Mandy M. Roth's Blog

Buy Direct from Mandy Nook Devils Among Us Single Title Novella

A forbidden menage romance between a natural-born demon slayer and the two ancient immortal vampires she was born to destroy.

Keane has ruled the underworld for centuries—taking what he wants, doing as he pleases, answering to no one. Then a beautiful young woman catches his attention, and the obsessive immortal finds himself watching her from the shadows night after night, leaving his devil coins where she sleeps. He knows better than to expect more than pleasures of the flesh from a mortal, yet he can’t seem to stop himself. Seducing her will prove to be a dangerous challenge. Keeping her will prove nearly impossible.

Hannah’s new secret admirer is more than she bargained for. As a slayer sworn to police the demons who dare to roam the earth, she has enough to worry about without some mysterious, darkly seductive stranger leaving calling cards on her pillow—especially one who puts her at odds with everything she was born to do. She should drive a stake through his obsession. Instead, she’s counting his coins like a rosary and aching for a man she’s never met.

She’s no match for Keane’s seductive powers, and when Janco, an immortal every bit as dangerous, announces he too is drawn to her, she knows she’s in way over her head. Wanting one vampire is a betrayal of everything she is. Wanting two could cost her far more than her calling. But she can’t stop herself. She wants them both, and they want her.

Inside this spicy paranormal romance novella you’ll find:

A spicy vampire menage romance (MFM) with two possessive ancient immortalsA fated mates paranormal romance where destiny refuses to take no for an answerA forbidden romance between a demon slayer and the vampires she’s sworn to huntAn obsessive, morally grey immortal hero who watches her from the shadowsDark paranormal romance heat with possessive alpha vampiresTouch-her-and-die protectivenessA guaranteed happily ever after with no cliffhanger

Devils Among Us is a complete standalone novella of scorching supernatural romance, blending dark romance edges, fated mates, and menage romance heat with the forbidden pull between a vampire slayer heroine and the ancient immortals who want her for their own.

Perfect for readers who love spicy vampire romance, morally grey heroes with centuries of patience, why-choose heat where she doesn’t have to choose, and fated mates who would burn the world down before letting anything touch her.

CW:
This book is intended for adult readers. It contains explicit sexual content, including a menage relationship, light BDSM, and blood play. It also features stalking and obsessive behavior from the heroes, a scene involving dub-con. 

Wicked Lucidity Is Back, and I Have Feelings About It

I wrote Wicked Lucidity in 2004.

Let that sink in for a second, because I still have to remind myself sometimes. This book came out when paranormal romance was having its big moment, but most of what was on the shelves looked very different from what I was putting on the page. The genre was leaning heavy into alpha males who growled a lot and heroines who needed saving. And I loved those books. I read them by the stack. But when I sat down to write, what came out was Karri-Lynn O’Higgins, and Karri was not interested in being saved by anyone.

Karri was a mess. A beautiful, fierce, funny, deeply wounded mess who cracked jokes while bleeding, who carried weapons under her jogging outfit, who fought demons in the dark while her best friend thought she was out partying. She had a mouth on her that could make a sailor blush and a heart so big it nearly got her killed more than once.

She was also a survivor.

I didn’t set out to write a book about childhood trauma. I set out to write a dark, sexy, funny urban fantasy romance with a heroine who could hold her own in any fight. But Karri’s past kept pushing its way into the story, and I let it, because that’s what real people carry. The toughest woman in the room still has a history. The one cracking jokes the loudest is sometimes the one hurting the most. I wanted to write that truth, even inside a world full of vampires and lycans and magik.

Back in 2004, dark urban fantasy existed, but it wasn’t nearly as widespread as it is now. And books that went this deep? That was rare. You could have a tortured hero with a dark past, absolutely, but a heroine who carried that kind of weight, who had survived that kind of evil, and who still managed to be the most magnetic person in every room she walked into? That was harder to find. Readers who found Wicked Lucidity got it immediately. They connected with Karri in a way that still makes me emotional when I think about the messages I received over the years.

But the book didn’t fit neatly into boxes. It was too dark for some of the romance shelves and too romantic for some of the urban fantasy shelves. It had humor that sat right next to heartbreak. It had a heroine who talked to ghosts and made up holidays about green beans and also had PTSD she refused to acknowledge. It was messy and big and unapologetically itself. Sound like anyone you know? Yeah, that part Karri and I have in common.

The genre has changed so much since then. Dark romance found its audience. Romantasy exploded. Readers are hungry for heroines who have been through hell and came out swinging. Complex female characters with complicated pasts aren’t a hard sell anymore. They’re what readers are actively searching for.

So when I had the chance to bring Wicked Lucidity back, I jumped at it.

This book was always supposed to find its people. I think the world is finally ready for Karri-Lynn.

One thing I want to mention about this edition: I added a resource page at the back of the book. Some of the themes in Karri’s story, the childhood abuse, the trauma, the long road to trusting anyone, those aren’t just fiction for a lot of people. If this book resonates with you in ways that feel personal, I want you to know that I see you, and that there is help available. The back of the book has links to the Childhelp National Child Abuse Hotline, RAINN, the 988 Suicide and Crisis Lifeline, and more. Because stories can crack open things we’ve been carrying, and when they do, no one should have to sit with that alone.

