I'm uncomfortable with this Onyx Storm thing
I learned the other day that Onyx Storm, the third book in Rebecca Yarros' Fourth Wing series, is the fastest selling adult novel in twenty years. It's impossible for me to be unaware of those books because of my profession but I still somehow managed to be surprised by this. Maybe it's because I'm not on TikTok, but I kept writing the Yarros craze off as a blip and expecting the bubble to burst. The books aren't good, but then again neither is James Patterson and he's a consumate bestseller, so maybe I'm just naive. Still — the success of a giant of the airport paperback genre and the success of an aggressively marketed, allegedly feminist romantasy saga by a previously-unknown author of military romances feel different to me. It's not that people haven't always been reading schlock, it's that they haven't been getting in fistfights in Target over it, you know?
I've talked about this before but my issue with the BookTok craze is how much of it is excessive consumption being presented as some sort of act of feminine reclamation. In the name of self-care, or finding comfort in these unprecedented times, women with purchasing power are being told that what will help them are sprayed edges, exclusive chapters, and fanart endpapers. At the same time, the books they're being sold are of increasingly shitty quality, rushed through manufacturing in god knows where with god knows what kind of labor standards, and being handed to the customer warped, shedding, and missing content. These are not eight dollar paperbacks. These are full price hardcovers, and they're crappy, and people are, I repeat, fighting each other in Target over them.
The other problem, though, and one that feels far more pressing in the wake of the current political situation in the US, is that the whole romantasy/dark erotica boom is feeling more and more like a psyop. I don't mean that literally; I am under no delusion that someone's sitting in a boardroom trying to undermine society through fairy porn or whatever. I do think people are buying these books because they enjoy them and because they relax them or excite them or make them horny or whatever. I am not saying that's not also why I do most things. But... despite steps towards diversity, despite "representation" which is what anyone who votes Democrat is trained to look for in media these days, the heavy hitters in this genre are still selling a really limited heterosexual fantasy. The women are young, beautiful, and spunky; they're possessed of some power they struggle to control, or they've got some talent they must learn to wield; and at some point a mysterious and handsome boy shows up and it becomes a will-they won't-they (they will) where he must tame the cute snarky wild thing and she becomes helplessly attracted to his assertive bitchiness and they make overtures at having actual conflict for ten seconds before fucking a lot.
I don't want to be like this isn't feminist but I don't think this is feminist. I think the reason this kind of romance is so heavily marketed, so hit over our heads repeatedly by publishing companies with a lot of money, is that it is a very profitable and conservative position to take. The women are pretty and likable! They're the protagonists! They're fantasy girlbosses! They probably do some sick fighting or do some magic! They are also, at the end of their story, safely going to end up with a guy who is confidently masculine and larger than them and will give them the dicking they deserve, which is what they've spent the whole story wanting anyway. We spent so long trying to get Disney princesses to have stories without boys in them and yet here we are back at square one, as adults, in the Barnes & Noble checkout line, paying thirty goddamn dollars for Mulan with sex scenes and without the crossdressing.
The other thing that is really bothering me about this is that we're watching the government, in real time, absolutely obliterate actual personal and sexual freedom. They're trying to criminalize transgender people out of existence! They've reverted to talking about gay people in terms of degeneracy! A lot of people in a lot of high places are very, very determined to make sure that American society is only having the kind of sex they want them to have with the kind of people they want them to have it with! And yet. And yet. If I walk into a bookstore today what I'm seeing is a whole lot of "dark romance" about men being threatening and violent and women getting off on it. I don't care what anyone finds hot. I don't care what anyone does in the bedroom. But I do find it deeply unsettling that this is the kind of kink — historically associated with the queer community and "deviant" sexuality! — that big corporate chains are eagerly selling in public. Is it not beneficial to the patriarchal project if women associate fear with excitement? Would a lot of shitty people not be a lot happier if the median American woman was one that found it erotic to be controlled?
Again, this has nothing to do with anyone's Pornhub or AO3 search history. This has nothing to do with what actual people are getting off on doing or having done to them in their actual lives. This is about what mainstream fiction, as directed by publishing houses and societal trends, is finding it profitable and politically advantageous to sell us. I do not give a shit if someone wants to be choked in the bedroom. I do give a shit if some aging conservative cryptofascist finds that fine and dandy but wants to legislate away my ability to be safely gay or transgender. We do not live in a vacuum. We live, regrettably, in a society, and I think we need to consider why certain things in that society are happening.
I really just... keep coming back to the feeling that it is very important that we think critically about why we are doing the things that we do. I think a lot of people are making a lot of money off of us not thinking critically about why we do the things that we do. Personal consumption choices are not going to save the world, but we're also not going to save anything by just doing what we're told, even if it's easy and relaxing and distracting and we feel like we deserve that during societal collapse. I am not trying to yuck anyone's yums, this shit is just freaking me out. I am so, so, so sick of seeing that book!!!!!