Writing in a World Obsessed with spice

Have you noticed how every book influencer now promotes new romantasy releases with a spice rating, measured in chili peppers or flames? If a review doesn't include a spice level, scroll to the comments and you'll find readers asking about it or complaining the book was not spicy enough.

When exactly did heat become the primary measure of a romance novel's worth?

I've been thinking about this shift a lot lately, especially as someone who writes romance. There's something unsettling about how we've started rating passion like a commodity and quantifying desire instead of asking whether the story actually moved us.
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You can always tell when an author's heart isn't in it. Those obligatory scenes often blur together. Same choreography, different character names. Whether your story is set in space or Victorian England, everyone seems to be reading from an identical script. The bar keeps shifting, too. What scandalized readers five years ago barely registers now. What was once considered steamy is now labeled "clean" or "vanilla", as if restraint is somehow a creative failure. Publishers push for more, not because stories demand it, but because sales do.
Several years ago, at a girls’ night out right after my first YA fantasy romance released, my friend proudly mentioned my book. One of her friends leaned in and asked, “Oooh, is it spicy?” with a conspiratorial smile. When I said, "No, it's romantic," the table went quiet. Like I'd admitted to writing a cookbook without recipes.

Back then, it stunned me. Spice? In a young adult novel? But that question — once surprising — now feels inevitable. Somewhere along the way, we’ve mistaken explicit scenes for emotional payoff. Yet the most electric romantic tension I've ever read wasn't in bedroom scenes. It was in the almost-touches, the loaded glances, the moment someone finally says what they've been holding back for 200 pages.

It's the same feeling I get when watching a movie. I don't need to see the actors perform the whole act. We all know what happens next. We don't need it choreographed for us like we've never heard of the birds and the bees before.

I know I'm swimming against the current. The market wants what it wants. And even though I might be clutching pearls over here, spice has become so inescapable that every other book is competing to be steamier than the last. You can't recommend a romantasy without someone asking about its heat level. We've reached a saturation point where the absence of spice is seen as a flaw rather than a creative choice. Where a book's worth and success hinges on how many steamy scenes it contains, as if emotional depth, world-building, character development, and actual plot are just garnish on the main dish of explicit content.

I know there are readers out there, quieter ones but no less passionate, who are exhausted by the spice arms race. We're still here, still buying books, still craving stories that don't have to rely on spicy scenes to give you something worth reading. Maybe that's the space I'm meant to occupy, to write for readers who still believe that love, written well, doesn't need to shout to be heard. Who understand that the best spice isn't added for fan service but woven into the fabric of the story itself.
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After all, spice should enhance the dish, not overpower it. And some of us are still hungry for the story underneath.

—Sam ♡

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