Sweet and spicy: A new romance book club in Greensboro offers a space to dish and discuss

Featured photo: Romance books are all the rage right now. (photo by Jordan McFadden)

First they were sweet, then they were spicy.

That’s the trajectory of the kind of books Danielle Chiasson has been reading lately. A few years before lockdown, Chiasson found herself watching the Netflix adaptation of Jenny Han’s To All the Boys I’ve Loved Before, and the rest, as they say, has been happily ever after.

“I digested that,” Chiasson says. “I watched it several times. It was that sweet feeling, the happy ending, the golden retriever energy; I was very into it.”

After watching the film, Chiasson read the rest of Han’s fluffy young-adult series. She soon dipped her toe into the adult-romance genre, and that’s when she really became hooked.

“When you have something you can dissolve into, it’s intriguing,” she says. 

She found herself looking up other readers’ reactions online to the books she was reading. What did they think of the main character? What about the love interest? What did other fans think they looked like? Who would they cast as actors if the show was made into a television show?

But she realized she could be having some of these conversations in real life. That’s how the Totally Reading for the Plot Romance Book Club got its start.

In October, Chiasson held the club’s first meeting at Bitters Social House in Greensboro. For that gathering, she chose The Very Secret Society of Irregular Witches by Sangu Mandanna, a cozy romance about a witch tasked with teaching three young mages at a remote house occupied by a handsome but prickly librarian. In November, the group gathered to discuss Emily Henry’s Funny Story, in which two recently single people decide to become roommates after their fiancées leave them for their respective partners. A classic switch-up.

The many tropes and storylines of romance books is one of the biggest reasons why Chiasson was drawn to the genre. 

“It’s an escapism thing,” she explains. “There’s been a lot of stigma for a long time. You used to associate from your teen years the fluffy, Fabio-covered romances of your grandmother’s generations. You saw it as something that was off the beaten path that wouldn’t interest you.”

But in recent years, the romance genre has found a new level of popularity. 

As seen on BookTok, or the colloquial name for the part of TikTok reserved for talking about books, and in the dedicated aisles of many bookstores, romance has skyrocketed to the top of the charts.

According to Publisher’s Weekly, the genre grew 52 percent in 2022 and 34 percent in the first half of 2023. That spike came as sales for other categories of books like adult nonfiction fell.

Chiasson thinks that when the events of the world feel increasingly less hopeful, romance books offer readers a usually guaranteed happily ever after.

“As hectic as the world is and anytime anything in the world feels scary or disappointing like the pandemic, the political environment right now, I think a lot of people feel nervous,” she says. “But with romance, you can relatively confidently assume that everything is going to resolve itself in the end.”

Scuppernong Books in Greensboro has an online romance book club and there is a queer romance book club according to Bookmarks in Winston-Salem as well.

While many of the books do involve sex and “titillation,” as Chiasson calls it, that’s not always the point. Instead, she thinks the rise in popularity shows readers — many of them straight women — that they can indulge in the stories without feeling shame. Popular TV shows like “Bridgerton” — which is based on a book series — also reflect this trend. And because many of these books are written by women, Chiasson says it offers a different kind of love story than ones that have been popular in the past.

“The feel for the way they address consent in particular is so different,” she says. And readers are gravitating towards that.

“The culture is influencing the romance writers, but now that we have this bigger pool, I wonder if that’s influencing the culture,” she says. “Like what the readers are comfortable asking for and demanding of their partners.”

For Chiasson, the romance books have been a way to bond with her husband.

“He reads them,” she says. “He has come to all of the meetings. He’s in the fan groups online. He loves this stuff. It’s nice that we have this thing to connect over.”

And for those that may not have someone close to them to share with, gathering with others to talk about these not-so-guilty pleasures offers a place of solace, Chiasson says. 

“It’s like a little party, a get-together,” she says. “There’s no real structure for it. It’s just about getting to know people in the community who have a similar interest.”

So far, about half a dozen people have shown up to the past two meetings. But Chiasson hopes that moving forward, that the group has a few dozen members. Using her Instagram with the handle @totally_reading_for_the_plot, she posts what the club will be reading and discussing each month.

While the group has been made up of mostly women, Chiasson says that the market for romance has been changing. In recent years, more queer and LGBTQIA2S+ romance has hit the shelves, as well as romance featuring more POC characters.

For March of next year, Chiasson chose the popular book, Red, White and Royal Blue by Casey McQuiston featuring a gay couple. Other books on the docket include The Season for Revenge for Dec. 10, Fourth Wing by Rebecca Yarros for January and Love and Other Conspiracies by Mallory Marlowe for February. The best part of the popularity of the genre, Chiasson says, is that the books are so diverse in both subgenres, plot, tropes and characters. 

“There is so much out there on the market right now,” she says. 

So whether readers enjoy the enemies-to-lovers trope (a personal favorite of Chiasson’s), want to lose themselves in a rich fantasy setting (looking at you Sarah J. Maas fans), or are interested in a hockey-themed love story (apparently they’re very popular right now), there’s pretty much anything they could want out there. And places like Chiasson’s book club offer an outlet to discuss them to their heart’s desire.

“It is a community more than anything,” she says.

Follow the book club on Instagram at @totally_reading_for_the_plot. The next meeting takes place at Bitters Social House on Dec. 10 for Tis the Season for Revenge. The January meeting takes place on Jan. 14.