[Ads-l] Word: Romantasy - literary genre blending romance and fantasy (with eroticism)

[ADSGarson O'Toole]

The romantasy genre is achieving new heights of popularity. This
portmanteau word appeared in the following recent article:

Website The New Yorker newyorker.com
Article: Did a Best-Selling Romantasy Novelist Steal Another Writer’s Story?
Author: Katy Waldman
Date: January 6, 2025
https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2025/01/13/did-a-best-selling-romantasy-novelist-steal-another-writers-story

[Begin excerpt]
In 2020, Maas's publishers changed up their marketing strategy,
causing the series to be rehomed in the adult section. "It birthed
this genre of romantasy," Cassandra Clare, the author of the
best-selling fantasy series "The Mortal Instruments," told me, "which
to me is books that contain a lot of the tropes that make Y.A. popular
but also have explicit sex in them."
[End excerpt]

I searched x-twitter to find early instances. I found different
meanings assigned to the word. For example:

X-Twitter handle: Mike Thomas Kelly @ramablahblah
Timestamp: 6:55 PM, Sep 21, 2008
https://x.com/ramablahblah/status/929753548

[Begin tweet]
Romantasy.2nd rate sex shop? Or roman costume store?
[End tweet]

The earliest tweet I saw which corresponded to a literary genre was this:

X-Twitter handle: Sybil @redwyne
Timestamp: 5:15 PM, Apr 10, 2008
https://x.com/redwyne/status/786736329

[Begin tweet]
New blog post: DUCKFLASH: Jean Johnson's Romantasy News
http://tinyurl.com/6fj3f6
[End tweet]

The tweet above is ambiguous, but the link points to an article that I
think displays the desired sense of "romantasy". The article indicates
that "romantasy" is used as a genre label in Germany. This article is
importing the term into English.

Website: The Good, The Bad, The Unread
Article: DUCK FLASH: Jean Johnson’s Romantasy News
Author: BevQB
Timestamp on website: April 10, 2008 at 4:15 pm
http://goodbadandunread.com/2008/04/10/duckflash-jean-johnsons-romantasy-news/

[Begin excerpt]
Anyway, for those of you who speak German, the website for the imprint
is http://www.penhaligon.de and the website for my book in particular
is: http://www.randomhouse.de/book_new/edition.jsp?edi=280654...and
they've labeled it "Romantasy"...which I think is a particularly good
way of describing the genre for the SoD series!
[End excerpt]

[Begin excerpt]
Don’t you just love that label, ROMANTASY? It’s perfect for these
surprisingly sexy Sword-and-Sorcerer-lite books. My favorite part
about these books? The characters actually use the bathroom! In fact,
in book 1, The Sword, Saber and Kelly bond over a mutual bout of
raging diarrhea. No, seriously!
[End excerpt]

Garson

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