There’s a boom in romance bookstores. More than 20 of them have sprung up around the United States in the past few years — up from just two in 2020 — and more are on the way.

They have quirky names like the Ripped Bodice, Tropes & Trifles, Love’s Sweet Arrow, and Kiss & Tale. They’re sprinkled across the country, from Alaska to Maine. They’re largely owned and operated by women, and have become vibrant community hubs for romance fans.

As a reporter who covers publishing, I’ve been following the soaring sales for romance, which is by far the top-selling fiction genre. But the arrival of brick-and-mortar romance stores struck me as something new, and surprising.

For a story in The Times, I visited romance stores in South Florida and Brooklyn, and talked to booksellers, publishers and fans of the genre, to find out why romance bookstores are suddenly thriving.

How readers fell for romance

Romance writers and their fans point out that, about a decade ago, there wasn’t much enthusiasm for the genre in independent bookstores. Even though romance has long been a major moneymaker for publishers, the literary world tended to look down on it as frothy and unserious, or worse, as smut.

Rebecca Zanetti told me that after she started publishing paranormal romance in 2011, it was hard for her to book a signing at a store, even though her novels were best sellers.

“Back when I started out, you’d go into a small local bookstore and they might not even have a romance section, and if I said I wrote romance, they weren’t interested,” Zanetti said.

The current romance craze traces to the early days of the pandemic, when millions of people were stuck at home, bored and anxious, and rediscovered their love of reading. Book sales spiked in 2020 and 2021, and romance in particular saw a steep and sustained rise. Its appeal during times of turmoil and uncertainty is obvious: Romance novels offer comfort and escape, and the stories often land on what fans call an “H.E.A.” — a Happily Ever After.

Many who turned to romance during the pandemic seem to have kept up the habit. Print sales of romance books more than doubled in the last few years, from 18 million copies in 2020 to 39 million in 2023.

On her most recent tour, Zanetti had events at three different romance bookstores in Southern California. And she said a new one — called It’s A Love Story — had just opened in her hometown, Hayden, Idaho.

Judgment-free zones

The new crop of romance bookstores look and feel different from your typical local independent shop. They carry thousands of books in every conceivable romantic subgenre — historical, L.G.B.T.Q., young adult, romantic suspense, supernatural, romantasy, sports-themed romance — and many carry a wide selection of self-published novels that mainstream booksellers don’t stock. Some customers I spoke to said that they loved being able to shop without feeling judged for their tastes, and that booksellers were happy to steer them toward whatever they fancy: secret billionaire romance, B.D.S.M. erotica, Sapphic vampire romance, polyamorous hockey romance.

A lot of the stores have an unabashedly feminine aesthetic. They are heavy on pink and floral motifs, with bright signs and merchandise that riff on familiar romance tropes — enemies to lovers, forced proximity, forbidden love, secret identity, fake relationships. They’ve become hubs for romance fans, not just to buy books but also to gather for book clubs, writing workshops, trivia contests and cheekily themed craft nights.

Melissa Saavedra, owner of Steamy Lit in Deerfield Beach, Fla., said that even though romance sales were soaring, fans and writers still needed dedicated spaces and more recognition from the publishing world.

“Even though it is the best-selling genre in fiction,” Saavedra told me, “we still have to fight tooth and nail for people to respect the genre.”

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