If you’ve never read Wicked Lucidity, you’re about to meet one of my favorite characters I’ve ever written. If you read it years ago and remember Karri fondly, she’s been waiting for you.

She’s still cracking jokes. She’s still fighting. She’s still here.

BUY LINKS

Wicked Lucidity is a dark urban fantasy shifter romance. It contains themes of childhood abuse (handled off-page), attempted sexual assault (not depicted), dark humor, violence, strong language, and a heroine who will absolutely steal your heart.

Buy Direct from Mandy Kobo Amazon US Amazon UK Amazon AU Amazon CA Wicked Lucidity Single Title Novel

Karri-Lynn O’Higgins has spent her entire life fighting demons. 

Half angel, half lycan, she’s a supernatural weapon wrapped in sarcasm and bad luck. Her childhood was a nightmare she barely survived. She clawed her way out, built walls high enough to keep everyone at a distance, and made a career out of killing things that crawl up from the underworld.

Now she’s one of the deadliest demon hunters alive, sent to a small town to protect her best friend from a growing supernatural threat. Simple enough. Kill what needs killing, guard the portal to the underworld, and try not to burn the place down.

Karri expects monsters. She expects blood. She does not expect the man next door who radiates enough power to make every supernatural instinct she has scream mine.

He fights like something ancient and lethal. He shows up every time she’s in danger as if he can feel it. And the way her lycan half responds to him, clawing toward him like he’s the other half of something she didn’t know was broken, terrifies her more than any demon ever has.

She’s got a vampire complication she can’t shake, a team of misfit warriors who’d die for her, and a demonic threat clawing its way out of the earth beneath this town. The last thing she needs is her enigmatic neighbor unraveling every wall she’s built.

Too bad he’s not asking permission. And too bad whatever he is, he has no intention of letting her go.

Tropes:

• Fated mates.

• Forced proximity.

• Found family.

• He fell first.

• A dark urban fantasy romance with a snarky angel-lycan heroine, supernatural warriors, and a sizzling heat.

• If you like your urban fantasy romance dark, funny, and filthy, this book has your name on it.

• Standalone dark romantasy. 

ASIN: 

CW: see below

 

View on Goodreads

CW:
Physical and emotional abuse of a child (narrative recounting of trauma)
Death/grief (including loss of parents, partner, and friends to supernatural violence)
Implied and near-explicit sexual violence by an abuser (not depicted on the page, but discussed and referenced
Trauma flashbacks depicted emotionally and viscerally
Self-destructive ideation and depressive episodes. 

What Is Romantasy? A Guide to the Genre That Has Everything

By Mandy M. Roth · NY Times & USA Today Bestselling Author

✦ ✦ ✦

Romantasy is romance with supernatural, magical, or fantastical elements at its core. If there’s a love story and something beyond the ordinary world — shifters, witches, vampires, fae, psychic abilities, gods, curses, prophecies, magical kingdoms — it’s romantasy.

I’m Mandy M. Roth, and I’ve been writing romantasy for over twenty years, starting with my first novel, Daughter of Darkness, in 2004. My books span witchy gothic romance with murder mystery (Grimm Cove), military shifter thrillers with genetically engineered super-soldiers (the Immortal Ops World), vampire operatives (Crimson Ops), paranormal operatives (PSI-Ops), and dark romantasy with supernatural protectors (Guardians, Tempting Fate). All of it falls under the romantasy umbrella.

✦ ✦ ✦ What Falls Under Romantasy

Romantasy is a big umbrella. If you’ve seen any of these terms while searching for your next read, you’re in romantasy territory:

Shifter Romance — Heroes (and sometimes heroines) who transform into wolves, big cats, bears, birds of prey, dragons, or other creatures. The shift is tied to their identity, their instincts, and usually a fated mate bond. My Immortal Ops World is built on genetically engineered military shifters. My Grimm Cove series features wolf shifters alongside witches, vampires, and Fae.

Witchy Romance — Heroines who wield magic — hereditary, learned, or newly awakened. Covens, spell-casting, herbalism, and the tension between power and vulnerability. My Grimm Cove series centers on witchy heroines discovering and reclaiming their abilities in a town built on gothic literature reimaginings.

Vampire Romance — Immortal heroes, blood bonds, centuries of history, and the tension between predator instincts and devotion. My Crimson Ops series pairs vampire operatives with fated mates in the middle of dangerous missions.

Fae & Fantasy Court Romance — Fae kingdoms, magical politics, court intrigue, and romances with beings who aren’t entirely human. Fae characters play major roles across my work — in the Immortal Ops World, in Grimm Cove, in my Guardians series, and in Tempting Fate, where the hero of Loup Garou is a Fae prince.

Dark Romantasy — Higher stakes, morally grey characters, power dynamics, and intensity. Content warnings apply, and the romance is earned through fire rather than sunshine.

