gets critical acclaim. In contrast, Courtney Milan, a Chinese author, calls out a book that’s racist towards Chinese people, and as a result, she gets completely ostracized in the industry, is kicked out of RWA, and nearly has her career destroyed. The double standard is profoundly sickening. White authors (and white people in general) constantly get away with being racist and are NEVER held accountable and even get rewarded for it. But POC authors who dare to speak out against racism get endlessly punished, gaslit, and shamed into silence. On top of that, POC authors struggle so much harder than white authors to even break into publishing in the first place. White, racist people are always protected and afforded forgiveness and kindness that are NEVER given for BIPOC.

So I’m begging white authors to stop hurting POC. Just please stop. We already suffer enough in our own lives with constantly feeling frightened in our own skin, with experiencing racism and horrors that you will never, ever deal with. So please stop adding to our burdens by writing books that hurt us.

Also, I’m really angry when I see white readers who defend racist books and say it’s not offensive. If you’re not a POC, you have absolutely no right to police what is or isn’t racist to actual POC.

Lastly, if anyone’s curious, here are some OwnVoices critiques from other Asian readers who explain how E&P is offensive: link 1, link 2, link 3, link 4, link 5

I had previously read a book by this author and decided to give one of her series A try. I downloaded the first book in the Fallen Gods series. Nowhere in the description, listing on amazon, or in the first several pages of the book did it list anything about potentially disturbing content or trigger warnings. The entire first chapter of that book was graphic sexual assault, human trafficking, abuse, torture, and murder. And I don't mean vague references to, I mean the actual descriptions of the assaults that were taking place at that time in that chapter and the things they were making women do on camera to traffic them​. There was nothing in the description that would have led me to believe that's what I was about to start reading.

When looking at writing by this author, it appears she does not feel the need to put any content warnings or information out about what her books might contain, even when it's graphic and disturbing material. While I like the first book I read by this author, the den of vipers, after this experience and realizing that they don't feel the need to alert their readers to potentially upsetting content I don't think I would ever pick up another book or series by this person again. I think it is in incredibly poor form and shows a lack of care about their readers when author is published such content and don't make it clear with warnings ahead of time. I would have been fuming if I had paid money for this book. I wanted to give others a heads up and warning before they pick up anything by this author that it may have extremely graphic or disturbing content without any warning, so please be wary of that going in.

CW: racism, fat-shaming

I'm assuming anyone on this subreddit supports the sub's stance on BLM, and would therefore not wish to support a creator with white nationalist ideals.

I just saw this all on Twitter this morning, but in case anyone here hasn't seen it, I thought I'd share this tweet, which contains many screen grabs of the incredibly offensive and racist comments Jamie McGuire has made. (Including one in which she calls BLM a "terrorist organization" and likens it to the KKK.)

Since there is a movie adaptation of her book in the works, I thought others might want to know in advance, so they can make informed decisions on where they do and do not spend their money.

This is just one of many tweets with examples: BookishAlerts Tweet re: Jamie Mcguire

Kidnapping? Incest? Rape? Forced marriage? Or just plain messed up? Rec it to me. I get there are things that are considered "taboo" in the romance reading world, and we aren't supposed to enjoy reading it because we are all feminists, right? And we are supposed to immediately DNF it and be repulsed? Sure, okay. But we all know that all of us enjoy reading certain tropes or subject matters that we aren't supposed to. So no matter how weird, effed up or controversial, spill what sort of tropes you like that others would find appalling, then recommend a book based on that trope.

It's okay! This is a safe space. NO JUDGMENT. I'll go first:

I love the book, Screaming Into the Silence by Lydia Kelly. It's about a young deaf woman who gets kidnapped for ransom and the main, hot captive rapes her and they fall in love. I'm into kidnapping as a trope.

You next!

As someone who lost a baby a couple of years ago and has struggled with infertility since, I find it impossible to read books where the FMC is pregnant or has a baby. I feel like I’m missing out on so many great stories people are always raving about because I just can’t cope with a pregnant FMC or newborn babies, especially if it happens early on in the book. I decided to give {P.S. You’re Intolerable by Julia Wolf} a try and couldn’t get past chapter three. Wondering how – if at all – my fellow romance readers handle these situations. Does it ever get easier? I really want to be able to enjoy these reads just not sure how.

