Rebecca Campbell here—your resident clever, helpful, and bitter spicy romantic women’s fiction author. Let’s chat about the romance genre and spice scales and then dissect what’s wrong with the term ‘clean’ romance.
(Caveat: I actually wrote this back in early 2024, but it still tracks.)
First, what is the romance genre?
Purists will argue that traditional romance novels must have a happily ever after (HEA) ending or, at the very least, a happily for now (HFN) ending. They must also focus on the romantic love story between the main couple and their struggle to make the relationship work. These are the two hard-and-fast rules. Authors who lay claim to the genre but stray outside these strict boundaries risk their professional reputations if they don’t give romance readers what they expect. And Bookstagram, Booktok, and Bookthreads are lawless and ruthless places if the fandoms scent a scandal.
But I digress.
Romance writing can be contemporary, historical, LGBTQ+, dark, fantasy, paranormal, science fiction, etc, or a combination. It can be written in single-, dual-, or multi-character point of view, first- or third-person (even second-person, although this is rare), and in past or present tense. It doesn’t have to include actual sex scenes or, indeed, any mention of sex, but it often does.
Popular tropes within the genre are enemies-to-lovers, friends-to-lovers, third-act breakups, love triangles, surprise pregnancies, second chance, forced/close proximity, fake dating, taboo/forbidden, age gaps, harem/why choose, and many other widely accepted plot devices.
Whether you like them or loathe them, Colleen Hoover’s and Sarah J. Maas’ books are commonly marketed as ‘romance’, much to the chagrin of purists because they fall outside the established rules. Colleen Hoover’s books are also, less flatteringly, referred to as ‘trauma porn’, but in 2022 she held six of the top ten positions in the New York Times Best Seller list. Between them, these women have sold over 70 million books in the last 12 years, so they’re obviously doing something right, even if they’re overstepping the boundaries of the romance genre.
And while I’m quoting stats, did you know that romance book sales in Australia increased by 37 per cent in 2023?
I categorise my writing as spicy romantic women’s fiction. ‘Women’s fiction’ because it consists of layered stories in which the plot is driven by the main female character’s emotional journey towards a more fulfilled self (as defined by the Women’s Fiction Writers’ Association), and ‘romantic’ rather than straightforward romance because it often strays from the aforementioned two rules since it includes aspects outside the definition, such as a female protagonist who engages in two flings before the romantic love develops between her and the main male character, another who is in an open marriage, another who has sex early on with the main male character and then falls in love with him later, and another who has multiple lovers and she and the main love interest don’t ever hook up on page but there’s an implied HFN ending for them.
To a large extent, readers expect a certain level of spice from romance books, while others seek ‘sweet’ or ‘closed-door’ romance.
So what constitutes ‘sweet’ and ‘spicy’, and how hot can it get?
There are lots of spice scales floating around social media, but this is mine:
🫑 = no spice or sweet (also labelled ‘clean’)
🌶️ = fade-to-black or closed-door (i.e. you know it’s happening, but it’s not described)
🌶️🌶️ = one or two non-explicit sex scenes (i.e. no description of genitals or bodily fluids)
🌶️🌶️🌶️ = a few explicit sex scenes
🌶️🌶️🌶️🌶️ = numerous explicit sex scenes and may explore kinks and BDSM
🌶️🌶️🌶️🌶️🌶️ = page after page of explicit sex scenes with little plot or character development (e.g. erotica)
Kissing might feature in ‘sweet’ romance, but it would not be described in any detail beyond soft or warm lips. Any mention of tongues and saliva would be unlikely.
One chilli pepper is self-explanatory and common in young adult (YA) romance. Kissing scenes will be a bit more descriptive, but beyond this, everything else will be glossed over.
Books in category two or three would still make sense if you removed the sex scenes because the characters and plots are strong enough to drive them forward.
