The First BookTok Trend Roundup of 2026
If you guessed it's mostly Heated Rivalry you wouldn't be wrong
Welcome back to Romancing the Phone, and welcome to 2026 and a new year on BookTok. We’ve entered the dawn of a beautiful new era, a time when someone made a wildly successful, beautifully earnest, emotionally deep, free from shame adaptation of a series of romance novels that is getting the reception it deserves (world domination and widespread psychosis). As I’ve already said, it feels too early to say what the exact impact of this one will be, but I can’t wait to find out.
Also, did you know that Christmas Day was the highest traffic day for fanfiction website AO3? When people are home with their families with nothing to do, mostly they want to find a little pocket of escapism to read (or watch the greatest television show ever made).
As much as we like to talk about beach reads, December is a really impactful month for both book sales (congratulations to Virginia Evans hitting #1 on the NYT with The Correspondent) and for romance trends. Instead of doing all of the pleasure reading I had intended (new Christina Lauren, new Ann Patchett, etc), I ended up reading a lot of viral fanfiction and KU romance and romantasy (watch this space for more about those, hopefully!).
I did, however, mostly stay off of TikTok. So this week, we’re diving back in and looking at the themes I’m noticing after three weeks (mostly) off the tok. Not many surprises here!
Yearning
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Once again, the people are talking about yearning. They are dying for yearning. But everyone’s interpretation of what gives good yearn, as well as what is missing from current popular romance novels, is different. As we’ve previously discussed, this feeling stems from a deep wellspring of dissatisfaction with the current state of the romance market. Readers are tired and looking for something that feels new, but also like the romances of the late nineties and early 2000s (so many readers are discovering both historical romance and 2000s paranormals).
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Is this a backlash against the popularity of high heat levels in popular romance and romantasy? A backlash against the prevalence of first person POVs? Or just a gently simmering malaise until a new book explodes onto the scene to claim everyone’s attention?
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This creator (who has racked up over 1 million views) also raises an interesting point: online dating is basically a self-esteem destroying cesspool where no one is having any fun (ask me how I know). She says “I need something that’s gonna like rip my heart out of my chest…because clearly I have no love life. So it needs to be in my books.”
She also raises the point of “cringe,” an increasingly present concern for some readers in conversations about romance. I, personally, work very hard to kill the part of me that cringes, but I do think some of the desire for yearning can be tied to this impulse as well. If characters are pining away from each other and observing, then they aren’t having as much earnest dialogue with each other. More to think about here!
Even Navessa Allen weighed in:
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Long Books Continue their Reign
Nearly every breakout, viral book from this holiday season that I picked up is 600+ pages. Is this the Alchemised effect? Still the Dickensian market forces of Jeff Bezos’s Kindle Unlimited, where authors are paid by the page read? A real reader desire for books that prolong the escape from our world? Or some combination of all 3?
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I will note that there is a growing backlash to the prevalence of doorstopper books in the romance market:
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2025 Reading Roundups
It will not come as a surprise to anyone that my feed is still flooded with best of the year content. What I have noticed is that content creators are making sure to emphasize exactly how many books they read this year before making their selections:
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Then, there are the creators who have differentiated themselves by selecting fewer favorites:
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As we enter January, these lists have morphed into books to add to your #TBR in 2026:
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Finding new ways to do the same task every day (recommend books) is hard! Hats off to the creators.
The People We Meet on Vacation Movie
Our long national nightmare is over - there is FINALLY a film adaptation of an Emily Henry novel, even if we’re all being deprived of seeing it on the big screen. Interestingly, much of the content I’ve seen about the movie is related to people’s disappointment that they won’t be able to see it in theaters. I’m interested to see people’s reactions in the wake of the success of Heated Rivalry - will the movie feel as successful? Is that even possible?
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Maybe it is! I have plans to watch it with friends on two separate days this weekend and I am counting down the days.
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And finally…
Heated Rivalry Psychosis
We are all still going to the cottage. Sweet husbands are trekking to multiple bookstores to find copies of Heated Rivalry and The Long Game for their wives:
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They’re also trying to cap the number of episodes their wives are watching in one night:
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And, of course, content creators are finding new ways to use Heated Rivalry to recommend books:
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Everyone is so creative!
Phew, that was a long one - thank you for sticking with me! I’m also working on my content calendar for the next few months (a new year’s attempt at organization? groundbreaking). Is there anything you’d like an explainer about? Are there any weird/interesting/mystifying trends you’re seeing on your FYP? Any books you’re seeing everywhere? Please let me know in the comments! We’re all prisoners of the algorithm, so help me break out of mine xoxo
Alyssa, any thoughts on the emerging trend for more upmarket love stories (with or without a HEA) as opposed to “straight up” romances for 2026? Karin Gillespie of Pitch Your Novel writes about it in her latest Substack post and I’d love your take on it, too. I wonder if this trend would address the need for more yearning and less high spice you mention here. Thanks!
This is better and more fun than scrolling this myself!