Edit: if you’re in this situation, I just want to say I’m really sorry and sending you lots of love ❤️

I'm an avid reader of noncon/rape erotica from sites like asstr, bdsmlibrary, etc but now looking to get into proper books with an actual plot.

I've read a couple of dark romance in the past, such as Tears of Tess, Captive in the dark, and The Siren by Tiffany Reisz - enjoyed them all but looking for much more darker stories. Books that has very brutal but also steamy noncon/rape scenes, violence, abuse, torture even (both physically and mentally) - I literally have no limits. I'd prefer if the girl doesn't enjoy it and hates it all throughout, but I'm fine with Stockholm syndrome and her embracing the pain near the end (this is a romance sub after all).

From looking at similar threads, I've come up with a good "darkest of the dark" list - but looking to add more!

Currently I have: - Untouchable by Sam Mariano - Sick Fux by Tillie Cole - Take me with you by Nina G Jones - Debt by Nina G Jones - Heat by R Lee Smith - Dirty Angels Series by Karina Halle - Consequences series by Aleatha Romig - Tragic Beauty by Iris Ann Hunter - The V Games series by Ker Dukey - The Bet by J.L. Beck - Lemonade by Nina Pennacchi

Thanks in advance!

PS. If you want to read some hot rape smut/erotica, then check out my most recent thread! Let me know if you have specific requests (I've read way too many stories on the internet)

My dear friend recently went through the tragedy of stillbirth. She enjoys reading, particularly lighter romantic comedy style books, and since many HEAs in romance end in pregnancy/children I offered to make her a list of books that are silent on pregnancy and without any onscreen death. I thought others might appreciate a recent compilation of books that I think avoid these triggers. And if anyone recognizes these and recalls pregnancy/child loss plots or just generally thinks any are too sad please let me know and feel free to share if there are books that would be good to add to the list <3

{When in Rome by Sarah Adams}

{The Cheat Sheet by Sarah Adams}

{The Hating Game by Sally Thorne}

{To All the Boys I've Loved Before by Jenny Han}

{Lovelight Farms by BK Borrison}

{The Love Hypothesis by Ali Hazelwood}

{The Wisteria Society of Lady Scoundrels by India Holton}

{Back After This by Linda Holmes}

{The Perfect Rom-Com by Melissa Ferguson}

{The Unhoneymooners by Christina Lauren}

{The Honey Don't List by Christina Lauren}

{Twice in a Blue Moon by Christina Lauren}

{Dating You Hating You by Christina Lauren}

{Nora Goes Off Script by Annabel Monaghan}

{Mr. Wrong Number by Lynn Painter}

{Happily Never After by Lynn Painter}

{Accidentally Amy by Lynn Painter}

{Today Tonight Tomorrow by Rachel Lynn Solomon}

{We Can't Keep Meeting Like This by Rachel Lynn Solomon}

{Unromance by Erin Connors}

Edit: Grammar, deleting one book from the list that isn't a romcom (Finlay Donovan - which is a fun mystery IMO but not relevant here)

As a longtime member of the infertility club, I should hate all baby, pregnancy and infertility books. Alas the human mind is a funny, fuzzy thing and I don't. Therefore I present to you my midweek gift, a tentative list of infertility related romance books. These are all MF pairings and the age range is varied.

The romance book resolutions to infertility can be magical (via super sperm) or medical (via IVF that works which is also magic if you ask me) or just none at all. And all of them are fine.

TW for discussions of infertility, loss, medicated conception and pregnancy.

Note: there is no one way to react to infertility, loss and medically assisted conception. All feelings are valid. No judgements or uninformed opinions on infertility are valid. Or welcome.

* = pregnancy, baby or child in the HEA/epilogue.

{Walk Through Fire by Kristen Ashley} *- MC, second chance. The MFC discovers early on that she is not able to have children and breaks it off with the love of her life without telling him the truth. Questionable decision that leaves him angry and her broken. Twenty years later they meet again. There is no resolution for her childlessness but I really felt her yearning for family. No magic solution. She's childless and he's got a family with his ex and everyone is doing their best. He's incredibly erudite and chatty for an Ashley MMC.