Towards the other end of the scale is a category popularised by the now 10-year-old Fifty Shades franchise. Since 2015, many more books have been published that push the kink and BDSM limits set by this trilogy—which was considered controversial and groundbreaking in its day—and are also much better written. This category relies on sex scenes to drive the characters and/or plot forward, so they couldn’t be omitted without negatively impacting the story.
Last on this scale is erotica at five chilli peppers, and what sets it apart from the other levels is an almost complete absence of any real character and plot development.
Readers and other authors may disagree with my scale, but if you compare spice in books to spice in food, everyone has different tastes, so that’s to be expected. What’s spicy for you might not be spicy for me, or vice versa. On my scale, my writing is a solid three chilli peppers, but sometimes I dip my toe into four. Some sex scenes are more explicit than others, but all are enthusiastically consensual, which is the only type I write and the type I prefer to read.
Some tropes in the romance book world are expected to be spicier than others, including taboo/forbidden and harem/why choose. And gone are the days of Mills & Boon’s comparatively tame references to ‘throbbing members’, ‘pulsing cores’, and ‘heaving bosoms’. The rise of indie publishing especially has allowed all types of unconventional encounters to flourish and find their fanbases, including minotaurs in Morning Glory Milking Farm, a front door in Unhinged, and blue aliens in Ice Planet Barbarians. And don’t let the cutesy cartoonish covers of traditionally published authors Tessa Bailey or Ali Hazelwood make you assume their books are not chock-a-block full of spice that will leave you reaching for something to subdue the heat.
Milk. I meant a tall glass of cold milk.
But why is the term ‘clean’ problematic?
Well, it implies that sex is inherently ‘dirty’, that it soils people (and not in the good way), that it’s something to be ashamed of, to hide away, and to cleanse yourself of. ‘Dirty’ then becomes a slur or an insult, both against the people who write spicy romance and against the people who consume it.
But we’re a quarter of the way into the 21st Century and, despite attempts to ban certain books, the morality police are losing (or have already lost) their grip on much of the population—especially women, who are the most avid romance readers. Many are loud and proud about it, too, with dedicated social media accounts celebrating and promoting all things romance and sexy times. Others choose to read more privately, either utilising an e-book reader or buying a paperback’s ‘discreet cover’ instead of the original version, often the difference between a text-only cover or a bare-chested man with a smouldering gaze, chiselled jaw and more abs than is physiologically possible.
Whether you share your reading list publicly or prefer to keep it on the down-low, books are much more accessible despite the bans. In addition to bricks-and-mortar bookshops, there are public libraries and street libraries, Booktopia and the ‘Zon, Kindle and Kobo, and apps like Borrowbox and Audible.
The clean-versus-dirty nomenclature also feeds into the critics’ and censors’ narratives. Detractors (often men) equate spicy romance books with online porn. I could write a whole article on this topic alone, but to summarise the main flaw in this hot-take, women still consume online porn. The two aren’t mutually exclusive. It could also be seen as an embarrassing self-own, indicating that the men making this comparison are fully aware that online porn, more often than not, caters for men and is not a safe space for women, and they choose to disparage spicy romance books knowing this.
Others complain that the genre sets unrealistic expectations of romantic relationships, which is true in the sense that not all men are rich and buff, but such a complaint ignores what readers love most about these stories—the female characters come first (in more ways than one), and the male characters love, admire and respect them (to use a heteronormative example).
But both ‘sweet’ and ‘spicy’ romance novels have their place on bookshelves and in e-book libraries and have their devoted readerships. As I mentioned before, I prefer to write and read consensual sex scenes, but that doesn’t mean every book I read includes sex scenes. Some of my favourite five-star reads in the past few years have included romance without even a hint of sex.
It’s the terminology that needs to change.
At the most basic level, I think it’s important not to pit ‘sweet’ against ‘spicy’ by labelling the former ‘clean’. Some people have gone a step further and reclaimed the word ‘dirty’ and celebrate it. There are hashtags dedicated to it, and my Instagram bio, for example, includes the tongue-in-cheek phrase, “I like my martinis the way I like my sex scenes—dirty”, and only one of those involves garlic-stuffed olives.