New Year, new stacks… and a lot of honesty. We step back from single-title deep dives to survey a full year of romantasy and romance-adjacent reads—what shocked us, what fell flat, and which series rewired our brains. From a YA dragon school that tackles colonial power with heart to a sci‑fi romance that outsmarts its pulpy cover, we spotlight books that prove premise isn’t destiny. We also confess the special editions we still haven’t opened and the sequels we’re saving for a quiet week.

We trade our most anticipated releases for 2026—T. Kingfisher’s Dagger Bound, Stephanie Burgess’s Enchanting the Fae Queen, and J.R. Ward’s new romantasy—and champion new-to-us voices, including Bridget Knightley’s fanfic-rooted contemporaries and Moniquill Blackgoose’s sharp worldbuilding. Audiobooks get their flowers: Jeff Hays turns Dungeon Crawler Carl into a one-man full-cast, The Cruel Prince grips harder in audio, and Your Coffin or Mine? dazzles with accent agility. If you’re audiobook-curious, this is your permission to switch formats and fall in.

Goals, without the guilt: one of us hit 314 by pairing audiobooks with “eyeball reads” and DNFing early, while others are lowering targets to keep the joy. We share practical series plans, pocket-sized anxiety hacks, and the titles we wish we could read for the first time again—Throne of Glass, Bull Moon Rising, To Shape a Dragon’s Breath. Also on the table: the hot take that a massively popular series isn’t for everyone, and that’s okay.

If you love romantasy, monster romance, dragon academies, and smart, character-first stories, you’ll leave with a sharper TBR and a saner plan. Subscribe, share with a friend who needs a goal reset, and tell us: what was your most surprising read of the year?