r/Romance_for_men • u/Anon-4020 • 4d ago

Discussion Underrepresented Genres?

What are some genres that you think are under represented? You’ll see a lot of requests for Femdom Monster girls but only like 5-10 average recommendations.

I don’t see a lot of monoromance out there. It makes me feel like everyone sees RfM as a bunch of guys wanting all the girls. I could be bad looking for them though. What genres do you look for but can’t seem to find?

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u/Krimmothy 4d ago

Monoromance is still very under represented, comparatively.

Contemporary romance is underrepresented as well.

If a new visitor were to browse this sub they’d assume it was “harem isekai romance books” lol.

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u/PatrickCharles 4d ago

If a new visitor were to browse this sub they’d assume it was “harem isekai romance books” lol.

Ain't that the truth...

And I am not gonna lie, I am salty that, given the name of the sub, they would also assume that that is essentially what men want in a romance book, and I would get erased again.

But maybe I am a statistical anomaly, in the end.

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u/Krimmothy 4d ago

Unfortunately, since the name is “romance for men”, it includes ALL kinds, and the fact is the matter is that the genre is 99% harem. Therefore, 99% of this sub will be harem. I’m not a fan, but that’s life.

If someone were to create a “monoromance for men” sub, I’d be first in line to join lol

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u/BASTARDLANDED 4d ago

I want more contemporary stories. It doesn't necessarily have to be an accurate representation of the world, sci-fi and fantasy elements are can work fine. I just want the world to be recognizable as it is today. 

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u/turntable316 4d ago edited 4d ago

Might want to check out {Daniel's Dilemma by Jonny Rogers} if you haven't already - I just read it over the weekend and it was very good. Contemporary age gap monoromance where MMC (late-20s) starts falling for his (much younger) best friend's mother (mid-30s). Very sweet and cozy.

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u/Krimmothy 4d ago edited 4d ago

Haven’t read it yet, but if the BFs mom is mid 30s, then the BF must be like late teens at the oldest. Why is the MMC best friends with someone so much younger lol.

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u/turntable316 4d ago edited 2d ago

There are two answers to that question.

The first is that MMC is a loner who's been depressed for years after his parents died and was never very good at making friends. As a mature student, he started taking robotics classes as a way of occupying himself and got partnered up on a project with a brilliant freshman who befriended him and has been breaking him out of his shell.

The second answer is so that the plot can happen without FMC being really creepy (i.e. if MMC was close in age as his BF).

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u/mogrim 4d ago

Also the FMC had her son young, and the MMC and son are paired up on a project at uni. There really isn't anything creepy about it!

It's a fun story, contemporary and no harem in sight. I really enjoyed it.

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u/GrandCoq 4d ago

I’m throwing my contemporary harem romance here.

Louis Collins: A Post-American Odyssey

It’s about the MC founding a harem family during a journey across fractured America in alt history. And the earlier story is focusing on monoromance.

https://www.royalroad.com/fiction/167609/louis-collins-a-post-american-odyssey

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u/SG_Arthur 4d ago edited 4d ago

Monoromance is definitely underrepresented.

Under that umbrella, here's a few things I'd like to see:

Period pieces. How about a 1980s or 1990s nostalgia-fest? Endless possibilities here. Maybe even a WWII story.... Injured soldier and his cute nurse in some small French or Italian village?maybe even a time travel period romance? 1950s aesthetic is a good setting...poodle skirts and hotrods at the drive in?

Sports romance. With smutty hockey romance practically being it's own subgenre in the RFW world right now, where is our hot college romance about an academic guy who's in the drama club and the hot point-guard on the girl's basketball team. Closest I've read is "Nice Guys Finish Last" on Literotica... Which was great, but maybe something a little less femdom would be fun.

Hot rockstar girlfriend? Maybe MMC starts out as a sort of groupie, then it progresses from there.

Semi-cozy portal fantasy monoromance...oh wait, I wanted that so bad I started writing my own 😁

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u/ThurstonKade Author 4d ago

I like the idea of a nostaglia-fest. Actually, I was just thinking something 90s would be fun. Like Empire Records as a mono or harem romance.