Gothic Romantasy — Dark atmosphere, classic literature connections, old houses with secrets, and romance threaded with beautiful danger. Grimm Cove lives here — Frankenstein, Dracula, and Salem witch lore reimagined as a living, breathing supernatural community of witches, shifters, vampires, and Fae.

Supernatural Military Romance — Elite operatives with supernatural abilities, found-family brotherhood, covert missions, and fated mates who upend everything. The Immortal Ops World — five connected series and over thirty books — is where I’ve spent the most time writing.

Paranormal Romance — Supernatural beings navigating dangerous worlds where their abilities make them both assets and targets. My PSI-Ops series — Paranormal Security and Intelligence — pairs paranormal operatives with fated mates in a world of supernatural covert ops.

Other corners of romantasy include monster romance, alien romance, angel/demon romance, mythology retellings, academy settings, and more. The genre keeps expanding because the only rule is: supernatural world + love story + happily ever after.

✦ ✦ ✦ How to Find What You’re Looking For

If you’ve been searching by genre label and not finding what you want, try searching by trope instead. The romantasy umbrella is enormous, and trope tags are the fastest way to narrow down exactly the vibe you’re in the mood for.

Some of the most popular trope tags readers use:

#fatedmates — supernaturally destined partners
#enemiestolovers — they hate each other until they don’t
#shifterromance — heroes who transform
#witchyromance — magic-wielding heroines
#touchheranddie — possessive, protective heroes
#foundfamily — the pack, the coven, the team
#slowburn — tension that builds across chapters (or books)
#spicyromantasy — steamy with a supernatural twist
#darkromantasy — higher stakes, morally grey, intense

If you’re looking for fated mates with shifters and military action, that’s my Immortal Ops World. If you want witchy heroines, gothic atmosphere, murder mystery, and humor, that’s Grimm Cove. If you want vampire operatives on midnight missions, that’s Crimson Ops. Search by what you’re in the mood for, and you’ll find your next obsession.

The genre label is just a starting point. The tropes are what get you to the right book.

Mandy M. Roth titles are available at Amazon, Apple Books, Kobo, Barnes & Noble, Google Play, and direct from the author at romancebooksandmore.com

Browse Books by Vibe or Genre

What Makes a Great Fated Mates Romance — And Why Readers Can’t Get Enough

By Mandy M. Roth · NY Times & USA Today Bestselling Author

✦ ✦ ✦

Fated mates is the most searched trope in romantasy, and it has been for years. Readers who love it will tear through entire catalogs looking for their next fix. Readers who don’t understand the appeal wonder what all the fuss is about. And authors who write it know that getting the trope right is the difference between a book readers reread five times and a book they forget by next week.

I’m Mandy M. Roth, and I’ve been writing fated mates romance for over twenty years. It’s the trope that runs through everything I write — from witchy gothic romance to military shifter thrillers to vampire operatives to dark romantasy with gods and monsters. Over 160 novels and the trope never gets old, because it never works the same way twice. The world shapes the bond, the characters fight it or surrender to it, and the reader gets a different experience every time.

Here’s what I’ve learned about why fated mates resonates so deeply and what makes the difference between a fated mates romance that sings and one that falls flat.

✦ ✦ ✦ What Fated Mates Actually Is

At its core, fated mates is a trope where two characters are supernaturally destined for each other — bonded by fate, prophecy, magic, genetics, or forces beyond their control. The pull between them is intense, often immediate, and usually undeniable even when the characters resist it.

That’s the definition. Here’s what the definition doesn’t tell you: fated mates is really a trope about the tension between destiny and choice.

The bond exists whether the characters want it or not. It’s not something they chose. It’s not something they earned. It was imposed on them by the universe, by prophecy, by their supernatural biology, by magic they don’t control. And that’s where all the storytelling tension comes from — because the most interesting question in any romance isn’t “will they get together?” It’s “will they choose each other?”

A fated mate bond removes the uncertainty of attraction. These characters want each other. The supernatural guarantee of that desire is built into the premise. What it doesn’t remove is every other form of uncertainty: Trust. Timing. Compatibility. External threats. Internal damage. Whether the characters are willing to be vulnerable enough to let the bond become something real rather than just something the universe inflicted on them.

That’s why the trope is endlessly rereadable. The guarantee of attraction makes room for the story to focus on everything else — and “everything else” is where the real romance lives.

✦ ✦ ✦ The Different Approaches

Not all fated mates romances handle the bond the same way, and the approach shapes the entire reading experience. Across my catalog, I’ve used all three — and the world determines which one fits.

Instant Recognition

In the instant-recognition approach, both characters feel the bond immediately. They know. The supernatural pull is unmistakable — a scent, a physical reaction, a psychic link, an overwhelming certainty. The story isn’t about whether the bond is real. It’s about what happens after two people who’ve just been supernaturally bonded for life have to figure out how to actually live with each other.

This approach works brilliantly in action-heavy romantasy where the external plot is high-stakes. If the characters already know they’re bonded, the story can focus on the threats trying to tear them apart rather than spending the first half of the book on will-they-won’t-they attraction.

