It’s just a convenient argument for banning the books that make people happy.

Cross-posted on Substack.

Oh good. The romance-is-garbage discourse has started again. And this time, it’s sponsored by Grammarly! So this feels like a good time to remind everyone that romance is not garbage, and is, in fact, Important with a capital I.

But I want to pause for a moment to address the wildfires in LA. I don’t live in LA, nor have I ever, but I know people who were evacuated. I have friends who have friends who lost everything. And it might sound kind of silly, but I spent so much time researching the city and talking to people who have lived there when I was writing Love Out Loud that I feel a connection, even if it’s only in my mind. (Isn’t that the beauty of literature? That it transports us and connects us?) I think

Evan J Kessler said it best:

This mentality is what inspired me to set Love Out Loud in LA, and it’s why the city worked so well for the story. My main characters are both on the cusp of something new, making art and falling in love, and more than a little delusional to take that leap for themselves. So, no, I don’t have to live there to love everything LA stands for, and my heart breaks for everyone who lost anything.

As I did with hurricane relief, I will be donating a part of my proceeds this month to the American Library Association disaster relief fund. I am also looking for other ways to help (as are many people). If you know of any organizations that need help, please post them in the comments for people to find.

My goal for 2025 was to drink less caffeine. I’ve been downing just about 3 mugs (so 6 cups? I KNOW…) per day.

It is not going well. Between late practices and all-day tournaments, kids coughing through the night or coming home with strep, and a general all-around exhaustion, my mid-day Dunkin run is basically all that is keeping me running. That said, I am trying very hard to make other changes for my health! I’m getting 8,000 steps per day with the help of a treadmill desk attachment I’m using while editing. I brought a standing desk to school, so I’m not sitting as much. I am, ACTUALLY, drinking more water. (Yes. I actually am.) I’m spending my mornings meditating and doing yoga, which has already done wonders for my stress levels. (Why was I waking up early to run, of all things??) I got a bullet journal again, and I’m knitting and sewing and generally doing some things every day that aren’t writing, school, or family related.

Honestly, I feel great with just these simple changes. I almost feel ready to write again. Almost. Because… see above about coughing and strep and caffeine. Thankfully, February gets a little lighter for me, so I anticipate being excited to jump back into my stories when the time comes.

The “smutty romance is corn-with-a-p” and “BookTok books are gross” debate has started up again on Threads. I’ve written about this before, because I’m so ahead of the game. (lol JK, this has been a debate FOREVER), but I’m going to write about it again. This time, it’s because the argument is subtly different. Now, it’s not just about disparaging the things that women typically enjoy. It’s about censorship. And if you’ve been around here for a while, you know I don’t deal well with censorship at all.

What I’m not going to do here is talk about corn-with-a-p. I don’t feel comfortable or knowledgeable doing that. There are plenty of people who can talk much more intelligently about the male gaze and what media is designed for which people and how romance enters that conversation.

But… healthy sexual relationships aren’t gross! In the romance genre, especially, we have media that is, by-and-large, created by marginalized individuals. It celebrates diversity in both body and mind, and explores what having relationships—that sometimes include sex—entails. By nature, then, it generally centers the pleasure of those marginalized individuals. And that is capital-I-important when you are talking about things like purity culture. The realization that you can be attracted to people of multiple genders, or that your body exists for your own pleasure and not someone else’s are powerful ones. Romance facilitates those realizations. Full stop. I cannot tell you how many people have written to me to thank me for my books, saying that they are victims of purity culture, and my books have given them a roadmap and vocabulary to ask for what they want in their relationships. And I think that’s beautiful.

More than that, though—and, as a literature major and teacher, I do feel I can speak knowledgeably and intelligently about this—is that when we start categorizing an entire genre by what generally adds up to only a few pages of explicit content, we are now setting the stage for censorship. Which, of course, is exactly what these people want. Conversations like this are also usually accompanied by hand-wringing iterations of “what about the children?!” which are, in turn, accompanied by retorts of, “the kids know exactly what they are reading, and no one is fooled by an illustrated cover.” (To which I can confidently say that is correct. Some of the books my students most want to talk and write about are the Colleen Hoovers and the Emily Henrys and the like.) But when you start to separate books into gross and not-gross, you’re making it easy for the general public (those outside of the online book communities) to say, “Oh, well those are gross anyway, so who cares if they’re banned?” or for a parent to say, “Well, I have never read this genre, but I’ve heard these things, so my kid will not read it.”

And, hey, I’m not going to tell you how to parent. I do, actually, believe that there is media that is developmentally appropriate (and, therefore, media that is not) at certain ages. But I can promise you that your teen is already talking about these things with their friends, and wouldn’t you want them to have a roadmap that shows them how to have healthy relationships? I do.

But—and this is key—romance can include sex, but it is about so much more than the spice. Characters in romance novels navigate grief, decide to leave crappy jobs, find themselves, push back against societal expectations. They want more out of life than what they’ve had in the past, and they reach out and take it. The sex, in most cases, deepens their intimacy with their romantic partner, but is largely secondary to the other issues these characters deal with. In that way, they not only fall in love with a partner, but they fall in love with themselves and the lives they’ve created. It’s beautiful and heart-wrenching and crucial. It shows readers of all ages that it’s okay to demand better—from relationships, from life, from the world around you. It’s okay for people—women especially—to have agency and control and consent over their lives. In fact, we encourage it.

Not only do these books create a map for readers towards a happier life, but they provide a more fulfilling and flexible career for the multitudes of writers creating them. But, since we as a society are intent on pushing women and other underrepresented creators back into the margins of society, we have to ban books that teach people it’s okay to be happy, and it’s a bonus that it’ll discredit and ruin the businesses of so many writers in the process. Fewer books, fewer writers, fewer people who read these books and start to realize… hey, I don’t have to put up with this. More people buying into the status quo because there’s nothing to tell them they don’t have to.

The problem then is clear: smut is a straw man. It’s an easy way to disparage a genre that teaches marginalized people that pleasure—whether in their relationships or in their lives—is theirs. Happiness is attainable. Your relationships don’t have to be dissatisfying. Your job doesn’t have to suck the life out of you. You can live a happy, fulfilling life outside of the suffocating boundaries of tradition.

Love in the Time of Conversation Hearts is available for pre-order! Grab your Kindle copy now so it’ll be delivered to you on February 1. We’re all going to need a little smut cute Valentine’s Day romance to get us through the rest of this winter, I fear. Just a little candy heart-shaped boost for you!

Pre-Order Now!

Happy first birthday to The Write Choice! (On January 16!) If you haven’t read it yet, what are you eve doing? I won’t say this one is a boost of happiness, but it is maybe the closest published book to my heart. You can read it on Kindle Unlimited or on Audible!

Read The Write Choice

Love Out Loud is officially on submission, and I’m so excited about it! More on that process later.

Don’t forget to subscribe to YouTube! I release new videos every Sunday morning. I’d love to have you along for the ride!

I haven’t been reading much between editing/school/family/busy winter stuff, but I’m looking for a great smutty romance. Preferably one that will rip my heart out. If you’ve got some suggestions, drop them in the comments so we can all read along!

Until next week,
Allie