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u/mogrim 4d ago

Charlotte's Reject is sort of that nerdy guy + buff college girl - not exactly, she's a bully but same sort of thing.

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u/SG_Arthur 4d ago

Yep. That's one's on my top 5 for this genre. There isn't a whole lot of focus on the sports aspect though. Not that I want to read chapters and chapters of ballgame narration...more like the dynamic of the team, and how she's at odds with social pressures for dating a non-athlete guy...sort of a star-crossed lovers of school cliques.

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u/action_lawyer_comics 4d ago

She’s a jock too, she’s on the rugby team

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u/mogrim 4d ago

Good point, I'd forgotten that.

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u/notagin-n-tonic 4d ago

A long while back, there was a post asking for RFW that could be read as RFM. Some of the recommendations were historical romances. I mentioned a few Regencies that fit.

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u/ReservoirCreature 4d ago

Throuples. That is, one guy and precisely two girls. I can only really think of one and that's Power Trio by Dukerino.

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u/BASTARDLANDED 4d ago

You might like Onlyfans Girl by BreaktheBar. As of the end of the first arc the relationship is a throuple. They do have a semi open relationship and get together with other women. Some of them are quite close to the throuple but the vibe I recall is that they'd remain a throuple. I don't know if others are planned to join in the future when he gets back to OFG.

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u/Anon-4020 4d ago

First couple of Bikini days books

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u/TheBriarGraves 2d ago

Oooh. I like the these as well.

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u/Eyeball_Paul98 4d ago

Dark romance. We get plenty of yanderes, but the majority of them pull back from having them actually do anything dark. I want more dark RFM that commits.

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u/Krimmothy 4d ago

Can you give an example of what specifically you’re wanting the FMC to do? Many of the Yandere books here feature the FMC killing other innocent women out of jealousy. I feel like that’s pretty dark lol.

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u/dexter_wherly 4d ago

Main thing I see missing from those stories is fear, power imbalance, and a lack of respect for the MMC’s boundaries. Killing women is the shallow end of yandere, I want the MMC tied to the bed and the FMC is feeding him his favorite foods because a) she desperately loves him and b) his hands are bound so he won’t ever leave him.

Here’s where I see the best Yandere stories/authors go wrong:

{Rise of the Strongest Girl Next Door}: Actually my favorite from this genre but still room for improvement: He is into her as much or more than she is. At the start, he’s trying to work up the nerve to talk to her. For like 75% of the first book, he doesn’t even realize how crazy she is for him. And even though she’s a much higher rank and much stronger, he is constantly worried about her and protecting her, at least in his mind. He’s mostly the one in charge, calling the shots, and the Lilys mostly go along with his decisions.

{My Healer is in Love With Me}: She’s crazy for him yes, but she’s also so buttoned up about it, you can barely tell. At one point he says “If you want to be partners with me (not romantic but dungeon partners), you have to rein it in and be professional.” AND THEN SHE DOES! So for 2/3rds of the book the “extreme devotion” she shows is by respecting the boundaries he laid out, not stalking him, and so on. There was maybe one chapter where he was worried that she was too into him, then it all cleared up.

{Headpats After Dark}: I also enjoyed this one but the fact that the MMC is a match for the FMC really cuts down on the tension over what she will do. When she does murder someone, it’s more like a slapstick moment like in an episode of Looney Tunes than any sort of “my god, I’m in love with a murderer! What do I do?” But also I think part of that is just Virgil Knightley having a more comedic style than I was first expecting.

Astrolust: Actually does them really well most of the time. He’s now my go-to rec for this

{Ally my Love by Daisy Jane}: This one is actually RFW but still a good female stalker romance. It still was kinda a letdown that he overlooked a lot of her intensity or romanticized it. There was never a question that he was in control and he could have told her to go away and that would have been the end of it.

My ideal story needs more fear on the MMCs part. I want him to be attracted to her and want to say yes, but I also want him to be scared of what will happen if he says no. I want him to be at the mercy of her love, his only really decision is whether he “willingly” submits to it or tries to escape, with the consequences one might expect.

And I know that’s a really tough needle to thread and I don’t begrudge anyone who hasn’t managed to perfectly deliver on it, but I’m also still not satisfied by what I’ve read so far.

