Hello all! I'm so excited that you have joined the Fantasy and Sci-Fi with a Side of Romance Quest! As it says in the description, my goal for this quest is to highlight SFF books that have a delicious romance, without it being the main driver of the story. When I was selecting books for this quest, I tried to ask myself, if the romance plot line was removed, would I still enjoy the story? I tried to create a list that would include a variety of SFF subgeneres, including books that maybe aren’t as popular on Pagebound yet. If it’s part of a series, only the first book is included. I encourage you to please suggest additional books for this quest and I will add more periodically. This is my absolute favorite niche in the SFF genre so selfishly this quest is also a way for me to learn about new (and old) books y’all recommend! Have fun!💞

Hi! Unfortunately the fall and winter are just hard for me due to losses I have to live with, and I’m hoping to read some books where the characters are going through the same. It has helped me in the past :) I’m also looking to explore more genres but if you got romance with a grief subplot I’d love to hear it too!!

I want to read some dystopian fiction, so give me your recommendations, please. I've already read The Hunger Games and its prequels, 1984, and Brave New World, and I have The Handmaid's Tale, though I haven't read it yet, haha. So please recommend me more dystopian novels, especially those that aren't as well-known but that you believe are 5-star books.

Idk if this is me reading too many white American/Scandinavian novels, but why is every white character blonde/ginger??? I'm white, but I live in Greece, and I imagine almost every character with brown hair and brown eyes, which let me mention, is extremely common! And then boom, his 'blond curls' bc he's an extremely beautiful white man, and he can't have plain common brown hair I'm currently reading as the earth turns silver, which is a beautiful book right, but the fmc is constantly talking about how dark the chinese's mmc's eyes are, and how dark his hair is, as if she's never seen anyone with dark hair in her life. And like I get it, you have to mention that difference somehow, and like she yearns for him based on his eye color in ways I've never seen but come on 😭😭 You live in a racist country in the 1910s, I'm sure the thing that surprises you most isn't that he's brown haired and brown eyed (special mention here, the emphasis is on them being /black/). I get him being confused that she's a ginger and calling her a red demon woman, but I don't buy for a second /her/ fascination 😭 I feel like every book I read lately where poc characters are involved is constantly talking about their 'dark' color palettes and their dark hair and dark eyes. And idk, it's weird, it makes me feel weird, I get it, they're not white, they're not /blond/. Might be a diversity issue, not everyone can have brown hair when all the mcs are white right? Do they think /thats/ diversity?? But it's always like, they're not white bc they have 'the darkest eyes the MC has seen and it's so exotic'!!! Like??? Please talk about something else, there are so many other beautiful ethnic features that never get mentioned (now that I remember in as the earth turns silver only his more 'western' features get special attention, like his stronger nose, and his height, TELL ME ABOUT HIS EYES OR HIS JAWLINE OR SMTH WHY DO YOU TRUST ME TO IMAGINE THE ETHNIC FEATURES MYSELF WHILE GOING INTO GREAT DETAIL FOR THE 'WHITE' ONES???? ig in this one I get it bc the FMC has a lot of racist bias, it's her rationalizing the fact that she's attracted to a 'chinaman', but it happens so often in other works of fiction it makes my skin crawl) Idk, might just be me, but blond white ppl jumpscare me. If it's a romance especially, I just pretend they don't exist

The prompts for this yearly event just dropped. Can we start a recs thread for all of these prompts here? I'll add the prompts below as well so you don't have to click over. AAPI Author Sapphic Knights Ace or Aro Sapphics Indie or Small Press Author Manga, Comic, or Graphic Novel Transfem MC 2025 Release Translated Work Disabled Sapphics Toxic Yuri Choose Your Own Prompt* Book From Your Physical TBR* New or New to You Author Poetry or Nonfiction Sci-fi 40+ MC *Obviously you can't really give recs for these categories. I have created a list so we can see all the recs with clickable links in one place!

i don't seek out romance, but most fantasy books have some sort of romantic trope or the other and i'm curious what everyone's favorite/least favorite tropes are! i'm reading a book right now leaning heavily into a miscommunication trope between two of the protagonists and it has reminded me of just how much i absolutely hate this trope (but i'm still eating it up, so do i really hate it??). i love any kind of yearning in a novel <33

Do you have a favourite/least favourite narrative pov and tense ? And does it impact your decision to read a book? I've started Arcana Academy, and immediately sighed at the 1er person/present tense; my least favourite combo. I'll read it anyway but it does bother me and takes me longer to get into. I often find those a bit cringe when I read a blurb, and I'm not certain it hasn't made me put down a book at the bookstore