Dark romance is a new sub-genre that was heavily popularized through the internet, and involves discussion and sexualization of darker topics, including murder, torture, rape, kidnapping, abuse, sexual assault, and other criminal acts. Dark romance was made popular through BookTok, an online community of readers on the social media platform TikTok. At the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic, BookTok became wildly popular and began recommending and popularizing dark romance novels such as Haunting Adeline by H.D. Carlton, and many other romance novels, including the works of Colleen Hoover, Ruby Dixon, and Ali Hazelwood. In this thesis, I trace the history of the romance genre and the history of dark romance and argue that the Gothic romance and many adaptations of Gothic classic novels have contributed to the rise of dark romance. I then analyze a few of the most popular dark romance novels, including Haunting Adeline by H.D. Carlton, Hooked by Emily McIntire, Butcher & Blackbird by Brynne Weaver, and The Predator by RuNyx. Finally, I present a collection of some oft-repeated criticisms of dark romance made by users on various social media platforms, including YouTube, TikTok, and X, and refute each argument. My thesis argues that while dark romance has been demonized and heavily criticized on social media, to the point that some users call for censorship of the entire genre, there are many reasons why readers would enjoy such a genre. I also refute the idea that dark romance has a lasting negative effect on readers.
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Dark romance is a new sub-genre, unlike anything seen in the romance genre before. It is gritty, passionate, violent, and has a rabid fanbase on the internet. One of the main goals for this thesis is to provide a definition and discussion of dark romance. I begin with a literature review, detailing the different ways romance novels and dark romance have been discussed over time, and then define dark romance as a sub-genre of romance novels that deals with dark topics that are not widely accepted by the romance community. Some of these topics include extreme violence, sexual assault, murder, kidnapping or captivity, dubious consent to sexual activity, and generally, sexual activity that involves kink or power dynamics is included. These topics are particularly dark, and because of this, some might see their inclusion as antithetical to a romance plot. (1)
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A very popular dark romance category is dark retellings. There are many of these, ranging from Disney movie retellings to classic Greek Myths retold in a modern cityscape. (32)
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The themes of murder and kidnapping are present in many romance novels, but in dark romance, the reader is supposed to find the MMC murdering for the FMC to be erotic and romantic. Even more controversial, the MMC sometimes rapes the FMC in these novels, and the readers are supposed to find this romantic and hot, as a sign that he loves her so much he cannot restrain himself. This specifically is what drives some readers away from dark romance, as sometimes they can excuse murder if they deem it necessary, but rape of the FMC is often only supposed to happen if a villain gets a hold of her, and it’s devastating to the FMC. Instead, the MMC of these stories often is the villain, and he certainly gets hold of the FMC, and they live happily ever after, as is required by the genre. (33)
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Many dark romances are on the lighter side to appeal to the broadest audience to sell their books. The darkest romance readers are a niche group, and the mainstream romance consumer might be willing to read a lighter dark romance novel, but be completely alienated by the darkest romance novel. (37)
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There is a generalization that dark romance novels have the most sex scenes out of all other romance subgenres. The numbers presented here do not show that these dark romance novels have that many more sex scenes, though the general average of the numbers presented here are slightly higher in the dark romance category. (41)
Here's the abstract:
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