A Rant About Cozy Fantasy 

*sits down with a nice cup of tea ready to listen to Liene rip books I liked to shreds once again* 😂

Honestly, i read Legends and Lattes, really enjoyed it and went 'well... I think i got everything i wanted from cozy fantasy' and went back to Age of Madness lol

After watching the video, I'm still not sure whether you have a problem with the concept of cozy fantasy per se, or just with the particular examples of it that you have read. I don't think I had heard Small Angry Planet categorized as "cozy," and, having read and enjoyed it, I don't think it would have occurred to me to apply that label to it. It's my understanding that the label "cozy fantasy" was inspired by the earlier term "cozy mystery" as a subgenre of mystery/detective fiction, with little or no "onscreen violence," a "cozy" setting (like a small town), and an unassuming protagonist who is not a police or professional detective.

I could probably get more into Cozy Fantasy if book prices weren't so damn high. Don't wanna take the risk on something I can comfortably assume will have little plot when I'm paying 30-40 dollars for 300 page hardcover. Imma need these cozy fantasies to start having cozy prices.

So, are these books that publishers would normally laugh at and reject, but instead saw a cash-in trend?

I can really understand the frustration of a 'cozy' book having disturbing concepts and still presenting itself as cozy... it could mean that the writer (and publishers) don't even conceive of particular things are problematic, often from a narrow and biased worldview... or it could mean they fully do realise this and want to push the ideas or worldview as something you don't even need to think of as anything to question, just a given. Great point. (It's not even a book, but I randomly thought of the BBC show 'Merlin', which had a comedy episode involving people forced to fall in love by magic... and in this ep, for the crime of being a bit stuck-up and mean to one of the male leads, a guest female character was left enchanted to love one of the men, with no way of breaking it forever. So no chance of peace or real love, for the rest of her life, delivered as a joke ending, that you don't even need to think about. Still hacks me off to this day. Didn't finish that show)

Before I sit down and listen to this rant (yay rant!!), I will express my issue with the recent "cosy fantasy" books I've read. Frankly, they just aren't good books. Legends and Lattes (the one I've seen people rave about most!) is...fine. It's not a great book, not even good. I like cosy books, yes. But give me a good story, well told! That's what I'm looking for here. And most of these books recently marketed as cosy fantasy? They're not good stories. And they're not well told. If I want cosy? I'll read Anne of Green Gables. I'll read Little Women. I'll read a book of quality that also makes my heart smile.

So, I DNF'd Legends and Lattes yesterday and started The long way... this afternoon. Thanks for saving me some time.

I also thought about another cozy fantasy favorite -Howl's moving castle! The one that emily wilde really tried to rip off but with little success.

Friend…..where have you been

my cozy fantasy is jonathan strange and mr norrell

I don't know that people in SFF were deliberately going for "cozy" until after Legends & Lattes, which is why books like the Wayfarer series are sort of retrospectively labeled that way but absolutely may not qualify in the same way as L&L. I've also noticed that every time I hear a booktuber talk about Emily Wilde or Wayfarers or Can't Spell Treason without Tea, they almost always don't feel it's 100% "cozy." Beginning to think maybe L&L is the only really "cozy" SFF book start to finish? 🤨

I haven't read any of these books so I might pick them up and hate them... but I like the idea of COZY Fantasy. Does this mean I don't like more serious fantasy? Absolutely not, my favorite series is First Law where the "nice" characters are ruthless killers. But I like the idea of also reading fantasy where the stakes aren't risk your life and loved ones or else the whole world (or universe or multi-verse) explodes. Sometimes you want to just relax and hangout. It's why I can love watching Breaking Bad but then want to switch to Friends.

Usually cozy fantasy means "Fantasy where nothing cool happens."

Deep worldbuilding is so cozy to me. For example Wheel of time. Living in the world alongside the characters. Coziness is also experiencing the characters journey and not rushing to the destination.

What a great opening. 😂😂

I did like Emily Wilde’s Encyclopaedia of Fairies but I do feel like more could have been done with it. This idea of the scientific study of fairies is so interesting but I wanted MORE science, MORE academia.

You make a compelling argument. 😂 Despite our reading taste being opposites.

I love me some ranting

You absolutely killed it with this video, Liene! Wonderfully well scripted and thought out. You articulated everything I have disliked about this subgenre but hadn’t been able to put into words coherently or intelligently. From this sub genre, Legends and Lattes has been the biggest disappointment for me. Just garbage. I mean I love cozy vibes (Gilmore Girls being the best tv show ever), I love coffee, I love fantasy (especially soft or lower fantasy, more character-driven) but L&L was just a big load of nothing.

