In a packed room in Sydney, an excited crowd riffles through stacks of stickers and bookmarks searching for their favourite characters. Another group flicks through racks of clothing, pulling out T-shirts that say “romance readers club” and “probably reading about fairies”.
A poster on the wall, with tear-off tabs, invites visitors to take what they need: a love triangle, a love confession mid-dragon battle, a morally grey man or a cowboy.
Half of the tabs have already been taken. This is a pop-up shop for bookish merchandise: visitors already know which tropes they want to go home with.
I’ve come along with my sister, a devoted romance reader, and suddenly found myself amid a vibrant and rich fan community. The pop-up store is held by Books With Jess, an Australian small business that makes handmade book-themed merchandise. The event was advertised to the account’s 23,000 followers on Instagram, and many showed up: the queue outside the warehouse in Chippendale stretches down the block.
It is one of many events that have sprung from Australia’s rapidly growing online book community. Booktok and Bookstagram, on the social media sites TikTok and Instagram respectively, have exploded since the 2020 pandemic and romance and romantasy – a blending of romance and fantasy – are the most popular genres.
The core participants are women in their 20s and 30s who grew up with online fan communities.
One such reader is Jess*, a 25-year-old secondary school teacher from Brisbane who began reviewing romance novels on her Instagram account in 2020.
“I grew up in what we like to refer to as the Wattpad era,” she says, referring to a fan-fiction site. Much of the writing was “pretty terrible,” she says, “but a lot of it was quite romance based and I read so much of that.
“Once I got to university I started reading a little bit more of romance … and I’ve been pretty much reading it ever since.”
She now reads between 200 and 400 books a year. Her Bookstagram has allowed her to connect with other romance readers around Australia and overseas – including her new housemate.
“We initially connected over Instagram and figured out that we were both teachers, both read the same stuff and we’ve met up in person a bunch of times and now we’re about to move in together next year as roommates,” she says.
“I’ve got quite a few friends over in America, Germany and other places who all enjoy the same things so it’s really cool to have someone to talk to about that same passion.”
The online community is a big drawcard of the genre, say cousins Aleyna* and Leyla*. They started their online store, Trilogy of Romance, as a space to celebrate their love of romance novels.
“We noticed that romance – especially darker and trope-driven romance – didn’t always have a dedicated, judgment-free space in traditional bookstores and starting online allowed us to connect directly with readers who shared that passion,” they say in a joint statement.
“The reception has been incredibly positive, we’ve built a loyal, engaged community that supports not just our store but each other.”
Their customers are predominantly women aged from their 20s to 40s who are “very drawn to morally grey characters” – although hockey romance, another subgenre, is also popular.
Dark romance is by far the biggest seller in books and merchandise, they say.
Despite being the fastest growing genre along with science fiction in 2024, according to Neilsen Bookscan data, Australian bookstores do not tend to have stacked romance sections. Outside breakthrough titles – such as romantasy smash hits A Court of Thorns and Roses and Fourth Wing – most romance readers rely on ebooks.
If they want to browse the shelves, they journey to Sydney bookstore Romancing the Novel. The store’s 29-year-old owner, Scarlett Hopper, herself a romance author, says customers have often planned their day around their visit.
Her favourite are those who haven’t picked up a book in years.
“We’ve actually gotten men who don’t read romance but they want to dip their toes in, or they love to read fantasy and they’re like ‘Oh I’ve just read Fourth Wing’ … what can I get into next?” she says.
* Surnames have been withheld
