{"id":4171,"date":"2025-09-05T17:27:10","date_gmt":"2025-09-05T17:27:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/4171\/"},"modified":"2025-09-05T17:27:10","modified_gmt":"2025-09-05T17:27:10","slug":"unofficial-a-court-of-thorns-and-roses-cookbooks-fuel-romantasy-gold-rush-as-genres-popularity-grows","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/4171\/","title":{"rendered":"Unofficial A Court of Thorns and Roses cookbooks fuel romantasy gold rush as genre\u2019s popularity grows"},"content":{"rendered":"

Open this photo in gallery:<\/a><\/p>\n

Unofficial spinoffs of popular book series like A Court of Thorns and Roses speak to the success of the romantasy genre.Slow Burn\/Slow Burn Books<\/p>\n

It\u2019s been nearly four years since the last instalment in the A Court of Thorns and Roses series was released. <\/p>\n

And while there\u2019s light on the horizon for fans \u2013 author Sarah J. Maas recently announced she\u2019s finished a first draft of the sixth book \u2013 it\u2019s been a long old wait for anyone desperate to know what happens next in the dramatic lives of these fae folk and the mortals who become entangled with them.<\/p>\n

Commerce abhors a void, however, and in the long silence from the Prythian realm an entire constellation of ACOTAR-adjacent content has sprung up to keep the phenomenon alive. There are the umpteen special editions \u2013 including a $53 collector\u2019s edition of the first book, complete with gilded end papers and a cloth slip cover \u2013 released by the series publisher, Bloomsbury, but also a host of unauthorized offerings, such as The Unofficial A Court of Thorns and Roses Cocktail Guide, A Feast of Thorns and Roses cookbook or an ACOTAR colouring book to keep your hands occupied while you listen to the audiobooks for the fifth time.<\/p>\n

Open this photo in gallery:<\/a>Open this photo in gallery:<\/a><\/p>\n

Spinoffs like these are not unique in publishing, says Kathleen Schmidt, the marketing consultant behind the Publishing Confidential<\/a> Substack. When she worked at Skyhorse, an American publishing house, she helped launch an unauthorized Bridgerton-adjacent cookbook, for example. <\/p>\n

\u201cWe had to be really careful,\u201d says Schmidt of creating something that felt like it belonged in the Regency universe created by Julia Quinn, but didn\u2019t actually infringe on any copyrights. These unofficial ACOTAR-adjacent books, in her opinion, simply speak to the gold rush around romantasy that the success of this series helped spark, and which other publishers are trying to get their own piece of.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s not Sarah J. Maas\u2019s publishers putting it out there. It\u2019s other people knowing there\u2019s a hunger out there for the brand, and using that for their own purposes \u2013 which in turn keeps fans interested,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n

And assuming there\u2019s no actual IP infringement, Schmidt doesn\u2019t think that Maas\u2019s publishers, Bloomsbury, would be that bothered by this bandwagon-hopping supplementary content.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe only time you get into trouble is if you\u2019re using the exact art, the exact font, without properly licensing it. I\u2019ve seen that before, and then the book is printed and [the publisher has] to get X amount of books destroyed because you can\u2019t sell it any more,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n

These franchise-adjacent spinoffs fall into what Suzanne Norman, a senior lecturer at Simon Fraser University\u2019s publishing program, calls the \u201cgrey area of fan fiction\u201d when it comes to copyright. <\/p>\n

She points to After by Anna Todd \u2013 which got its start on Wattpad as One Direction fan fiction \u2013 and E.L. James\u2019s Fifty Shades franchise, which started life as Twilight fan fiction, as examples of how \u201can author\u2019s work can be used, commercially, by enterprising people.\u201d <\/p>\n

When it comes to some of these ACOTAR-adjacent books, the line between inspiration and creation is much more direct than, say, the distance between Bella Swan and Edward Cullen and the literary characters who became Christian Grey and Anastasia Steele. <\/p>\n

\u201cLegally, the author or publisher could pursue legal recourse for copyright infringement,\u201d says Norman, but many times the adaptation of the original material is simply accepted by the IP holder. \u201cIf it doesn\u2019t harm the author of the original work \u2013 commercially, morally et cetera \u2013 pursuing legal action is often not worth it,\u201d Norman continues. \u201cAnd the fan fiction may, in fact, help sales of the original work, especially if said work is older or sporadically published.\u201d (Not a problem in ACOTAR\u2019s case, of course.)<\/p>\n