In my Immortal Ops World, that instant-recognition dynamic collides with covert missions, government conspiracies, and operatives who were genetically engineered into super-soldier shifters by a program that definitely didn’t plan for fated mates. The bond hits in the middle of the chaos, and these men — trained to control everything about themselves — are confronted with the one thing they can’t control. If you’ve ever loved the supernatural ensemble energy of True Blood mixed with military thriller intensity, that’s where the Ops world lives.

In my Crimson Ops series, the instant recognition carries a different weight — vampire operatives who’ve been alive for centuries suddenly confronted with a bond they never expected to feel. When you’ve survived hundreds of years without a mate, the instant hit doesn’t just disrupt a mission. It disrupts an entire identity built on the assumption that this would never happen to you.

Slow Acceptance

In the slow-acceptance approach, one or both characters resist the bond. They feel the pull but fight it — out of fear, mistrust, prior damage, conflicting loyalties, or sheer stubbornness. The romance arc is the story of resistance breaking down, not through the bond overriding their will, but through the characters gradually choosing to trust what the bond is offering them.

In Grimm Cove, where witches, wolf shifters, vampires, and Fae live alongside oblivious humans in a town built on gothic literature reimaginings, slow acceptance gets room to breathe. The heroines in Grimm Cove are women starting over — discovering abilities they didn’t know they had, navigating supernatural chaos they never signed up for, and falling for heroes who are patient enough to let the bond develop at a pace the heroine can handle. The romance builds through banter, through the heroine’s growing comfort in her own power, through the found family forming around the couple, and through murder mysteries that force them to rely on each other before they’re ready to admit they want to. Readers have compared the vibe to Practical Magic meets Gilmore Girls, and the Gilmore Girls half of that is doing heavy lifting in how the relationships develop — through conversation, humor, and genuine connection rather than just supernatural compulsion.

Fighting the Bond

The fight-the-bond approach is where dark romantasy and enemies-to-lovers intersect with fated mates. The characters are bonded, and they are furious about it. The bond doesn’t make them like each other. It makes the hatred or distrust between them even more agonizing because they can’t escape the attraction underneath it.

In my Guardians and Tempting Fate series, supernatural protectors and beings tangled in fate, folklore, and dark mythology discover bonds that complicate everything they thought they knew about their duty and their identity. The fight isn’t just emotional — it’s existential. These characters are resisting the bond because accepting it means changing who they are, and that’s a harder surrender than any battle. If you love the grit, mythology, and dark supernatural intensity of the TV show Supernatural, these series carry that same energy — with fated-mate romance woven through the danger.

In the darker corners of the Immortal Ops world — especially the Shadow Agents series — the fight-the-bond approach takes on additional weight because these operatives are already fighting to control what was done to them by the program that made them. Adding a mate bond to a man who’s barely holding the beast inside him in check creates a pressure cooker that doesn’t let up until the heroine either breaks through or walks away. She never walks away.

✦ ✦ ✦ What Separates Great Fated Mates from Forgettable Fated Mates

After writing the trope across 160+ books, selling over four million copies, and reading the trope across thousands more, here’s what I’ve found makes the difference.

✦ The Bond Can’t Do All the Work

The fated mates romances that resonate most are the ones where the bond creates the initial collision but the characters build the relationship through their choices, their conversations, their willingness to be vulnerable, and their actions under pressure. When the bond does all the heavy lifting and the characters don’t have to earn each other, the romance can feel thin. The bond gets them in the same room. Everything that happens after that has to be earned.

In every one of my series, I build the relationship on top of the bond, not because of it. The bond is the spark. The characters’ choices are the fire.

✦ The Heroine Must Have Agency

The fated mates romances that hit hardest are the ones where the heroine has real agency within the bond. She can push back against it. She can negotiate its terms. She can demand that the hero earn what the universe handed him for free. Her acceptance of the bond feels like a choice, even if the attraction was never optional. That tension between destiny and agency is where the trope gets its power.

My heroines are not passengers in their own love stories. The Grimm Cove witches handle supernatural chaos with sarcasm and spine. The PSI-Ops heroines are psychically gifted women whose abilities make them assets in a supernatural intelligence war — and their mates have to respect that their partners can hold their own. The women in my Guardians and Tempting Fate series didn’t ask to be pulled into supernatural wars, and they make the heroes who bonded to them earn every inch of trust.

✦ The External Threat Must Match the Bond’s Intensity

If the fated mate bond is the most intense force in the story, the external threats have to match it. Small-stakes conflicts feel absurd next to a supernatural bond that rewires two people’s entire lives. The best fated mates romances pair the bond with threats that are genuinely dangerous — enemies who want to destroy the bond, worlds where the bond is forbidden, power structures that would use the bond as a weapon.

This is where writing across so many different series has taught me the most. In the Ops world, the threat is institutional — the government program that created these operatives views the mate bond as a liability, not a gift. In Grimm Cove, the threats are woven into the town’s gothic literary history — the same mythology that makes the town magical also makes it dangerous. In the Guardians, the threats are ancient and mythological, tied to the same forces that created the bonds in the first place.