Nice! She's back

I don't know anything about cozy SFF but I do know that I love listening to you talk!

I

This is interesting since I would not consider Emily WIlde cozy fantasy at all.

I first became addicted to Cozy Fantasy after seeing Legends & Lattes being recommended by Wee Lass Reacts. I got curious about the book, looked it up, read it...and LOVED IT! I loved the book so much, I actually went about looking up other titles from the author and pre-ordered the prequel book

Sounds like the better name would be "Lazy Fantasy" 😁🤣

This being the very first video I've watched on your channel because of the topic covered, I am glad I am not the only one who kind of cringes from the cozy fantasy genre. Not my cup of tea, as I am much more a fan of traditional fantasy in the realm of LOTR and Dragonlance. Honestly, I did rather enjoy Emily Wilde's Encyclopaedia of Faeries, although it did not creep past me that I noticed exactly what you talked about in this video. It would have been much more impressive and interesting (in my opinion) that Heather Fawcett would've pointed to the reasons behind where the lores originated instead of just using the lores as part of the plot. I just picked up the hardcover copy of Sarah Beth Durst's "The Spellshop" just because of the author, and I really enjoyed her Queens of Renthia trilogy. This was my misdoing, but I did not realize that this book is labeled as cozy fantasy. I was a little bummed about that, but I'll give it a shot and see what goes down. I hope this is not a foreshadowing of what is to come, that being well-known authors (or authors cashing in on popular genre waves) jump on the cozy fantasy bandwagon. Yet again another example of publishing companies somewhat dictating what will be popular. Give me Tolkien, Abercrombie, Gwynne, and Hobb, you can keep your stupid cozy fantasy. Love the content, new subscriber here!!! I found this channel because of Goodreads! Happy reading!!

Some of the ones who mentioned aren't normally on the list of cozy fantasy...

Ooooooooo she comes ......everyone into the fall out shelters ❤ truly appreciate your rants.

Cozy fantasy, aka boring fantasy.

When you mentioned you were going to read Emily Wilde's Encyclopedia a month or so ago, I immediately thought "Liene's going to hate that book", and yep. I Agree. That book is the worst. Excited for the full rant video.

You aren't wrong about cozy but you are wrong about warbreaker hope this helps ♥

Nice conversation I'm also not a fan of a Cozy Fantasy, and some books from this list never gave me the vibe I'd enjoy it (and I have no buddy reads that would make me read those).

Totally agree with everything here. Cosy fantasy is definitely uncanny. The only proper cosy fantasy I like is probably cosy comics and Diana Wynne Jones but those have pretty interesting worldbuilding. My cosy fantasy is usually whimsical literary fantasy like The Night Circus or fairy tales, and those can get DARK 😅 I do like cosy sci-fi like Murderbot or space operas, but those don't necesarily lack stakes entirely. (But that's probably because I prefer soft sci-fi, where I don’t have to be annoyed at the bad "hard" science or turn off my brain to ignore that.) The only proper modern cosy fantasy I've read is probably House in the Cerulean Sea (it was fine, forgetable) and Emily Wilde Encyclopaedia of Faeries. And I hated Emily Wilde's so much. Also low stakes cosy? Nope. What's cosy about a trumatic self inflicted hand injury/amputation on page! Like, what's cosy about self mutilation?? Nothing! And it's not even important for the plot! Everything happens the same if it hadn't happened. Like what was the point?? And the character acts later like it hardly even happened!! Aside from that mismarketing, it was truly a nothing book. It wasn't interesting fairy lore that contrast human morals, it had shallow neurodivergent and lgbtq+ representation, it was not historical enough, not scientific enough, not a romance, not cosy, not dark enough, not epic, it was nothing!

Will you be doing House of the Dragon season 2 responses? 👀 Looking forward to your in-depth Emily Wilde review … lol, maybe?😅

Glad to see you back and with compelling arguments as usual, Liene! I liked L&L but the “cosy” subgenre got old very quickly for me.

Wandering inn is “cozy fantasy” done right

Lol. I don’t have the same qualms, I just find the cozy books so dull with few exceptions, but I appreciate the rationale for your rant!

I was not aware of this sub-genre.

I also don't like cozy fantasy but, funny enough, I put Kingkiller kind of in that category, and I know you love those books.

