Supernatural Romance; Ok I get it now.

Supernatural romance was a genre that used to confuse me. 

‘Why,” I thought, “Ruin a perfectly good monster book with abs?” 

I’d been a part of the Twilight hate crowd when the book got so big you were required to have an opinion. I read the first book and felt deeply conflicted. It didn’t help that it was the first book I had read where romance was the main plot, not a subplot. Amongst the creepy stalking, the mortal and supernatural boys falling all over themselves to get to the new girl, and the sheer lack of vampire content that mattered to me, I was still drawn to the idea of Edward. I liked the idea of someone with intense eyes who found the reader’s stand-in absolutely irresistible.

What changed?

I have always loved the lore and legends of the supernatural, as much as some gals love true crime. I am a mythology buff and will give a read to almost anything that captures that sense of wonder. That was how I stumbled across the Mercy Thompson series. 

I was recommended the series by my then-crush. I picked up the first book and was immediately swept up in the world of a coyote shifter mechanic with a fae mentor, a vampire buddy, and a charismatic pair of werewolves interested in her. It took a reread through the series for me to see how much everyone was falling head over heels for Mercy because the majority of the plot was so interesting and touched on so many tidbits of lore and fairytale that I got lost in it. As urban fantasy romances go there is a heck more urban fantasy in the Mercy Thompson series than average. It even has power escalation. 

But it was finding the Mystic Bayou series that solidified my understanding of the appeal of supernatural romance. The Mystic Bayou series does not have a single protagonist. It is built around a community. It has more found family and true love elements than even fanfiction I’ve tracked down and that’s saying a lot since found-family is my favorite trope in any type of fiction. It was this series that showed me the appeal is not merely the sexiness of fast-healing creatures, or even the relative youth of the long-lived. It is the sense of belonging.

So Where Does That Leave Me?

I have sampled the appeal in other series. Even when they have the previously mentioned traits in troves, the main appeal still comes down to a sense of belonging. From a man who accidentally gets a harem of sexy vampires who dote on him to the community of gruff protectors a werewolf pulls around her because of who she is, supernatural romance asserts that who you are is not only something you should not be ashamed of, but that being is the very thing that makes you belong, and makes people feel they belong with you. 

So I am sorry, Supernatural Romance, for the crap talk I have given over the years. And I am sorry for the complaints that all you have is unnecessary sexiness. You give people a place where they feel like they belong(for me that is the library so much I once got locked in). And I have no right to get in the way of the peace people can get from that…or in the way of the sexiness if that’s your thing. You have a lot to offer. So thank you Supernatural Romance. I get it now.