Eight Bookmarks
Romantasy is one shelf with a huge range on it. One book is a fairy tale with a single love scene. Another is a war college where a dragon rider wants you dead. If you search for romantasy books, you get piles of favourites and no way to compare them. So I put eight books on one chart, scored for spice, darkness and pace. There are no spoilers, only one line and a set of numbers for each book.
The short answer, and it is my opinion. The spiciest book on the chart is A Court of Silver Flames. The darkest and the fastest is Fourth Wing. And the gentlest place to begin is A Court of Thorns and Roses. Everything else sits between them, and by the end you will know where to start.
How I Scored
Here is how the chart works, so you can argue with it. Each book gets three dials, from one to five, in half points, and ties are allowed, because two books can really be equally spicy. Spice is how much sex is on the page and how explicit it is. Darkness is violence, death, torture and heavy themes. Pace is how fast the story moves. Five is the hottest, the darkest and the fastest.
Where do the numbers come from? Not from other people’s reviews. They come from the guides and book pages already on this channel, and from counts I re-ran on the ebook text for this list. The chapter counts, word counts and explicit chapters are counted facts. The dials are my opinion, and they are a draft for you to check.
One rule decides who is on the chart. Only books with a page on this site are here, and that gives eight, including three sequels. Each gets the same treatment: one line on what it is, then its numbers.
The Mild End
A Court of Thorns and Roses is the gentlest book on the chart. Sarah J. Maas published it in twenty fifteen as book one of her series, and it is a fairy tale about a hunter and a faerie lord. It runs forty six chapters and about one hundred twenty nine thousand words.
Spice, two out of five. It has one explicit chapter, chapter twenty seven, and it is short. Darkness, three, because the beatings and torture arrive late, between chapters thirty four and forty five. Pace, three, because the first half drifts. I found no f word in the whole book. If you are new to romantasy, my pick is to start here. It is a slow build with a strong final act, and it sets up everything else on this chart.
The Warm Middle
Three books sit in the middle, and they could not be more different. The Knight and the Moth, by Rachel Gillig, is a gothic quest from twenty twenty five with a talkative gargoyle and a very rude knight. It has thirty one chapters and about one hundred eleven thousand words. My scan finds one explicit chapter, chapter twenty five. Spice three and a half, darkness three and a half, pace four.
A Court of Mist and Fury is book two of the Maas series, from twenty sixteen. It is bigger and hotter than book one, with sixty nine chapters, about one hundred eighty four thousand words and three explicit chapters: two, forty eight and fifty five. Spice four, darkness four, pace three and a half. Read book one first.
When the Moon Hatched is book one of The Moonfall Series by Sarah A. Parker, from twenty twenty three, with dragons and a hidden identity. It has eighty nine chapters plus a prologue and an epilogue, and about one hundred sixty three thousand words. Six chapters have sex or self touch on the page, and only one goes all the way. Spice four, darkness four, pace four.
The Hot End
Now the hot shelf, four books. A Court of Silver Flames is the hottest I have scored. It is book five of the Maas series, from twenty twenty one, with eighty chapters and about two hundred nine thousand words. Ten chapters have sex or a sexual climax on the page. Spice five, darkness four, pace three.
Fourth Wing, by Rebecca Yarros, is book one of The Empyrean, from twenty twenty three, set in a dragon rider war college. It has thirty nine chapters and about one hundred eighty four thousand words, and two open door chapters, thirty and thirty two. Spice four and a half, darkness five, pace five.
Onyx Storm is book three of The Empyrean, from January twenty twenty five. It has sixty six chapters plus a prologue, and about two hundred eleven thousand words. Four chapters carry sex on the page: three, twenty five, forty eight and forty nine. Spice four and a half, darkness four and a half, pace four and a half.
Quicksilver, by Callie Hart, is book one of the Fae and Alchemy series, from twenty twenty four. It has forty five chapters and about one hundred ninety six thousand words. My scan finds three explicit chapters, twenty two, twenty seven and thirty seven, plus two heated ones. Spice four and a half, darkness three and a half, and pace two and a half, the slowest on the chart.
The Spice Ranking
Here is the first ranking, hottest to mildest, so you can screenshot it. A Court of Silver Flames is first, at five. Then three books tie at four and a half: Fourth Wing, Onyx Storm and Quicksilver. Then two tie at four: A Court of Mist and Fury and When the Moon Hatched.
The Knight and the Moth follows at three and a half, and A Court of Thorns and Roses is last at two. Notice that explicit chapters do not map neatly to the score. Fourth Wing has only two, but they are long and graphic, so it keeps its place. I weigh how explicit a scene is, not just how many there are.
The Darkest Books
Spice is not darkness, so here is the second ranking. Fourth Wing is the darkest, a five. Our guide to it counts a death on the page in fourteen chapters, and chapters thirty six and thirty seven are the hardest.
Next is Onyx Storm at four and a half. Its own warning page lists war, gore, murder and poisoning. Then three books tie at four: A Court of Mist and Fury, A Court of Silver Flames and When the Moon Hatched. The first carries war and trauma, the second heavy themes, and the third torture and beheadings.
Quicksilver and The Knight and the Moth follow at three and a half, and A Court of Thorns and Roses closes the list at three. Darkness is the dial where I expect the most disagreement, so tell me where you would move a book.
The Pace Ranking
Now pace, and this one is easy to feel. Fourth Wing is the fastest, a five, because almost every chapter ends on a new threat. Onyx Storm follows at four and a half. Then When the Moon Hatched and The Knight and the Moth tie at four.
A Court of Mist and Fury is three and a half. A Court of Thorns and Roses and A Court of Silver Flames both sit at three, because each is slow before it lifts. And Quicksilver, at two and a half, is the slowest. It has a great heroine and a wild final act, but the middle drags.
The Language Count
One more number, for readers who want to know about swearing. I counted every form of the f word in the text, and I round down. A Court of Thorns and Roses has none. A Court of Mist and Fury has twelve. The Knight and the Moth has about forty, and A Court of Silver Flames has over one hundred twenty.
Then it climbs. Fourth Wing has over two hundred fifty, When the Moon Hatched over two hundred sixty, Onyx Storm over three hundred and Quicksilver over four hundred. So the spiciest book is not the sweariest, and that is worth knowing before you hand one to a friend.
Where To Start
So where should you start? If you are new, start with A Court of Thorns and Roses. My draft age for it is sixteen and up. If you want fast and dark, pick Fourth Wing. If you want gothic and funny, pick The Knight and the Moth. And if you want banter and a slow burn, pick Quicksilver.
If heat is your hard line, stop after the books scored three and a half or lower. If violence is your hard line, the last three on the darkness list are your safer shelf. Mist and Fury, Silver Flames and Onyx Storm are sequels, so read the earlier books first. Apart from book one of the Maas series, treat every book on this chart as an adult book, and check the content notes on its page. All eight are linked on bookexplained dot com, and every score here is my opinion.
Fourth Wing Book Four
Before you go, the question I get most. Is there a Fourth Wing book four? As of October thirtieth, twenty twenty six, there is no official title and no release date. Rebecca Yarros has said she is writing it.
Threshing Day came out on September twenty ninth, twenty twenty six, and it is not book four. It is a collection of thirteen stories set in the same world. Treat any date you see online as a guess until the publisher announces one.
Your Turn
Which book would you move on my chart, and which one did I score too high or too low? Tell me in the comments, and I will read every one. If you have a romantasy book you want me to score next, name it, and I will add it to the chart once it has a page on the site. Subscribe for more lists like this, and tap like if the chart saved you a bad pick.