How to Write Romantasy: Romance, Magic, and a World That Gets in the Way

By Lindsay, Founder of Inkling · Updated October 2026

You have read a shelf of romantasy, you know exactly what you love about it, and you have a pair in your head who will not leave you alone. What you may not have is a plan for holding two genres at once: a love story that has to land, and a fantasy plot that has to make sense. Most romantasy drafts that stall do so because one of those two quietly takes over. This guide covers the choices that keep both alive, from romance-led or world-led to heat level, tropes, the braid, the world, and point of view, with a premise worksheet you can copy and a live character card for building your pair.

What romantasy is

Romantasy is a story where a romance and a fantasy plot share the spotlight, and the book only works if both pay off. The love story is not seasoning. The world is not wallpaper. Take out either one and the book collapses. Jenna Moreci's craft book How to Write Romantasy (Ten Speed Press, October 2025) describes it as a romance between two or more people that drives the narrative within a fantasy setting and plot, which is a good working definition.

It is also a genre with a lot of readers right now. Exploding Topics, which tracks search trends, shows tens of thousands of monthly searches for “romantasy” and steep growth. In an NPR segment, a books analyst at Circana called romantasy the highest growth category of the entire US print book market in 2024, driven largely by Sarah J. Maas and Rebecca Yarros. With A Court of Thorns and Roses book 6 out on October 27, 2026 and book 7 due January 12, 2027, a lot of readers are thinking about writing their own. If that is you, our post on writing your own fae story before January 12 turns the wait into an 11-week drafting plan.

Big readership cuts both ways. Readers know the genre's shapes intimately, so they will notice a wobbly payoff, and they have seen the most popular tropes many times. The opening is in how you combine and execute them.

Fantasy romance or romantic fantasy: decide which leads

Before anything else, decide which genre is the parent. A common convention is that the noun is the parent genre: a fantasy romance is a romance first, set in a fantasy world, and a romantic fantasy is a fantasy first, with a romance that matters. Reedsy's guide to writing romantasy puts the test neatly: the parent genre decides which arc drives the story and resolves the climax. In a fantasy romance, the central relationship is the spine, even with a villain present. In a romantic fantasy, the spine is the external conflict, and the romance matters without deciding how it ends. The labels are not used consistently across publishers and readers, so check what your comparable titles call themselves.

This choice changes real decisions. In a romance-led book, the first chapter usually puts the pair on a collision course and the biggest set piece is an emotional one. In a world-led book, the first chapter may establish the danger, and the romance can build more slowly in its shadow. Neither is better. Being unclear is the problem, because a book that cannot decide what it is tends to end with one arc resolved and the other limping.

Keep the romance central, and keep the promise

The romance genre has one non-negotiable. The Romance Writers of America's widely quoted definition, summarized in Wikipedia's article on the romance novel, says the main plot centers on two people developing a relationship and ends in an “emotionally satisfying and optimistic” way. Readers call it the HEA (happily ever after) or the HFN (happy for now). If your couple ends apart, or one of them dies, readers who picked up a romantasy will feel cheated, however beautifully it is written.

Series complicate this, and romantasy is very often a series. You have two main options:

• A new couple each book. Each book ends with its own pair together, while the wider fantasy conflict continues. Readers get a full payoff every time.
• The same couple across books. Each book ends at least happy for now: together, committed, maybe with a war still coming. A cliffhanger on the plot is acceptable to most readers. A cliffhanger that breaks up the couple is riskier.

Our guide to planning a book series covers how to pace arcs across several books.

Choose a heat level on purpose

Heat level, often called spice, is how much of the physical relationship happens on the page. Treat it as a craft decision, like tense or POV, not a moral one. Broadly:

• Closed door. Intimate scenes happen off the page. The scene ends at the door, or the chapter cuts away and picks up after. The tension lives in looks, touches and what is not said.
• Somewhere in between. Some on-page sensuality, with the most intimate moments implied or kept brief.
• Open door. Intimate scenes are written on the page, fully.

Reedsy's advice is practical: match the heat level to the book's overall tone, keep it consistent throughout, write at a level you are comfortable with, and signal it through your description and early chapters. Consistency is the real rule. A closed-door book that suddenly opens the door in chapter thirty, or the reverse, breaks the reader's trust more than any single choice would. Whatever level you pick, those scenes should still do story work: change the relationship, reveal a wound, raise the stakes. A scene that could be cut without changing anything is a scene to reconsider.