✦ The Humor Matters More Than You’d Think

This one surprises people. Fated mates romance is inherently intense — the emotions run high, the stakes are personal, the attraction is overwhelming. Without humor to break the tension, the story becomes exhausting rather than exhilarating.

An ancient wolf-shifter warrior who can defeat any enemy in combat but has absolutely no idea how to talk to the woman fate bonded him to? That contrast is where humor lives, and it’s what keeps readers from drowning in the intensity. In Grimm Cove, a squirrel familiar named Burgess steals scenes and judges everyone from the sidelines. In the Ops world, operatives who express affection through insults and sarcasm bring the kind of dark, dry humor that makes the brotherhood feel real. The humor doesn’t soften the romance. It makes the romance survivable — for the characters and the reader.

✦ ✦ ✦ Why the Trope Endures

Romance trends come and go. Second-chance romances surge, then fade. Enemies-to-lovers peaks, then plateaus. Fated mates never loses its audience. It’s been the backbone of supernatural romance since the genre existed, and it’s the single most requested trope in the romantasy space today.

The reason is structural. Fated mates removes the most boring question in romance (“will they be attracted to each other?”) and replaces it with the most interesting ones (“will they trust each other? will they fight for this? what will they sacrifice? who will they become?”). It front-loads the certainty of attraction so the story can spend its time on everything that matters more.

Destiny says they belong together. The story asks whether they’ll earn it.

That’s why readers can’t get enough. And after twenty years, four million books sold, and 160+ novels built on this trope, neither can I.

Mandy M. Roth titles are available at Amazon, Apple Books, Kobo, Barnes & Noble, Google Play, and direct from the author at romancebooksandmore.com

Browse Books by Vibe or Genre

Michelle M. Pillow’s Tor Bramble Deal: Realm Immortal & Tribes of the Vampire Series

Michelle M. Pillow and I have been best friends for over twenty years. Our first books came out a week apart at the same publisher. We’ve been there for one another for the highs and lows. People call us friendship goals. I call her my sister from another mister.

So when she told me about her seven-book deal with Pan Macmillan’s Tor Bramble, there was no question—this deserved a proper spotlight.

Mandy: I’m so excited and have been sitting on this news too long! I need you to spill the details now! I’m going to burst if you don’t.

Michelle: Okay, but I’m rethinking letting you have so much coffee this morning.

(takes a deep breath)

Tor Bramble just signed seven of my books—world all-language rights, including print, audio, and translations, for my Realm Immortal and Tribes of the Vampire series. It still doesn’t feel entirely real when I say it out loud.

And Mandy, you have been a reader of both of these series since the very beginning. You were rooting for these books before most people even knew they existed. So this moment feels a little bit yours too.

Mandy: Aww, that is sweet to say, but it’s easy to be behind both series because they’re awesome. You know what would be even more awesome? If you rewrote Tribes to have Jiri with a woman named Mandy who just happens to have dark hair, wear glasses, and have a weird love of decorating with skulls. I have plans to start a letter-writing campaign to make this happen. In the meantime, let’s back up for readers who are just discovering you. Who are you, and what do you write?

Michelle: I’m Michelle M. Pillow, NYT and USA Today bestselling author. Over 100 published books spanning romantasy, paranormal romance, sci-fi romance, urban fantasy, and cozy mystery. I am a hybrid author, which means I balance indie publishing with traditional publishing, and I genuinely love both sides of that world.

Mandy: Where should readers start if they’re new to you?

Michelle: If you’re new to me, the best place to start is my website, where you can find my full reading order and figure out which series calls to you first. If you want to dive into the Tor Bramble series, grab King of the Unblessed for high fantasy romance or Redeemer of Shadows for gothic vampire romance. Both series are also in ebook.

Mandy: Yes, readers, start there and be sure to hit the contact form on her website and let her know you love my plan for Jiri. Oh, I have plans for Merrick too. I have a soft spot for morally gray Fae kings. Tell the readers about Realm Immortal.

Michelle: Realm Immortal is high fantasy romance. Morally gray kings, lush world-building, enemies-to-lovers tension, and that dark forbidden pull that makes you completely lose track of time. The whole series grew out of a question I could not stop asking after watching Labyrinth: what if she had stayed with the Goblin King? David Bowie’s Jareth is the blueprint for a dangerous, magnetic, impossible-to-resist hero, and Merrick in King of the Unblessed carries that same energy. Think Tolkien’s scope meets Labyrinth, with romance at the center.

Mandy: Okay, now tell them about Tribes of the Vampire. And yes, I’m still serious about Jiri.

Michelle: Tribes of the Vampire is the darker, more gothic counterpart. Forbidden attraction, antiheroes you absolutely should not fall for and absolutely will, and an atmospheric world in the tradition of Anne Rice. Brooding, immersive, and deeply romantic in that complicated way I love.

Mandy: And what is Tor Bramble, for readers who might not know the imprint?