{Wall by Cate C Wells} * - MC, cheating second chance romance. If you don't like cheating, don't go here. TW: Discussion of multiple miscarriages. I love this book, it's one of the only romance books that I've read that showed how a reasonably happy marriage can be fractured by infertility. The coldness and isolation that both partners can experience and the withdrawal from life that can occur after loss. The HEA has pregnancy, the solution is obviously magic right time sperm. I'm not super mad about it.

{Lady and The Orc by Finley Fenn} * - She's a lady who was labeled barren until the orc leader sniffed out her true fecundity and kidnapped her. You all know what to expect, the solution is magic orc sperm, and there is SO MUCH OF IT. TW for oh man everything. Just everything, I can't list it all here but kidnap, dubcon, fluids, breeding and exhibitionism are prominent.

{The Raven Prince by Elizabeth Hoyt}* - HR, he's a mean earl and she's his secretary, a widow who was barren. He wants her but he also wants heirs and therefore keeps his distance. He then decides that widow secretary >progeny but she refuses him. Somehow they end up both married and with kids because magic sperm (her late husband has a bastard elsewhere so it's def magic).

{Reaper's Fire by Joanna Wylde} *- MC, MC's in their mid 30's. She's had a traumatic and very sad event that leaves her unable to have children. He's lying to her about his true identity and spends about 2/3 of the book with OW for 'club business", while making googly eyes at the MFC. Finally his business is done and he tries to come clean and it doesn't go great. Ending has a discussion of an open adoption which I love.

{Lock & Key by Cat Porter} * - MC, both are older, she's 42 and he's 41. She can't have children due past violence that leaves her physically unable to conceive (plus discussion of loss). They discuss surrogacy, adoption and her fears feel valid. The MMC here is really hot and open about wanting her in a way that doesn't really feel like typical MC alpha-hole.

{The Serpent's Mate} by Susan Trombley - Sci-Fi, kidnap and fated mates. She's 40 and a business bitch. He's a snake man with two dicks. Breeding talk all around and turns out the planet they end up on makes her younger and can reverse aging. I am not angry about any of this and there are two very good reasons for this. TW snakes, blobs monsters that consume physical bodies, some body betrayal due to pheromones and imprinted mates. This book is child free but there is discussion of a possible pregnancy in the future.

{Broken Heir by Alison Aimes}* - Sci-fi omegaverse. I love the Ruthless Warlords series and this book can do no wrong. Again we meet a barren widowed omega and the beastly alpha who wants to breed her. Arranged and forced marriage, mistaken identity, beastly transformations. Also mafia. Also rebellion. He refuses to let omegas touch him without being tied down (!) because he's scared of hurting them due to his beastly form. She's the clever MFC who tames him. Surprise he's got super sperm and she gets pregnant. Again, these books can do no wrong for me but TW for standard dark omegaverse tropes and kinks.

If you have a good or maybe bad infertility book rec, let me know.

Hi Everyone,

I hope you're doing well.

This is gonna be a bit of a rant but please hear me out. I've been getting a bit temperamental and just wanted to reach out to see if people feel the same. I suppose to get some internet validation. 👻

I have never judged anyone on their preference on what they read. I personally do not like the Step sibling trope however if that's what some like to read, I am perfectly ok with it. I would never make someone feel less because of a book they like.

Why is this relevant? Because apparently, it's not okay to like dark romances that involve Dub Con or Non Con and that makes me a bad person. I loved the Twist Me Series!! It's the trilogy that made me fall in love with dark romances, and now, dark romance is mainly what I read.

