It may have taken a Young Adult genre explosion called Twilight – for which legions of grown women lined up to buy – to draw attention to a staggering surge in a sub genre to the science fiction/fantasy/romance world called “Paranormal Romance”, but according to the numbers, the genre is more popular than ever among both dreamy teens and libidinous adults.
What the hell is it? Well, it’s contemporary mythical fantasy that usually involves a hot female mortal and her interactions with otherworldy creatures or creatures out of legend. Often we are talking vampires, but also werewolves, good old fashioned ghosts, faeries, gods and goddesses, demons, telepaths and angels. What will be the new vampire? My money is on demons. Â
In these urban fantasies, the heroine will fall in love with her future (soul) mate – generally a diabolically attractive paranormal being – at first site. After the concupiscent professions of undying love and romancing come the high adventure and the fending off of the bad guys. There is a mandatory happily ever after where the lovers end up married, or at least bonded for life. I can see how Paranormal Romance is a more accessible genre for readers unfamiliar or uncomfortable with the dreary trappings of “Science Fiction” or “Fantasy”. At their core, books like “Little Red and the Wolf” and “Millionaire Vampire” are more romance than fantasy – but grittier, more actual sex, less the romance of sex, and between a mortal and non mortal. Which really is just a new twist on the same old bad boy hero. Only this bad boy will love you forever.
The Romance Fiction genre generated a mind boggling $1.36 billion in sales in 2009. To put that in perspective. The old fashioned Mystery genre generated $688 million, and the even more old fashioned Classic Literary Fiction a mere $446 million. The growth of the Urban Fantasy/Paranormal Romance sub sets books sales have been staggering, finding a larger readership than any other sub sets of Science Fiction or straight up Romance/Fantasy. And the variety of work being published uner the banner of Paranormal Romance shows no sign of diminishing anytime soon.
The reigning queen of the Paranormal Romance explosion is Sherrilyn Kenyon, who has in print 17 million copies of her books in 34 countries. Her Dark Hunter series had a staggering ten #1 rankings on the New York Times bestseller list in two years. Kenyon is also interesting for having endured a hardscrabble life including a laundry list of humiliating jobs and living in her car. She is also severely dyslexic and writes her books in less than 6 months. Like it or not, Sherrilyn Kenyon is arguably one of the most popular and prolific authors in America today.
Suffice to say, Paranormal Romance is anything but undead….