Michelle: Tor Bramble is Pan Macmillan’s dedicated romantasy and paranormal romance imprint, and they are doing incredible things right now. The deal covers worldwide language rights, so these series are going to reach readers in formats and markets they have never been in before, including new hardbacks, new audiobooks, and translations. The editor, Ajebowale Roberts, said I was “a juggernaut when it comes to paranormal romance and romantasy” and I will not pretend I did not screenshot that immediately so I could brag about it.

Mandy: This is the part where I make you list every single date so readers can go preorder right now.

Michelle: The Tribes of the Vampire audiobooks are already out! Redeemer of Shadows, which is Book 1, launched in February 2026 narrated by Natalie Naudus. The Realm Immortal audiobooks began rolling out in April 2026, narrated by Lauren Fortgang. For the hardbacks, King of the Unblessed releases June 16, 2026, and Faery Queen follows September 8, 2026. It is a whole era.

Mandy: What does a deal like this mean to you at this point in your career?

Michelle: It means that stories have their own timing. I wrote these series years ago, readers loved them, and they have lived in readers’ hearts ever since. Now they are getting a full-scale re-introduction to the world through one of the most respected genre imprints in publishing. That is not something I take lightly.

And having you in my corner for all of it has meant more than I can say. We started at the same time, at the same publisher, one week apart. We have celebrated together, worried together, and figured this industry out side by side. Hitting the bestseller lists together is still one of my favorite memories.

Mandy: Hitting the bestseller lists at the same time was great, but what about that time when we were in Canada and… (It was at this point that Michelle paused the interview to point out that “what happens in Canada stays in Canada.”) In all seriousness, these series are amazing, and so is my bestie! Go check her books out!

About the Interviewer

Mandy M. Roth is a New York Times and USA Today Bestselling Author with over 160 published titles and more than 4 million books sold worldwide. She writes paranormal romance, romantasy, and urban fantasy. Find her at MandyRoth.com.

About Michelle M. Pillow

Michelle M. Pillow is a New York Times and USA Today Bestselling Author of over 100 romance novels spanning romantasy, paranormal romance, sci-fi romance, and paranormal women’s fiction. Her Realm Immortal and Tribes of the Vampire series are coming in stunning new hardback and audio editions from Pan Macmillan’s Tor Bramble. Find her at MichellePillow.com.

What Is Romantasy? What Is Romantasy?

A quick guide to the genre that brought supernatural romance under one roof

One Word, Many Worlds

Romantasy is a broad umbrella term for any book that combines a supernatural or fantasy world with a central love story. If it has magic, mythology, or monsters and the romance is at the heart of the story, it falls under romantasy.

The term gained widespread popularity through BookTok readers who were looking for a single word to describe the kind of books they loved. It stuck because it’s simple and intuitive, and it gave readers one place to search instead of sorting through half a dozen genre labels.

The Subgenres That Blended In

Romantasy didn’t appear out of nowhere. It’s the natural convergence of several subgenres that have been thriving for decades, each with its own loyal readership.

Paranormal romance brought vampires, shifters, witches, and demons into romance with fated mates, alpha heroes, and guaranteed happily-ever-afters. Urban fantasy built supernatural worlds layered over the real one, with heroines navigating danger and desire in equal measure. Fantasy romance set love stories in fully imagined secondary worlds with their own magic systems, courts, and mythologies.

For years, these subgenres lived on separate shelves. Readers who loved all three had to search each one individually. Romantasy collapsed those walls. Now the sorting happens by trope and vibe rather than by which shelf a publisher put the book on.

The genre isn’t new. The word is. What You’ll Find Under the Umbrella

Romantasy covers an enormous range of stories. Here are some of the tropes and elements readers search for most:

Fated Mates Alpha Heroes Witchy Heroines Vampire Romance Shifter Romance Found Family Enemies to Lovers Supernatural Worlds

It also includes fae court epics, dragon-rider academies, gothic literature reimaginings, military supernatural thrillers, Celtic mythology, alien warrior romance, and more. If it’s supernatural and the love story is central, it belongs.

How to Find Your Next Read

The best way to discover romantasy books you’ll love is to search by trope rather than genre label. The trope tells you what the reading experience will feel like. The genre label just tells you which shelf it landed on.

#FatedMates #ShifterRomance #WitchyRomance #EnemiesToLovers #TouchHerAndDie #VampireRomance #FoundFamily #AlphaHero

Searching this way opens up both brand-new releases and backlist treasures that were published under older genre labels but deliver exactly the same reading experience romantasy fans are looking for.

Reader Tip

Don’t stop at “romantasy” as a search term. The more specific you get with tropes — #shifterromance, #witchyromance, #fatedmates — the more likely you are to find books that match exactly what you’re in the mood for.

What Is Romantasy? What Is Romantasy?

A quick guide to the genre that brought supernatural romance under one roof

One Word, Many Worlds

Romantasy is a broad umbrella term for any book that combines a supernatural or fantasy world with a central love story. If it has magic, mythology, or monsters and the romance is at the heart of the story, it falls under romantasy.

The term gained widespread popularity through BookTok readers who were looking for a single word to describe the kind of books they loved. It stuck because it’s simple and intuitive, and it gave readers one place to search instead of sorting through half a dozen genre labels.