I don't understand where the link to liking a book is, to the judgement of my character. I understand the difference between fantasy and reality and know that what these MC's do is not acceptable in the real world These books, the emotions, the development, the angst, (the book covers🤣) are what helps me to escape this god forsaken reality so why is it an issue? To be told that by liking this trope, I undermine a victim that this happened to is frankly disgusting especially since I myself was a victim of sexual assault. (I dislike the word victim but I wasn't sure how else to describe this)

Book characters are not meant to be perfect, otherwise, what would be the character development? As long as trigger warnings are present, then I don't think it's an issue to like these tropes. I literally see people send extreme hate on certain authors on TikTok or other social media platforms and it's not okay. If you don't like the book/character, it's definitely ok to pass on your opinion but please reserve your judgement for those who do.

I just want to scream to leave my books alone!!

Edit: To be clear, I have not seen direct comments about this on Reddit, I was referring to what someone said to me on TikTok.

Spoilers for Still Standing by Kristen Ashley

Holy shit did I hate this book! This is going to be a long and rambling rant. I know the non-con and dark romance are a thing but this book was not described like that. It came up on my goodreads feed as a straight up romance, no trigger warnings included.

So the book is about a woman who is so down on her luck, she has a dollar in her bank account, her car is about to be repossessed, and she is running errands for a drug dealer to stop him from pimping out his wife (her best friend). She goes to deliver a message to a Biker Badass ( the hero of the story) who tells her how much worse her situation really is, tells her he can take care of her if she sleeps with him, and proceeds to get her hammered and has sex with her (what we call rape). It goes downhill from there.

I rage quit this book while yelling "WHAT THE FUCK?!" repeatedly. I was convinced that Kristen Ashley was going to pull an ol' switcharoo and the heroine was gonna somehow escape and ride into the happily ever after by herself or at the least with a less asshole of a man. But nope! Skip to the end and what do you find? An epilogue with them happily ever aftering together. Go suck an egg Kristen Ashley you waste of hours of my time!

Highlights from this shit show:

• The first 'love scene' - it'ssss.........you guessed it! Rape. Ding! Ding! Ding!
• Him making her completely dependent on himself (money, mode of transportation, home, job, everything is his).
• She constantly thinks how dependent she is on him and how only he can save her best friend so she has to put up with whatever he wants
• He throws her against a wall in anger and then everyone around her (including this turd of a hero) tells her to just not get in his way when he is like that.
• His 16yr daughter gets assaulted and let's not reassure her or take care of her at all, let's go beat up the boys. But don't call the cops because that'll tarnish our Biker badass reputation, even though we are completely clean and run a hardware store. Oh and let's also not get her a therapist because she can totally just get over it by hanging and shopping with the girls. And by just talking to another woman who got raped when she was teenager and became a 'whore' but who's totally okay now because she caught herself a good man. Let's just handle it in the family.
• Every single time they have a disagreement, he either tells oh you are being cute, shuts her up, or she ends it by agreeing with him. 'He is right' is a sentence repeated over and over and over again
• He keeps the state of her best friend secret from her because he didn't want to 'worry' her and she needs to stay in the sunshine! And she is totally fine with it because it means he wants to take care of her.
• How he describes why he likes her - she cleans his towels, keeps his bathroom clean, takes care of his house, takes care of his kids, has very nice tits and ass and face, sucks him off in the mornings, regularly puts out, and has a nice smile or something. (I'm not exaggerating here)
• He tells her she can't leave when she threatens to after he hit her. Physically restrains her even though she is yelling 'Don't touche me!' over and over again.

If you are writing about abusive relationships, you have to make it clear on how they are not okay, either in the narrative or if it's not part of the fantasy then before the reader opens a book. This is normalizing abuse. There is nothing sexy about coercion and non consent. It's time to end rape is sexy trope in the romance genre.

I know this has become a essay now even though I omitted some other heinous details. If you made it till here, congratulations! Now DM me and we can egg Kristen Ashley's house or you know leave this book one star reviews everywhere. I made an account here just to rant about this. And also someone tell Kristen Ashley to go meet some actual women and not just mean girls from 90s high school movies.

Edit- Hello, I see that I shouldn't have made those remarks about the author no matter the tone. I apologize.

And I am not trying to kink shame anyone. Whatever floats your boat. This book was not labelled as a Dark Romance, dub-con, or non-con, it was presented as straight romance so that's how I'll review it. And this is just a 2am rant not an attack against anyone's likes or dislikes.

