A moment early in Taylor Swift and Travis Kelce’s relationship seemed like the stuff of a paperback love story.
Swift was attending her first Kansas City Chiefs game, cheering for her new lover in a box seat. A camera landed on Kelce just as he looked up, noticed her, and broke out into a grin while slowly shaking his head as if to say, “I can’t believe she’s here.”
It was straight out of a romance novel, according to Tessa Bailey, who knows a thing or two about what makes a successful book. She’s the author of dozens of best-selling romance novels, including a new series of love stories starring athletes.
“As a romance author, it’s almost too good to be true. It’s been so interesting to watch the way he’s behaving like a romance hero,” Bailey says, referencing little moments between Kelce and Swift that have played out in viral video clips.
In the literary world, sports romances are having a Cinderella moment of their own. Is the word’s fascination with a certain pop star and football player’s relationship to blame?
Athlete-centered romance novels historically have been more popular in self-publishing than traditional publishing, according to KT Hoffman, author of “The Prospects,” which debuted this spring through top publishing company Penguin Random House.
Hoffman began writing his enemies-to-lovers romance about two minor league baseball players in 2018, and sold the book in spring of 2022, all before the sports romance craze really took off.
To Leah Koch, co-owner of romance bookstore The Ripped Bodice, sports romances have seen steady popularity among her hardcore romance readers over the last eight years or so. But to the general public, hockey romances really took off last year, thanks at least in part to “Icebreaker” by Hannah Grace, starring an ice skater and a hockey player.
“That’s part of what’s so great about romance: People are like, ‘Oh, ice hockey romance is a thing?’ And you turn around and discover that not only is it a thing, but you have, like, 50 books that you can read,” Koch says.
Off the ice, more authors are gaining traction with books for other sports: baseball, soccer, basketball and, yes, football. What is it about athletes that writers — and readers — keep being drawn to as love interests?
“The most compelling thing about athletes is that confidence and drive that you have to have in order to be a successful athlete,” Hoffman says. “You have to have worked at it your whole life. … Characters who really want something are inherently going to make an interesting narrative.”
Is it Swift and Kelce’s fault that readers can’t get enough of sports romances? Not entirely, experts say. Traditional publishing moves a lot slower than their less-than-a-year-long relationship.
When Hoffman started writing “The Prospects," he was warned that the book might not sell very well. But after selling it to a traditional publisher, there was an “inkling” that it might be on-trend, Hoffman says.
Feel-good soccer show “Ted Lasso” was all the rage. Then came hockey books like “Icebreaker.” And suddenly ”sports were everywhere” in romance.
“I’m really lucky to be hitting the niche at the right time," he says.