The Subgenres That Blended In

Romantasy didn’t appear out of nowhere. It’s the natural convergence of several subgenres that have been thriving for decades, each with its own loyal readership.

Paranormal romance brought vampires, shifters, witches, and demons into romance with fated mates, alpha heroes, and guaranteed happily-ever-afters. Urban fantasy built supernatural worlds layered over the real one, with heroines navigating danger and desire in equal measure. Fantasy romance set love stories in fully imagined secondary worlds with their own magic systems, courts, and mythologies.

For years, these subgenres lived on separate shelves. Readers who loved all three had to search each one individually. Romantasy collapsed those walls. Now the sorting happens by trope and vibe rather than by which shelf a publisher put the book on.

The genre isn’t new. The word is. What You’ll Find Under the Umbrella

Romantasy covers an enormous range of stories. Here are some of the tropes and elements readers search for most:

Fated Mates Alpha Heroes Witchy Heroines Vampire Romance Shifter Romance Found Family Enemies to Lovers Supernatural Worlds

It also includes fae court epics, dragon-rider academies, gothic literature reimaginings, military supernatural thrillers, Celtic mythology, alien warrior romance, and more. If it’s supernatural and the love story is central, it belongs.

How to Find Your Next Read

The best way to discover romantasy books you’ll love is to search by trope rather than genre label. The trope tells you what the reading experience will feel like. The genre label just tells you which shelf it landed on.

#FatedMates #ShifterRomance #WitchyRomance #EnemiesToLovers #TouchHerAndDie #VampireRomance #FoundFamily #AlphaHero

Searching this way opens up both brand-new releases and backlist treasures that were published under older genre labels but deliver exactly the same reading experience romantasy fans are looking for.

Reader Tip

Don’t stop at “romantasy” as a search term. The more specific you get with tropes — #shifterromance, #witchyromance, #fatedmates — the more likely you are to find books that match exactly what you’re in the mood for.

Why I Trust BookDefender to Protect My Books (And Why You Should Too)

I’m going to tell you something most people in this industry don’t know. The man who built BookDefender built it because of me.

In 2004, I discovered that my books were being pirated across the internet. Entire novels uploaded to download sites, handed out for free to thousands of readers who never paid a cent. I was furious. I went to my publishing houses at the time expecting them to do something about it.

They didn’t.

They knew about piracy. They just didn’t consider it their problem to solve. My books were being stolen, my income was being eroded, and the people who were supposed to have my back shrugged it off as a cost of doing business.

My husband Shane didn’t shrug.

He’s an engineer by trade—he spent his career in automotive quality assurance, where precision matters and “good enough” doesn’t exist. When he saw what was happening to my books and watched the industry do nothing about it, he started doing the work himself. He learned how piracy networks operated. He tracked down every stolen copy he could find. He filed DMCA takedown notices and followed up when platforms dragged their feet. He did it again the next day when new links appeared.

He did this for years. Not as a business. As my husband, protecting my work because nobody else would.

It Didn’t Stop with My Books

Word gets around in author circles. My friends—fellow authors, many of them six- and seven-figure earners—were dealing with the same problem. The same piracy. The same silence from publishers. The same helpless frustration of watching their hard work get stolen.

One of those friends was NYT bestselling author Jana DeLeon. Over the years, Jana kept telling me the same thing, “Shane should start a business doing this. I’d hire him.”

Six years ago, he finally did. He took everything he’d learned—twenty-plus years of fighting piracy, combined with his engineering and coding skills—and built BookDefender into a professional DMCA takedown service from the ground up.

And Jana beat me to the signup. She became his very first client. NYT bestselling author Michelle M. Pillow, who’d been agreeing with Jana every single time she told Shane to make it a business, became his second. (I’m still a little salty about being third in line for my own husband’s company, honestly LOL.) The list of my close author friends who hired him out of the gate grew. Over the years, they have been wonderful about spreading the word about him and his business, pointing out what he’s done for them in their fight against digital piracy.

Now, BookDefender helps over one-hundred of today’s top authors fight back against digital piracy. All of that from word of mouth.

What BookDefender Is

For anyone who doesn’t know, BookDefender is a professional anti-piracy DMCA takedown service built specifically for authors and publishers. Shane and his team find pirated copies of your ebooks and audiobooks across the internet—piracy sites, file-sharing platforms, Telegram groups, torrent networks, all of it—and file DMCA takedown notices to get your stolen work removed.

The thing that makes BookDefender different from every other service out there is that every single link is verified by a human being before a notice is filed. Shane built it that way because he’s an engineer and he doesn’t cut corners. Automated services blast out notices by the thousands without checking whether the links are actually piracy. They flag legitimate Amazon listings, library copies, and book reviews as infringement. Every false positive damages your credibility with platforms like Google—and once that trust is gone, it’s incredibly hard to rebuild.

BookDefender doesn’t have that problem. Human eyes on every link. Every time. No exceptions.

The results reflect that approach. Over 5.5 million takedown requests processed with a 95.7% success rate. BookDefender is also a member of Google’s Trusted Copyright Removal Program, which provides expedited access to Google’s copyright removal tools—a membership earned through years of accurate, legitimate filings.

