You're Missing Out If You Think You're Too Good for Horny Dragon Books
Despite the wild success of books like Fourth Wing, the romantsy trend has been cast as unserious, unintellectual smut. I'm here to tell you it's not.
ByJackie Jennings
Hey, you: News-reading, politically-conscious, thinking woman. Have you ever had fun at a non-Disney theme park? Do you sometimes choose a frozen pizza over a fresh one? Have you ever ordered a Coors Lite because you wanted a Coors Lite? Then you should try horny dragon book Fourth Wing by Rebecca Yarros. Despite its wild success, it has been cast as unserious, unintellectual smut. But I say to you now: I am a smart woman and I refuse to be shamed for my horny dragon books.
What is Fourth Wing? Truly so glad you asked. It is book one in the The Empyrean Series which follows the adventures of Violet Sorrengail, a cadet at Basgiath War College. Basgiath is a very dangerous and intensely sexy place where smoking hot twenty-somethings learn to ride dragons and also get eaten out so masterfully by their impossibly hot boyfriend, that they almost light their dorm on fire (with magic).
The book has been a New York Times bestseller for nearly 40 weeks, sitting at number one for much of that time. It’s part of the rise of romantasy, a portmanteau coined to describe romance novels in a fantasy setting. It, along with other genre juggernauts like Sarah J. Maas’s A Court of Thorns and Roseshas helped #romantasy and #romanticfantasy videos rack up hundreds of millions of views on TikTok. These books are a whole, undeniable thing.
Yet, there’s a specific undercurrent to all the reviews and coverage of the romantasy trend. There are think pieces that alternate between wondering, “Do these books have value?” and “How did this happen?!?” It all feels like the first time Kim went to the Met Gala and the whole fashion world was like, “Hiiiii Kiiiiiiim!!!! Who the fuck let you in?????”
This is unfortunate because, for femme nerds, these books are the best thing. I grew up collecting X-Files trading cards. My “look” in high school was hair dyed black to look like Arwen from The Lord of the Rings. And, for most of my life, I read what dominates fantasy and science fiction: stories with male protagonists, written by male authors, featuring lots of violence and almost no kissing.
Thankfully, that landscape has been changing. With the rise of rock stars like N.K. Jemison, Charlie Jane Anders, and Nnedi Okorafor the genre is, thankfully, decolonizing and queering. The unbridled, mainstream success of books like Fourth Wing is a part of that work. The accessibility and broad appeal of romantasy are like a portal, beckoning uninitiated readers to enter the realm of speculative fiction. Truly, what could be bad about this? Why aren’t we all jumping for nerdy joy that more people are reading more books? To be fair, I think many readers/nerds are. But naturally, anytime women are having fun, gathering in large numbers, and talking about sex and/or magic, we’ve got to worry, right?
Speculative fiction is a space that has been gate-kept forever. Case in point, this NYT review of the Game of Thrones premiere: “While I do not doubt that there are women in the world who read books like Mr. Martin’s…I have never met a single woman who has stood up in indignation at her book club and refused to read the latest from Lorrie Moore unless everyone agreed to ‘The Hobbit’ first.”
That review was written in 2011. The Affordable Care Act had already been passed; America was ready to dabble in socialized medicine before it was ready to admit that girls might like dragons. But now we have books for us–“us” being anyone who sometimes wants their magic to exist alongside sex, feelings, and friendships. So why are so many women embarrassed to like these books?
When my podcast, Breathing Fire, produced episodes about Fourth Wing I got so many DMs from women confirming they all felt this shame. They loved the books but were kind of embarrassed to admit it. And I was right there with them. I would hesitatingly recommend ACOTAR or The Fourth Wing to friends. We’d talk about the books in whispers on the playground like my three-year-old might hear me and say, “Whoa, mom, you read slutty magic books?”
But I’m not sure we can lay the blame entirely at the feet of critics and naysayers. In fact, I wonder if it’s really all about the books. Sure, maybe we’re ashamed because romantasy is coded as smutty and unserious. Or maybe we just loathe the term romantasy (can’t say I love it). But maybe we’re actually ashamed because reading these books is an act of pure, female pleasure.
Ever since women were allowed to have sex for reasons beyond procreation (starting, like, thirty minutes ago) it’s evolved the way we experience and talk about our bodies. Maybe now we need to work on our brains. I think our minds, like our bodies, need more than baby-making missionary. Not that literary fiction is missionary! Or that missionary is bad!! But maybe only missionaryreading leaves something to be desired. We need literary reverse cowgirl, mental masturbation, a rim job of the mind. We need fantasy in our intellectual landscape, whatever that looks like for you.
Hard fantasy is rarely taken seriously as literature, so none of this is totally new. And there’s probably a healthy dose of good old-fashioned elitism at work, too. Rebecca Yarros doesn’t have an MFA, lives in Colorado, and pre-Fourth Wing, she was a contemporary romance author. So maybe it’s understandable to wonder how this book about dragons, written by a romance author in the middle of the country, became the biggest mainstream hit in recent memory. But when you add historical gate-keeping to this general side-eyed examination, who could help but internalize the idea that these books are something smart women should be embarrassed to like?
So you should read these books because they are fun. Because they are good. Because reading can be for pure pleasure without qualifications or apologies attached. Go ahead and love these books out loud. Talk about them at the playground–let the youths hear! Give them as gifts and force your stuck book club to try something fun for once. Proclaim your appreciation for a fictional finger blasting so mind-melting, that it’s dangerous to everyone in a five-mile radius.
