About the Book:
After an explosive argument with Oren, Sage finds herself alone in The Stone City. The supernatural capital, hidden behind the temples of Petra, is ancient, beautiful – and corrupt.
Sage must solve a string of murdered vampires, a werewolf’s natural enemy, to secure her place and keep her own deadly secret.
But will Oren, P and the rest of the team get there to help before it’s too late?
Find on Goodreads. Find on Bookshop.org UK (affiliate link).
About the Author:
Amie Jordan is from Salford and studied Film and Media at Manchester Metropolitan University. When she isn’t writing she spends most of her time knitting, having provided bespoke pieces for the costume departments of film, TV and theatre. Her other talents include solving Rubik’s cubes, getting hard knots out of string, and quoting Lord of the Rings start to finish. Amie lives near Manchester city centre with her son and their two cats and two dogs, Marvy, Marmalade, Major and Percy Jackson.
What actually is a love story, though?
Ah, romantasy. You take romance and fantasy, mix ‘em together and what do you get? A portmanteau if you’re fancy… Or ‘y’know, two words smushed together’, if you’re… me.
Romantasy has taken the reading world by storm over the last decade or so, helped along, of course, by the phenomenon of BookTok. But whilst BookTok has aided the genre’s evolution into what it is today, it’s not a new concept. Arguably one of the most hardcore romantasy girlies was Tolkien himself, who upon her death had Lùthien engraved on his wife’s headstone – the name of the female counterpart in what he considered the ultimate love story of Middle Earth, and Edith Tolkien died back in 1971.
I think I probably look towards Twilight as the start of the current boom. Though we hadn’t as a culture yet coined the term Book Boyfriend, the potentially friendship ending debate of Team Edward vs Team Jacob was clearly the start. Thankfully, these days we’ve swapped weird fantasies of consuming our human girlfriends with sexy Bat Boys and the longswords inside both their scabbards and their trousers. No true romantasy girly can claim to be part of The Current Scene if she’s not swooned over the High Lord of the Night Court at least once or twice. Though I confess to be a Rowan Whitethorn diehard myself, even I was swept off my feet by the mountains tattoo’d on Rhysand’s kneecaps – the symbol for centuries of his vow to bow before nobody and nothing but his crown… until he kneels at Feyre’s feet.
Romance has been popular for as long as storytelling has existed; history scattered with great and epic tales. Wuthering Heights. Romeo and Juliet. Anna Karenina. Orpheus and Eurydice. Cleopatra and Marc Anthony. But if we’re honest, the majority don’t end particularly well, do they? To think, we’re actually indebted to Jane Austen for managing to rebel against the norms and steer Elizabeth Bennet and Mr Darcy clear of any suicides, or some other particularly tragic fate.
And I think that’s the real crux of romantasy’s popularity. Everyone loves a good love story of two people willing to die for each other – but we’re just bored of the tragedy of it all. When the only thing we can be assured is truly eternal is death, that’s actually pretty depressing. We want the magic of eternal love in the form of immortal fairies. We want the promise of unbreakable devotion in the form of bonded mates. WE WANT the escapism of a seven-foot muscular hunk that rides a dragon so fearsome it somehow metaphorically implies he’s also an absolute monster in the bedroom… as we close our books for the night and glance dolefully towards the farting, snoring humans we’re really fated to spend our lives with.
Perhaps that’s also why the most infamous Book Boyf’s are covered in sexy, mysterious tattoos. As both an armchair psychologist and a member of The Heavily Tattoo’d Community myself it’s an observation I find fascinating. Due to my own coverage, I admittedly forget how much their perpetuity unnerves the tattoo-less until somebody asks whether I’m scared I’ll ever regret them. But the reality is that for people like me, to get to this point it’s already been a very intentional decision made knowing the life-long commitment. There is no going back. Their permanency leaves no room for regrets. Me and my tattoos are in this for life now, together forever. You see where I’m going with this analogy, right?
So, quick recap. If we’re debating what makes a good love story we’ve got strong contenders so far in gravestone engravings and double suicides… But we’ve also established it’s all so bloody depressing. Therefore instead, I’m pitching a different train of thought. Dictionary.com defines love as ‘a strong feeling of warm personal attachment or deep affection’ which is actually pretty broad, and Thesaurus.com offers synonyms including ‘fondness’ and ‘respect’. It also listed another word that might surprise you, because whilst BookTok (and a small minority of my negative reviews) do have a tendency to imply a good love story is nothing without pages and pages of obscenely graphic sex scenes, there are other types of love that exist. Another synonym offered was ‘friendship’.
History is also littered with platonic love stories: Damon and Pythias. Hamlet and Horatio. Alexander and Hephaestion. Sherlock Holmes and Dr Watson. Percy Jackson and Grover. And look at that – not a single reactionary suicide in sight! Sure, hearts break when death is involved, but Alexander the Great ordering an extravagant funeral pyre upon the death of his childhood bestie seems a much more rational response. Granted, as Hamlet lies dying Horatio does have a momentary wobble, but quickly rallies as Hamlet insists he live on to tell their tale. Which to be honest, is a far more relatable endeavour. And whilst Horatio didn’t describe Hamlet as ‘lighting up every room he entered’ as we’re obliged to be described in the social media tributes caused by our premature passing, in Ye Olde speak it’s all close enough.
But in my humble opinion tales of platonic pairs are also more encouraging. Marlin never would’ve found Nemo had Dory not kept reminding him to just keep swimming every time his faith waivered. Piglet is never as brave as when Winnie holds out his hand. Frodo wouldn’t have gotten very far without Sam. And everyone knows there’s no place in this world more encouraging than a group chat of besties egging each other on (no matter how unhinged the drama) with ‘Exactly!’ followed by a carefully curated selection of emojis. Men coined the ol’ adage bros before hoes, but all men know the true reality: the moment they end up on blast in that group chat it’s Game Over. There’s no recovery from that kind of loyalty rallying en masse.
So this is my theory. Romantasy has become so popular because it embodies a devotion we all inherently crave, taught to us in the epic love stories of old. But often they are just that, stories, and the harsh reality is that Hinge is a cesspit where such devotion is likely unattainable. And we’re sick of it. So we mixed it with fantasy to utilise the magic and craft perfection that lasts forever. And, granted, now we’re all having a great time. But I’m just saying that in doing so I think we overlooked something precious. Something we already had. Platonic love often already offers almost everything we crave from romantic love. We just take it for granted.
And I know some of you will still say, ‘But Romantasy is ROMANTIC love, the clue’s in the name.’ And sure. Maybe I am slightly clutching at straws to make my point. Maybe I’m just an author that wrote a romantasy series, but by the end knew that the most important person, the one who really got my main character through the hardest, most traumatic moments of her life, wasn’t her love interest but her best friend. Perhaps I know that nobody will ever get it for me, whatever it may be, more than my best mate. Not even my own boyfriend.
Don’t get me wrong, none of this is to poo-poo all over romantasy as a genre, or the concept of romance entirely (I love my boyfriend, Ben, dearly). Despite my scathing commentary above it’s all said in jest. If look at my kneecaps you will find mountains tattoo’d there. And on my arm there’s a B in a love heart. There forever.
(For what it’s worth though, my best friend is also called Bea. So I guess it’s for you to decide what that B ultimately represents.)
Thank you, Amie!
#UKYASpotlight 
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