Books we’re loving in September<\/a><\/p>\n

Rebecca Yarros and Sarah J. Maas are dominating the book industry with red-hot \u2018romantasy\u2019<\/a><\/p>\n

For Amanda Gauthier, director of curation at Indigo \u2013 which stocks some of these very titles \u2013 their existence is proof of an engaged, enthusiastic fandom that was born via word of mouth in the BookTok community, a place where loving a book can be more of a lifestyle than a passing interest … even as you\u2019re waiting years for the next instalment.<\/p>\n

\u201cAnd in the meantime, to keep that special interest alive, there have been lots of ideas,\u201d says Gauthier. \u201cIf you go to Pinterest, you\u2019ll see \u2018How to throw an ACOTAR party,\u2019 or games you can play, like playoff brackets where people plug in the most dramatic scenes and you vote. It\u2019s playful, and it keeps people connected while they wait for the next book.\u201d <\/p>\n

For a retailer like Indigo, stocking these universe-peripheral titles \u2013 Dungeons & Dragons or Minecraft cookbooks, for example, or colouring books for classic novels like Anna Karenina \u2013 usually speaks to the reach of a particular fandom.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere are different areas in the book world where having an activity associated with the story just makes sense. There\u2019s an aesthetic or a universe you can dig into,\u201d she says. \u201cIt\u2019s an ever-expanding way for people to demonstrate how well they know a franchise.\u201d<\/p>\n

These titles also tend to work really well as gifts, adds Gauthier. \u201cIt\u2019s a great way to demonstrate you know somebody well, and here\u2019s a book that relates to their special interest.\u201d<\/p>\n

Does the rise of Onyx Storm signal the end of the book snob?<\/a><\/p>\n

Gauthier thinks the rise of fandom-adjacent objects like this also speaks to a sea change happening in how book lovers are perceived. <\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s something cool about reading that wasn\u2019t as cool … 10 years ago,\u201d she says, pointing to the rise of totes or hoodies advertising allegiance to a fandom. \u201cThat\u2019s an interesting swing away from that always-online universe. There\u2019s something very analog, slow. You have to put in time to become a fan, to get the reference. It\u2019s something that takes effort, and we\u2019re proud of that.\u201d <\/p>\n

A pride you might demonstrate, perhaps, by mixing your book club a Nesta\u2019s Dirty Martini from The Unofficial ACOTAR cocktail book.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s such a beautiful way to show the people in your life that you\u2019re making something really special and it\u2019s going to be a reason to talk and connect over this story,\u201d says Gauthier. \u201cIt\u2019s more than a book. It\u2019s a lifestyle.\u201d <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Open this photo in gallery: Unofficial spinoffs of popular book series like A Court of Thorns and Roses…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":4172,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[30],"tags":[276,261,277,489,251,249,278,275,248,268,269,264,250,247,219,84,156,273,267,259,289,252,253,266,262,263,256,279,257,284,111,285,139,287,282,286,69,280,283,254,271,272,135,270,281,260,145,274,265,258,255,288],"class_list":["post-4171","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-books","tag-alberta","tag-arts-news","tag-bc","tag-books","tag-breaking-news","tag-breaking-news-video","tag-british-columbia","tag-canada","tag-canada-news","tag-canada-sports","tag-canada-sports-news","tag-canada-trafficcanada-weather","tag-canadian-breaking-news","tag-canadian-news","tag-economy","tag-education","tag-entertainment","tag-environment","tag-federal-government","tag-foreign-news","tag-globe-and-mail","tag-globe-and-mail-breaking-news","tag-globe-and-mail-canada-news","tag-government","tag-life-news","tag-lifestyle","tag-local-news","tag-manitoba","tag-national-news","tag-new-brunswick","tag-new-zealand","tag-newfoundland-and-labrador","tag-newzealand","tag-northwest-territories","tag-nova-scotia","tag-nunavut","tag-nz","tag-ontario","tag-pei","tag-photos","tag-political-news","tag-political-opinion","tag-politics","tag-politics-news","tag-quebec","tag-sports-news","tag-technology","tag-travel","tag-trudeau","tag-us-news","tag-world-news","tag-yukon"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4171","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4171"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4171\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/4172"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4171"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4171"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4171"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}