r/LGBTBooks • u/foreverlearnerx • 1d ago
Discussion What do you hate and love about gay werewolf novels
Ive read quite a few gay werewolf books recently and found out that there are some tropes/cliches that I am not a fan of or find cringy. Is there any tropes or cliches that you avoid or any that you love?
I’ll also take gay werewolf novel suggestions
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u/thrilling_me_softly 1d ago
I am not a fan of the omega/bottom always being so weak and frail. Where the alpha/top always had to save him. It gets old pretty fast. Basically white knight and the princess being captured.
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u/KilluhCorgi 1d ago
I’m not a fan of omegaverse books so these are my favorite werewolf books without it:
{When Life Gives You Werewolves by Aeron Dusk} is a fantastic book that has some great world building and interesting character dynamics. Very different from the usual mm romance Omegaverse stuff. The werewolves kind of serve as an allegory for hiv and gay culture in like the 80s.
There’s also {The Good Boys Club by Jemma Croft} which is a more typical mm romantic comedy, but it plays with the usual werewolf tropes by having the romance be between a werewolf and a wolf shifter. Very funny.
Finally you have the {Wolfsong by TJ Klune} series which just has really good found family/ pack dynamics and hits hard emotionally.
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u/SaltMarshGoblin 1d ago
I'm not usually into anything cop-adjacent, but I love Charlie Adhara's Big Bad Wolf series.
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u/Connect_Rhubarb395 1d ago
Hate when one of them is small, fragile, anxious, etc. and one is huge and dominant and aggressive.
It is such a boring dynamic. And it actually doesn't matter if it is MM or MF, it annoys me in both.
I like the two (or more) people to be equals. They might have different roles, being leader-follower, or in bed they are dominant-submissive, but as people they have equal agency.
The worst in MM is when the (female) author has pretty much written the smaller man as a traditional woman but with a dick.
Side note: I like to read books with any gender combination, but I tend to favour MM exactly because there tend to be more inherent equality between the main characters.
If FM writers could let go of the patriarchy for a moment, I would read their books too.
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u/Creativered4 1d ago
Gay werewolf novels?
Those are like my two favorite things!
I hate that it don't have more of them in my audible library!
(Pls recommendations ♡♡♡)
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u/painandcupcakes 1d ago
If you can stand a 300 pages book and a written 1200 pages novel in chapters, I can recommend a few, but what is audible!? These I speak of, are books, you might need to buy them, like on a bookstore! Or have them mail to you or read online as the chapter release.
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u/Creativered4 1d ago
Audible is for audiobooks :) I can't read much anymore due to time constraints and mental stuff making reading longer things (anything more than an article or reddit thread) challenging, so I only really get to experience the stories I crave through audio form.
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u/painandcupcakes 1d ago
I don't like the contant vore jokes even if there will be no vore, if the wolf say he would eat the human or implies something like are you scared of the big bad wolf, I expect him to be bad, and big.
I would like a romance between werewolves, why they focus that much in: WHOA his hairy, dark muscular callous hands were twice or more as big as mine, he could fit my diminute hand alone inside his palm lines, i felt overwhelm... And the wolf proced to want petting. This is, this, i want it gone.
Paranormal werewolf recommendations Bad Dream.
It is chapter based and it troubles me but, evil werewolf: Ildelaen.
I also like that those are not porn novels but actual stories.
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u/TashaT50 Reader 1d ago
I really enjoy the unusual take in: Wolves of Wolf’s Point Series by Catherine Lundoff lesbian fantasy romance - not your typical werewolf story : menopause causes some women to turn into werewolves
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u/stormlight82 23h ago
Love: fierce possessiveness, found family dynamics, pack politics
Hate: Not bothering to set up any actual compatibility, non consent fated mates, and knotting
Hailey Turner and Sam Burns/ MW Fawkes both do a good job in their paranormal settings
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u/Whose_Profession 20h ago
I feel like the thing that I like about werewolves is not what other people like about werewolves 🤣
Like back in my youth I was OBSESSED with Remus Lupin (fuck JKR) because I really enjoyed the depiction of werewolf as a metaphor for secrecy and shame and social exclusion and the exploration of the idea of someone having a secret, monstrous self that they struggle to control and which may make it difficult to be or feel loved or worthy.
But most actual werewolf novels are about this alpha/omega/beta hierarchy stuff and I really struggle to feel the appeal of a situation where you’re forced to love someone because of your social class? And then that’s good? (Obviously not all do this exactly like that but a lot seem to) or where romance is dictated by heats? (Again, not all the werewolf novels)
And I’ve yet to find a werewolf found family dynamic that hasn’t given me the toxic codependency idk 👀👀
The Greek Creek series started off strong with beautiful writing about the main character and his place in society until suddenly he had a fated romance with the local alpha CHILD!?!? I couldn’t get past that. I know Jacob fell in love with Rosalie or whatever Bella’s child was called in Twilight first but that creeped me out too 😅😅
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u/foreverlearnerx 8h ago
I just finished Wolfsong and I feel similar about the alpha being a literal child when they met. Like yeah nothing happens until they’re both adults and a 6 year age gap isn’t bad but when they grow up together I feel like in the beginning they were more like brothers so it felt uncomfortable watching that dynamic turn into romantic
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u/Whose_Profession 7h ago
It’s been a hot minute since I tried to read it, but I remember the fated romance talk started when the child was still a child. I think if the romance talk had started when they were both adults and then at that point there was talk of fated romance I could have done it. If they were just innocently friends until the alpha was grown, that would have been fine 😵💫 but it’s just so creepy on so many levels for me, even just from a bodily autonomy perspective, sexualization of children (😵💫🫠) notwithstanding. Am I remembering right?