Why I’m Writing This

I’m not writing this because Shane asked me to. I’m writing this because I’ve spent over twenty years watching authors struggle with piracy and not know where to turn. I’ve watched friends lose significant income to stolen books. I’ve seen authors get blindsided by KDP account issues triggered by pirated copies they didn’t even know existed.

And I’ve watched too many authors hand their money to takedown services that promise everything and deliver nothing—services that launched last year, rely entirely on bots, and can’t produce a single satisfied client whose name you’d recognize.

I know what good piracy protection looks like because I’ve had it for over twenty years. I’ve watched Shane do this work day in and day out since 2004. I’ve seen the results firsthand—not just for my own catalog, but for my friends’ catalogs and for the hundreds of authors BookDefender now protects.

Some of the biggest names in indie publishing trust BookDefender with their careers. NYT bestselling author Jana DeLeon has said publicly that BookDefender is the first DMCA service she’s used that actually gets results. That kind of endorsement doesn’t come from marketing. It comes from the work.

What I Want You to Know

If you’re an indie author and you’re not actively protecting your books from piracy, you’re losing money. Maybe a little. Maybe a lot. But you’re losing it.

If you’re in Kindle Unlimited, pirated copies of your exclusive titles can trigger account reviews and worse. That’s not a scare tactic. It’s happened to authors I know personally.

If you’re using a takedown service that relies entirely on automation, ask yourself: has anyone actually looked at the links before filing notices in your name? Because if the answer is no, that service might be doing more harm than good.

And if you’re looking for a service that does this work the right way—with the experience, the accuracy, and the genuine care for authors that this work demands—I can tell you from twenty years of personal experience that BookDefender is it.

Yes, the founder is my husband. Yes, I’m biased. But I’m biased because I’ve watched him do this work with the same relentless precision for two decades. I’m biased because I’ve seen what happens when authors don’t have this protection, and I’ve seen what happens when they do. The difference is real, measurable, and career-changing.

Your books are your business. They deserve someone who treats protecting them like it matters.

Shane does. He always has.

Visit BookDefender.com to learn more.

I’ve been waiting to share this for a while.

Grimm Cove Books 1-4 are getting collector’s edition hardcovers. Signed. Stained glass cover art. Sprayed edges. The whole thing. And the only way to get them is through my upcoming Kickstarter campaign.

And there are exclusive goodies and content!

New Grimm Cove Content—Kickstarter Only

Resthaven: The Demon in Apartment D (A Grimm Cove World Novella)

Been dying to read more about Dana’s grandmother and her senior center crew? This novella is a Kickstarter exclusive.

Sunny with a Chance of Alchemy

You’ve been asking for Travis’s story for years. It’s a stretch goal for this campaign. If we hit it, Travis finally gets his story—tier backers gets the ebook before anyone else.

Bonus Scenes

The collector’s edition hardcovers include bonus scenes you won’t find in any other edition. And the more stretch goals we hit, the longer those scenes get. I might even toss in some deleted scenes as well.

The Collector’s Edition Hardcovers

Each book features:

Signed by meExclusive stained glass inspired cover art (designed by me—my background is in art, and I’ve done thousands of covers and commissioned pieces professionally)Custom sprayed edgesBonus scenes exclusive to this edition6×9 collector’s size

Stretch goals for the hardbacks include a ribbon bookmark and headband, exclusive interior artwork, spot UV coating, illustrated end pages, and color pages.

Special Edition Paperbacks

Not looking for all the hardcover frills? There are also special edition paperbacks of Books 1-4 with the exclusive stained glass inspired covers, new size, and bonus scenes.

The Books:

Book 1: Cloudy with a Chance of WitchcraftBook 2: Hexing with a Chance of TornadoesBook 3: Spellcasting with a Chance of SpiritsBook 4: Starry with a Chance of NightshadeExclusive Swag

There’s also Kickstarter-exclusive swag you won’t be able to get anywhere else—character cards, bookmarks, stickers, and more. I’ll be revealing these throughout the campaign.

About the Series

If you’re new here: Grimm Cove is a paranormal romance series set in a supernatural Southern town where witches, wolf shifters, vampires, and Fae live alongside (mostly oblivious) humans. The series follows a group of women navigating magic, mystery, found family, second chances, and romance.

Over 26,000 readers have rated the series with a 4.5-star average.

Tropes include:

Fated matesSecond chance romanceEnemies-to-loversFound familyGrumpy/sunshineStrong heroines and protective alphasNods to classic gothic literature (Van Helsing, Frankenstein, and more)Supernatural small townStrong female friendshipsWhy Kickstarter?

Collector’s editions are expensive to produce. Small print runs, premium materials, hand-signed copies—none of that happens through traditional retail. Kickstarter lets us do this together.

How to Back the Project

The campaign launches soon. If you want early access to backer pricing and limited reward tiers, follow the prelaunch now:

FOLLOW THE KICKSTARTER PRELAUNCH

You’ll get notified the moment we go live.