Mythology and Romantasy: Why Women Devour it—Leading into a Billion-Dollar Industry
By Rachel Van Dyken
Romance has always been a booming industry, add in some mythology and you have another genre that’s completely taking the world by storm—romantasy. What is romantasy? If you’ve been living under a rock over the last two years, stayed away from social media, and for whatever reason haven’t been to a store lately—don’t worry, I got you. A lot of the books that have jumped to the forefront of sales recently have been this very genre.
Romantasy can be anything from space operas (so good) to a mythical world where dragons and Fae exist. Think high fantasy and add in a dose of romance and you have one of the most addicting and best-selling genres out there.
But what makes women (and let’s be honest, men too) devour this genre? What’s so special about it? Honestly, I truly believe that romantasy offers something that we all have needed for quite a while—a complete and total escape into an alternate reality, and not only that, a complete escape into another world that still deals with issues that we deal with today—but provides solutions with strong characters that aren’t willing to back down without a fight.
There is something so attractive about reading a book that you can just let yourself fall into. A recent TikTok trend actually includes people trying to “fall” into their own books and being disappointed that they can’t, it’s obviously a joke but it’s a very huge tell into where we are all at mentally as a society.
And that’s, exhausted.
When reality is exhausting, the most natural place to go for escape is into the written word. Women are often asked to be everything to everyone. A recent survey in the New York Post in 2025 showed that nearly a third of Millennial moms get less than thirty minutes of time to themselves a day. Most women can’t remember a time when they didn’t feel rushed during a meal. The age of women finding time for themselves is sorely lacking, and a lot of that is also attached to guilt of taking time when they have it! Enter the era of reading. Reading isn’t frowned upon, reading is celebrated, reading as an escape is intelligent, brilliant in fact, and it’s something that feels acceptable in a society which often puts females down for both doing too much and not doing enough.
Romance continues to be a billion-dollar industry for a reason. Some of the most prolific romantasy authors out there are former lawyers, CEO’s, doctors. Romantasy is being written by extremely successful, incredible women who have a strong understanding of the underlying pulse of what women want to read. Not only do they know how to write wonderfully romantic and creative romantasy at it’s best—they know how to keep readers coming back for more.
A simple answer to this question would be, why do you read? A simple answer. It makes us happy. We need a lot more happiness and joy in the world. Women deserve a safe space to escape. Women deserve representation in these books (which BIPOC authors do so brilliantly), women deserve a world where they’re allowed to be unapologetically who they are, and that is a beautiful thing.
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About the author: Rachel Van Dyken the #1 New York Times, Wall Street Journal, and USA TODAY bestselling author of regency and contemporary romances. When she’s not writing you can find her drinking coffee at Starbucks and plotting her next book while watching guilty-pleasure TV. To learn more please visit www.rachelvandykenauthor.com
Fallen Gods is a Norse-inspired adult fantasy romance from Rachel Van Dyken, filled with ancient secrets and perilous desire.
The world believed the Gods were myth and the Giants were only stories. They were wrong.
The Gods aren’t dead – they’re merely sleeping, locked in mortal bodies, scattered across the world, waiting for the right spark to wake them. And Rey Stjerne’s father is the most ruthless of them all.
He raised her to obey, to bleed, and to be his blade when the time came. Now, he’s sending her to Endir University, a place steeped in ancient bloodlines and deadly secrets, with one mission: to steal back Mjolnir, the hammer of legend. If she fails, everyone she loves will die.
But Aric Erikson wasn’t part of the plan. He is the enemy’s heir. Distant. Dangerous. And the one person she absolutely cannot afford to fall for. He has closed himself off completely behind a wall of ice, but the more she is ordered to unravel him, the harder it becomes for her to remember where the lies end and who she truly is.
Only a mission she never chose – and a man she was never meant to love – stands between her and a war that will decide the fate of the world.
For fans of sexy romantasy and Neon Gods by Katee Robert, Rachel Van Dyken’s Fallen Gods duology is a steamy, dramatic myth retelling.
‘A must-read’ – Vanessa Williams, award-winning actress and singer
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Category: On Writing
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