In 2025, the answer might be: a bestseller. Genre boundaries are increasingly porous, and today’s readers are embracing the hybrid. Welcome to the era of genre-blending fiction, where labels are looser, rules more elastic, and expectations deliciously disrupted.
One of the clearest examples of this trend is the rise of “romantasy” — a portmanteau of romance and fantasy that has grown from niche fanfiction roots to become a juggernaut dominating bestseller charts.
These novels excel in both longing and world-building, seamlessly merging the emotional stakes of a love story with the high-concept drama of speculative fiction. Think Fourth Wing or Carissa Broadbent’s The Serpent and the Wings of Night. Readers no longer want to choose between swoon and swordplay.
Genre-mixing extends far beyond romantasy
Experimental literary fiction is borrowing from science fiction, horror is flirting with comedy, and autofiction is blurring into speculative memoir. Novels like "We, Computers" by Hamid Ismailov, narrated by an AI voice in a poetic form, upend narrative conventions while engaging deeply with human themes. Readers are hungry for books that surprise them formally as well as thematically.
Part of this movement comes from readers themselves. BookTok and Goodreads are alive with fan-generated genre tags, such as sadcore fantasy, queer time loop fiction, and haunted academia. These unofficial taxonomies reflect a shift in how we approach storytelling—more intuitive, more emotional, and more inclined to bend the rules.
This genre-fluid reading culture rewards curiosity. It allows for books to be many things at once: playful and profound, structured and chaotic, romantic and cynical. It also expands the space for underrepresented voices. Authors who once struggled to fit neatly into publishing categories now find readerships eager for complexity.
Five genre-blending books to read now
1. The Atlas Six by Olivie Blake
Dark academia meets speculative thriller with a dose of philosophical interrogation and emotional disarray. I could not recommend this book more.
2. The Serpent and the Wings of Night by Carissa Broadbent
A romantasy epic with vampires, trials, romance, and moral ambiguity. This one ticks so many boxes.
3. We Computers by Hamid Ismailov
An AI narrator tells a tale of war, memory, and identity through poetic fragments—genre-breaking in the best way.
A fusion of historical fiction, linguistic theory, and magical realism, examining colonialism and revolution. It's no surprise this has been a smash.
5. A Touch of Jen by Beth Morgan
A satire of influencer culture that veers into horror and surrealism, disorienting and deliciously weird. Love it. And that cover? As standout as the book.
Genre-blending fiction isn’t just a trend; it reflects a cultural moment. One where identity, belief, and storytelling itself feel fluid. These novels embrace contradiction and complexity, and invite us to do the same.
Let them.
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