Hey yall, I was reading a book and I noticed a pattern. The heroine stops eating when she’s stressed so of course the hero can come in and make her feel better and eat blah blah blah whatever but it made me notice that in like every romance novel I’ve ever read or even a fantasy w romance elements, the heroine stops eating when she’s stressed out. The “warning signs” for the hero to become all concerned are when she loses weight and it’s always remarked that these characters are “so tiny” etc. I always feel weird about myself after. Especially when it’s a character described as average weight and looks and then the author makes a point to say that her appetite is so tiny or she’s just too stressed to eat. I have an existing eating disorder so honestly it could just be me getting sick again. Opinions?

{Santa’s Hot Christmas on Dinosaur Island by Stix Hiscock}

So… I saw this utter nonsense on Hoopla and I laughed thinking it would be a fun, campy romp! Boy was I wrong! Two pages in after learning about Santa’s existential crisis we get this scene. TW for abuse and racism.

If only the lower classes of this world would cease their uncontrolled breeding, and end the spread of their inferior genes that have become such a blight upon the land. Then, perhaps, I could know some measure of peace. “Ummm... Excuse me... Mr. Claus, sir?” I heard a high-pitched little pitch squeak into my ear. I turned to see Jingleberry Spritz, one of my toy making elves, staring up at me with wide purple eyes. I immediately delivered an open-handed slap to his face. “How dare you interrupt the master at his work?!” I demanded. Jingleberry Spritz rubbed at his face where the print of my glove was still fading from his abnormally bright pink skin

I feel like I need to wash my brain now! How in he world did I pick up a book expecting some hot Stern Brunch Santa action only to be met with eugenics propaganda?! 😭

I read Truly by Carmel Rhodes and wow I'm speechless ... in a bad way. The female protagonist is sexually assaulted by the male protaganist. She begs him to stop but he doesn't and even runs away crying and mentions/ hints throughout the book that it was a traumatising experience ... the male protrotaganist refuses to acknowledge what he has done and the female characters essentially has to force/beg him to apologise to her... he threatens her throughout the book and does other REALLY SHITTY STUFF and i felt so so so uncomfortable because in end she falls in loves with him and they live happily ever after . What type of message is this sending to people... why do people like tropes like this? There is no amount of groveling that can make me forgive the male protaganist.

Edit : im no longer going to respond to anyone on here since everything i write gets downvoted xxx

😐

The way non-con and bullying is handled in some of the books I read is laughably bad. It's stereotypical dickmitization. The FMC will have some of the most vile stuff imaginable done and said to her and the best the author comes up with her is "witty" comebacks that aren't witty. Cussing isn't witty, I'm sorry. Where are the books where the MC causes genuine emotional distress to her tormentors instead of being a glorified doormat who's "feisty" sometimes?

Like the FMC just gets thrown around and assaulted and is perfectly fine after? She's fine just talking to the MMC and being "feisty" with him even after he ruined her? It's the same "oooh I shouldn't like it" nonsense all the time and it's exhausting. There's no trauma or realistic aftermath. It's just a FMC with no personality aside from being "feisty" and a psychopath who should be in jail.

TRIGGER WARNING: INITIMATE PARTNER VOILENCE!!!

So I recently came across this tiktok and got to know that the author of The Mindf*ck Series passed away in 2021. She wrote romance, paranormal and thriller books and apparently her husband is the one who killed her. He didn’t let her publish her books so she published under various pen names and he only allowed her to publish this series right before her death. Now he roams free and gets all the monetary benefits from her books. I cannot believe that someone who wrote so passionately about love never got to experience that in real life and her life ended so tragically. So this is request to please not buy her paperbacks because all the money goes to that murderer. But do check out her works, they are pretty amazing, specially this series.

I read {Slaughter by Shantel Tessier} a good couple of years ago, and the rape scene still pops up in my head sometimes. I love a dark romance, and I like her other books, but it was just a horrific blow-by-blow scene that I don't think I'll ever get over.

I've read many Zoe Blake books, that while can have unpleasant moments, never stuck with me like that one scene did.

Does anyone else have a book they've read that still crosses the line years on?