MM Romance Reading Rundown 2019 – 2023

faebell — Mon, 15 Jul 2024 15:40:56 +0000

It’s past time to talk about my reading habits. Because I read. A lot. Of MM Romance. Especially in the last four years I’ve been reading as much as possible. As for what I read, I don’t read high literature, I find that really bores me. Some people have really impressive reading lists full of books of high intellect and powerful prose, but I mostly read romance books. And in 2020 I made a big shift to MM romance from straight romance. I really, really like MM romance more than straight romance for a number of reasons, mostly because it puts the reader outside the relationship, even if the book is written in 1st person.

One of the main reasons I enjoy MM romance more is the way I identify. I am asexual leaning towards majorly demisexual so if I don’t have to picture myself involved in the steamier side of a relationship I really quite like that more. So once I shifted to MM romance the amount of books I read ramped up enormously.

2019 Romance Reading

In 2019 I only read 27 books, but it did mark the first time I subscribed to Kindle Unlimited, a service I have grown to love since so many thousands of books are available on KU and I can read them as I want. Before that I was still buying some books in old school ways but years ago I realized I enjoyed reading books on my phone more than actually holding a physical book so a Kindle Unlimited subscription is really such a good value for me.

In 2019 I read through the Ice Planet Barbarian series that had been published to date, though I bet there are lot more now that I have missed out on. But they are straight and since I shifted to MM Romance it’s very, very hard for me to read straight romance. I have read a few successfully but it’s not easy for me.

2020 and 2021 Are Lies

The graphs on Goodreads would have you believe that from 2020-2021 I didn’t read anything at all. Shock, gasp, what happened, right? Well, that’s not true at all. I wish there was a quantifying tool for ArchiveofOurOwn because I read a ton in 2020, but I didn’t read published books. I read fanfiction voraciously. That’s when I also started writing my own fanfiction under then name faeriebell! I have written over 30 stories within the BTS fandom to varying success. Sope forever! But that’s why my 2020 and my 2021 are pretty empty.

2022 Marked a Shift Toward MM Romance Books

In 2022 I began the shift over from fanfiction. I love fanfiction, really, and my fandom of choice has an almost unending supply of stories. But with all the members going into their compulsory military service I started to distance myself. I did this for emotional reasons. I miss them incredibly much and want to shelter myself from the hurt of reading stories with them doing fun things when I know that they’re possibly doing unpleasant things.

Thus, I started late in the year but I read the whole Captive Prince series including all the short novels by CS Pacat which I love dearly and have reread several times since.

2023 Opened the Floodgates on MM Romance

I read 228 book in 2023, a huge number for me.

Jumping into the MM Romance genre turned out to be great for me. I enjoy romance books, in fact have read them since I was quite young. I was unaware that there was such a prolific world of MM Romance out there for me to enjoy though. After a recommendation to read a few books by Alessandra Hazzard, that’s all it took.

Those books were my true gateway into the mm romance genre. I’d read Captive Prince and a few books by Cat Sebastian but I actually devoured all of the Wrong Alpha series that had been published at the time and then drove straight through the Calluvia’s Royalty series and finally the Straight Guys series.

Then it the floodgates were truly open and I was out of control reading as many mm romance books as I could. I got Covid in early 2023 and during the week or so I was in bed I read nearly 20 MM Romance books. I didn’t really slow down after that.

My friends must have wondered where I went, I stopped writing, disappeared from online places I used to frequent, and sort of went low-contact with a lot of people. But I was just so involved with reading as much mm romance as I could. I also started review MM Romance books on Goodreads and here so I could point out the good and the bad.

How Much MM Romance Am I Reading in 2024?

I’ve posted already that I’m already finished with 120 MM Romance books in 2024. On Goodreads my goal is fairly low goal at 150 books. I already know I’ll surpass that. I’m hoping for something more like 250 but I am a perfectionist and hate to not achieve goals I set for myself so I set my goal pretty low so I would be sure to achieve it.