Combine tropes: three per premise

Tropes are not a weakness in romantasy. They are a promise to the reader about the experience they are going to have. The craft is in the combination. Raquel Vasquez Gilliland's piece in Writer's Digest recommends listing every romance and fantasy trope you love, then mixing them into premises, with three as the sweet spot. Reedsy adds a useful refinement: commit to one central trope that answers what keeps the couple apart, and let smaller tropes play at the scene level.

Put those together and you get a reliable formula: one central romance trope (what keeps them apart), one fantasy trope (what shapes the world and the danger), and one wild card that makes the combination feel like nobody else's. “Enemies to lovers, a bargain with the fae, and the heroine is the court's new tax collector” is already more specific than any one trope alone. Our full guide to romantasy tropes goes through fourteen favorites, what readers love about each, the trap, and how to make it yours.

Braid the romance arc with the fantasy plot

The most common structural problem in romantasy drafts is alternation: a chapter of romance, a chapter of plot, a chapter of romance. It reads like two books stapled together. The fix is to braid them so that the turning points line up. Reedsy recommends plotting the two arcs in parallel and looking for scenes that advance both at once. A good test for any scene is to ask: does this change the relationship, the danger, or both? Both is best. Neither means cut.

Here is one way the beats can pair up. It is not a formula, just a shape to check your draft against:

• The meeting is a plot event. They meet because the danger brought them together: a bargain, a capture, an assignment.
• The resistance has a plot reason. They are on opposite sides, or one of them is lying about why they are here.
• Growing trust gets tested by the danger. A mission, a court event or a battle forces them to rely on each other.
• The midpoint turns both arcs. A first kiss or confession lands at the same moment as a reveal that changes what the plot is about.
• The dark moment is both. The plot's worst turn is also what drives them apart: a betrayal, a secret exposed, a sacrifice one of them will not accept.
• The climax needs the relationship. The bond, or the choice to trust, is what wins the fight. Reedsy makes the point that the two arcs should peak together, ideally with the couple's bond driving the victory.

How fast the romance moves inside that shape is the pacing question. If your pair takes most of the book to get together, our guide to writing a slow-burn romance maps where the tension needs to rise and where it needs a release. If you are juggling side threads too, tracking subplots keeps them from crowding the braid.

Build the world without getting trapped in it

Fantasy readers expect a world with weight, and romantasy writers love building one. The risk is spending months on courts, bloodlines and magic systems while the draft sits at chapter two. The best guard is to build the world in service of the romance. IngramSpark's piece on worldbuilding for romantasy makes the case that magic and social rules should shape the romantic plot by creating obstacles that keep the lovers apart, and that you should keep consistent records of world rules and key decisions. Both are good filters for what to build first.

So ask of every worldbuilding idea: does this make the romance harder, the danger sharper, or a scene I am about to write clearer? If yes, build it. If not, write it on a list for later. In practice that means you need, before you draft:

• Who holds power where the story opens, and what they want.
• The one or two rules of magic (or bargains, or bonds) the plot depends on.
• The social rule that makes this pairing forbidden, dangerous or inconvenient.
• What the places in your first few chapters look, sound and smell like.

Everything else can be invented in the draft, in brackets, and tidied in revision. If your book involves fae, our guide on how to design fae courts helps you build your own courts, with their own politics, rather than borrowing a famous series' structure. A map is worth making early for one reason: consistent travel times and borders. How to map a fae realm covers how far to take it. For the wider world, see how to create a fantasy world and the worldbuilding template.

Choose your point of view

Romantasy is told in a few common ways, and each changes what the reader feels:

• Single first person. One lead narrates, usually the heroine. The love interest stays partly unknowable, which keeps readers guessing about their motives. Great for a love interest with secrets.
• Dual POV. Both leads narrate, often in alternating chapters. Readers see both sides of the longing and often know more than either lead, which creates delicious dramatic irony. Very common in the genre.
• Multiple POV. The pair plus others: a villain, a sister, a rival. Powerful for a big world, harder to keep the romance central.

