the rise of spicy romance novels

smut is big on TikTok

Growing up, summers at the family cottage were a ritual of sun-soaked afternoons and mosquito-bitten evenings—except when it rained. Those gray, drizzly days had their own charm, though, usually spent curled up with my latest book. But there was one time, in my early teens, when I arrived without one. Bored and restless, I wandered the cottage in search of entertainment. That’s when I stumbled across something unexpected on a dusty shelf in one of the bedrooms: a stack of well-worn paperbacks with lurid, glossy covers. Romance novels. Or, as I later learned, what some called “bodice rippers.”

The covers alone were enough to ignite my curiosity—men who looked suspiciously like Fabio (and probably were Fabio), with flowing locks and impossibly broad shoulders, their shirts perpetually half-ripped open. They always held women with cascading hair and dangerously low-cut dresses, the titles promising tales of Savage Passions or A Heart Aflame. Cheesy? Absolutely. But also…thrilling in a way…