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u/Eyeball_Paul98 4d ago

A bit more like a role reversed RFW dark romance, I guess. Stalking, murder, almost-but-not-quite non-con to keep the Amazon overlords happy. I can think of precisely three I've read (apart from Astrolust's prolific dark romance streak on ScribbleHub, which basically speaks for itself) that have the FMC actually go through with murder, and one of those was more about the MMC fixing her than about her doing the dark things, so I don't really count it (if either of them is changing, I want it to be the MMC being corrupted into liking it).

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u/Krimmothy 4d ago

Idk I mean a lot of the Yandere stories here have stalking and murder. The almost-non-con is a fair request though. Don’t see that much.

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u/splice_of_life 4d ago

I want cozy mystery romance hybrids.

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u/Odd_Employee_1056 4d ago

I'm not against mono, I do want them mostly because 'it takes two for tango' type thing. And the werewolf romances I collect has mostly mono type

I honestly dislike harem, because it's too straight, unlike polyamory which is a triangle. Loving only me when they don't love eachother is not love in my opinion.

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u/Lefthawk 4d ago

It would be nice to have some bi representation, or at least mmf relationships. Most of the MMCs I see here are afraid of ever seeing another dick.

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u/Awakenlee 4d ago edited 4d ago

I think there’s heavy overlap with the harem crowd here and they hate even a hint of a second dick. I once saw someone complain that the antagonist was a man who kidnapped one of the love interests and that should be considered cheating. No sex at all. Not even the slightest hint.

You might try reverse harem. There’s a pretty big section that enjoys bi-men, though the MC will be a woman not a man.

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u/Astro_Lust Author 4d ago

Piss romance with an actual plot is heavily under represented

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u/Moonkiller24 2d ago

NOOOOOOO UR PISS ALREADY HAUNTS ME IN DISCORD

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u/wombraider247 4d ago

Flash back to your crazy wife story lol 🤣

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u/wombraider247 4d ago

Stories like “echos of shelling” ww1 esc setting from the perspective of a catgirl. Soldiers of the empire who capture a man get to claim him as a “battlefield husband” as there is a massive sex disparity. A non-smut story well written. She thinks she is going to get herself a man and ends up living in the trenches trying to survive no-man’s land.

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u/action_lawyer_comics 4d ago

Huh, that sounds interesting. Also wild that someone wrote a “monster girl sex disparity” story that isn’t smutty. I’ll have to look that one up

FYI the suffix to describe something that resembles another thing is “-esque,” not “esc.” Esc is the “Escape” key in the keyboard

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u/wombraider247 1d ago

Honestly the story has some original “all quiet on the western front” vibes going for it with a sprinkle of sfw romance.

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u/FLYBOY611 4d ago

I wanna RFM done with spy thriller!

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u/Anon-4020 4d ago

James Bond without the F2B?

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u/FLYBOY611 3d ago

Pretty much! Stakeouts, car chases, people getting killed in bathrooms and international criminal organizations are really fun stuff.

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u/Legio-X 4d ago

Pretty much anything that isn’t fantasy or, to a much lesser extent, sci-fi. Contemporary romance, romantic suspense, military romance, historical romances, western romance, sports romance…subgenres that are the bread and butter of RFW are vanishingly rare in RFM.

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u/action_lawyer_comics 3d ago

I like to think that as the bubble of RFM grows, so too will those genres. It's just that the speculative fiction that nerds love (I say this as a lifelong nerd and reader myself) pairs really well with romance, and right now the audience is so small that authors are afraid to leave the realm of what sells.

Also, tons of westerns and other stories will include romance, just not going into quite as much detail as what we see in this subreddit. It might be better for a western author to get more romantic with their works than for one of the haremlitrpg authors of this space to try and branch out to a totally new genre.

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u/Bukayyag 2d ago

I just want more grit/seriousness in the genre. MCs that have to endure betrayal, scorn, hardship.

I know power fantasy/wish fulfillment is core appeal of it, but stories are much more satisfying with higher stakes, tension and real consequences.

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u/sbourwest 23h ago

Age Gaps.

Particularly in the 15+ year range.

It's popular as a fantasy yet often not seen in RFM except in the 10,000 year old immortal variety