The deciding question is what the reader should know. If the love interest's secret is the engine of the book, keep them out of the narrator's chair, or give them chapters that hide as much as they show. If both leads are hiding something, dual POV lets readers watch both lies at once. Our guide to writing a dual POV romance covers rotation and voice, and how to write a multiple POV novel covers bigger casts.

If you are coming from fan fiction

Many romantasy writers learned their craft writing fan fiction, and that is real training: pacing, longing, voice, and an audience that tells you what landed. If your fic has grown past a hundred thousand words, how to organize a long fanfic helps you keep track of it. If you want to take what you have learned into a book you can publish, turning fan fiction into an original novel walks through building your own world and characters from the parts that were truly yours.

A copyable romantasy premise worksheet

Fill this in before you draft. It takes an evening and answers the questions most stalled drafts never asked.

ROMANTASY PREMISE WORKSHEET

1. PARENT GENRE
[ ] Fantasy romance (the relationship is the spine)
[ ] Romantic fantasy (the external conflict is the spine)
The climax is resolved by:

2. THE PREMISE IN ONE SENTENCE
(Lead A) must (do what) with (Lead B), but (what keeps
them apart), and if they fail (what is lost).

3. THREE TROPES
Central romance trope (what keeps them apart):
Fantasy trope (what shapes the world or danger):
Wild card (what makes it mine):

4. LEAD A                         LEAD B
Wants:                            Wants:
Wound:                            Wound:
Lie they believe:                 Lie they believe:
Secret:                           Secret:
Why the other is the worst choice:

5. THE PROMISE
[ ] HEA (happily ever after)   [ ] HFN (happy for now)
Series? [ ] new couple per book  [ ] same couple
How they end this book:

6. HEAT LEVEL
[ ] closed door   [ ] in between   [ ] open door
How I will signal it (description, early chapters):

7. THE BRAID (one line each, romance | plot)
Meeting:            |
Resistance:         |
Trust tested:       |
Midpoint:           |
Dark moment:        |
Climax:             |

8. THE WORLD, ONLY WHAT I NEED NOW
Who holds power where it opens:
The magic rule the plot depends on:
The rule that makes this pairing dangerous:
Places in chapters 1 to 3:

9. POINT OF VIEW
[ ] single first   [ ] dual   [ ] multiple
What the reader knows that a lead does not:

Further reading

• How to Write Romantasy by Jenna Moreci (Ten Speed Press, 2025), a full craft book covering brainstorming, tropes, structure, worldbuilding and couples.
• Reedsy's seven-step guide, especially on choosing a parent genre and plotting the arcs together.
• Writer's Digest on mixing romance and magic, for the trope mind map and the three-trope premise.

Where Inkling fits, honestly

Inkling is a writing app with the planning tools next to the page. For a romantasy, that means:

• The Character builder holds both leads. Want, wound, the lie they believe, fears, trait chips and a Notes field for secrets and voice. Tie them to your novel and they sit in the Cast panel beside the page while you write. Try it in the demo above.
• The Storyboard shows the braid. Put Scene cards in two rows, one for the romance and one for the fantasy plot, and link each row with arrows. When you export the board to Word, a Google Doc or a PDF, each linked chain prints as its own numbered storyline, so you can read each arc on its own.
• The writing desk keeps chapters in order, with a private Notes pad beside each one for the heat level you promised, who knows what, and anything in brackets.
• The map maker carves a realm into courts with soft colour, dashed borders and a key, and lets you mark a place Secret so you can download a spoiler-free copy.
• A word-count goal with a deadline gives you a daily target, and the desk counts your words.

What Inkling does not have: a trope picker, a heat-level tracker, POV tags, a relationship-arc graph, or a fae name generator. The Muse gives you what-ifs, twists and relationship ideas from built-in lists, including slow-burn romance, second-chance romance, gothic romance and dark fairy tale lenses, and it never reads your story. The fantasy name generator has tabs for towns, realms, characters and taverns, but nothing fae-specific. If you need a database of tropes or a beat-sheet template, keep using whatever does that for you, and bring the plan to the desk when you write.

Inkling is an independent writing app. A Court of Thorns and Roses and its sequels are works by Sarah J. Maas, published by Bloomsbury. Inkling is not affiliated with, endorsed by, or sponsored by Sarah J. Maas or Bloomsbury.