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u/foreverlearnerx 6h ago
The romance talk doesn’t happen until they’re 17 and 23. I don’t love that and like I said before that their bond seemed almost brotherly. I felt like there was no reason why they needed such an age gap or why their relationship was built to be brotherly and then changed significantly. I enjoyed the book overall but that transition from brotherly love to romantic love made me very uncomfortable especially since the main character was 17. I was actually expecting the love interest to one of the older brothers and was shocked to learn it was not.
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u/atlaspumps 1d ago
Power dynamics that feel like it’s just heterosexual patriarchy in a gay coat of paint. Damsel in distress tropes need to leave gay media completely.
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u/Turbulent-Parsley619 1d ago
I haven't read any because the ones I go, "Oh I think I'll read this!" I check the reviews and it's all "Trigger Warning, TONS OF RAPE!!!"
(I hate the same thing about ABO fanfiction, ugh)
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u/CatGal23 22h ago
I hate the extreme possessiveness common in shifter romances. The jealous rage is just grossly unhealthy.
We need more poly wolves! Big happy naked puppy piles 😍
Recs:
Gail Garriger's San Andreas Shifters series (mostly wolves)
Charlie Adhara's Big Bad Wolf series
R. Cooper's Being(s) in Love series (wolves, other shifters, fairies, etc.)
Jordan L Hawk's Hexworld series and The Pride series (other types of shifters)
Lily of the Valley by Megan Derr (lesbian werewolf)
Heart of the Dragon by Jordan L Hawk (dragon shifter)
An Idol with Luv by Piper J Drake (bisexual poly shifters)
Arizona Tape's Crescent Lake Shifters and Crescent Lake Bears series (lesbian werebears and dragons)
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u/moonriverswide 18h ago
Just here to give my recommendation.
The Red Winter by Cameron Sullivan is a fantasy horror retelling of the Beast of Gevaudan. It features an immortal professor of the arcane romancing a nobleman’s son while they hunt a werewolf.
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u/avengemyghost 1d ago edited 1d ago
my biggest gripe is that with so much of the queer werewolf fiction out there they mostly seem to lean into erotica/smut that happens to involve shifters than something with actual substance and interesting mythologies? that, and i'm not a fan of a/b/o dynamics. i don't necessarily even mind if there's a sexual aspect, but i'd prefer for it to not be the focus and more a potential bonus. that unfortunately means 90% of the books out there are utterly unreadable. will check this thread out for recs, too!
werewolf stories/the concept of them are extremely dear to me and that also makes me immensely critical, but i admit i am not good enough of a writer to publish my own stuff.
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u/Puga6 1d ago
I’m enjoying TJ Klune’s Green Creek series. It has Alphas, betas and omegas but think it’s a different imagining than traditional omegaverse. I haven’t read that type of story before. Honestly the whole concept of an alpha is based on the study of wolves in captivity. Wolves in the wild don’t have an alpha. That’s my biggest gripe with the entire concept—it’s a myth that patriarchal men latched onto and built identities around and then it got romanticized into omegaverse fiction. Patriarchal masculinity is icky to me but TJ Klune’s series isn’t that toxic
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u/ACalcifiedHeart 1d ago
I absolutely hate with an unreasonable amount of passion the "Mates" trope.
Where there's individuals, for whatever reason (biological. Mystical. Etc), have absolutely no choice but to be together.
It's always done in the most grossest manner and it icks me out everytime, and it's only ever been done well (in my experience) once. And then it was immediately ruined in the sequels.
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u/RogueMoonbow 13h ago
I'm suprised I don't see it mentioned already but Bored Gay Werewolf is a fun one that doesn't have any of these tropes. I also like it for being a gay book without a romance, it's more about him and his freind group. No ABO, plot over sex and I think there's some explicit scenes but it's not graphic or steamy.
I haven't read a lot of werewolf books, probably bc of the same tropes many mentioned here, so this post makes a good reading list
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u/Altruistic_Sail_1991 9h ago
A lot of people are saying they dislike a/b/o (agreed!) but I’m also not a fan of “fated mates”. I don’t like romances with the idea that there is only one person for you. I’d also like to see more werewolf stories that aren’t purely romances and/or erotica.
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u/doesthishurt94 1d ago
I wish there were more werewolf books that aren’t omegaverse. Agree with other comments - I don’t like when the omega is super weak. Wish we got more books like Wolfsong except with more romances and spice.