Hi! I'm new, this is the first video of yours I've watched (already a fan of you!). I want to just start my comment by saying I actually enjoyed Legends and Lattes' series and Emily Wilde's series (which I do not even classify Emily Wilde to be cozy...I was a bit shocked when I read it!). But I can understand there were some world-building aspects that were missing from these stories. I feel the exact same way about the sub-genre of romantasy - the romance is definitely there, but the world-building is lacking greatly and there are a bunch of plot holes ("Fourth Wing," "Assistant to the Villain," etc.). I also feel like for Legends and Lattes, if the author decided to do this in a "real world" setting rather than fantasy, I feel like there wouldn't be much of a difference, and that's disappointing for a book classified as a fantasy novel. My personal opinion is since cozy fantasy is still newer in terms of sub-genres, it's still finding its footing, just like the subgenre of romantasy. I feel like some writers or publishers will slap on the "fantasy" term to cozy fantasy and romantasy just to say they are fantasy and make their novels stand out among the rest in their main genres (ex. romance for romantasy; not sure about cozy...maybe contemporary fiction or speculative fiction?), which is why I think it seems to lack the fantasy elements and world-building.

I’m pretty new to Fantasy Books and I think you do great work. So! … Correct me if I’m wrong, but based on your description of Cozy Fantasy couldn’t it be called “Lazy Fantasy”?

Love a good Liene rant. I liked Legends and Lattes but couldn't read past a couple chapters the sequel. For me, the cozy genre was nice for the first couple books, but after the novelty has worn off, I too find them boring. Though I'm struggling finding new SFF that doesn't bore me so if you find any new releases that you love, I hope you share that on this channel. I had completely forgotten about The London Seance Society. Probably a good reason for that lol.

Hehe a well deserved rant

Hadn't heard of cozy fantasy but definitely doesn't sound like something i would be into, thanks for the heads up. Sounds like lazy fantasy

I only read cozy or romantic fantasy books during Xmas and even then I prefer to watch a cozy anime

Oh now I'm afraid to read Long way to a small angry planet, I have heard great thing about it but I agree so much with all you said about cosy fantasy so... maybe itsalso not a book for me 😂

I haven't read anything in this genre, but i dislike too much detail and worldbuilding (I usually ignore most of it in high fantasy) and i love focusing on the characters and like knowing they'll be ok😔 Honestly tho the only worldbuilding i like is Neil's in general and Rainbow's during carry on so is definitely a ME problem haha

“…because I’m a First Law girlie…” - cozy SFF, like Legends & Lattes, is always going to be a watery, tepid brew compared to Joe Abercrombie’s scalding espresso. There’s still a place for it, but your takedown of bad world building and obnoxious themes is right on. On the plus side, does The Haunting of Tram Car 015 count as cozy?

Love your channel, and your work. Watching blog video. Paused to comment: Not that Becky Chambers did her genre history homework (by what you are saying she clearly hasn't) but before "Sentient" became the common term for self aware "creatures" in SF, Sapient as in "Thinking" was used to differentiate between alien "people" and alien "monsters." Perhaps, since she's reinventing the wheel, she is on a journey of parallel development? Hodgkin's Law? BTW - Thank You for making this available; I'm not into trolling, but I DO enjoy someone who can point out the Emperor's Clothing gaffes , because I feel insane when NO ONE ELSE NOTICES. Thank you for the low cost Mental health care.

never heard of it.

in the linked video about a long way to a small angry planet you go on a rant about how a character happened to have pink skin.. "you don't become genetically paler because there was less sun around for your parents. that's not how it works".. it does work like that over many generations. chambers was on the right track, pink skin it's an example of regressive evolution, adaptations such as pigmentation or eyesight loss readily happen in animals living in dark environments like caves (look at he olm/proteus for example). she probably took inspiration by this, but granted, this happens over a much longer period of time than what's mentioned in the book (you said "for centuries", i haven't read the book to know the details).. and to say about enceladus "whatever that's supposed to be" in a rant about how the science is iffy...

These books are just an aspect of publishers capitalizing on mainstream audiences. That may sound stupid, like of course they're going to do that, but considering where SFF publishers came from and how they were running their businesses up until 2010, it doesn't make a whole lot of sense. In addition to publishing "palatable" books, they're also disguising fantasy books by redoing or toning down covers. They don't want to serve a niche market (though that "niche" is bigger than it's ever been). If they just kept serving hardcore fans, I think they'd make more money than they do trying to blend in with the crowd.

It’s that final POV of the “villain” in eternal torment that’s doing it for me.. like why? are we just going to rub it in now? Wtf???

bahahahahahaha. No, i do believe you are correct Liene... 'cosy' fantay is most certainly, not in your hitting zone ma'am lmfao. And despite your horrible Warbreaker opinions, Liene is still the best, chuck out the rest.

Swiftly going to the Angry Planet rant next 🚶‍♀️🚶‍♀️🥳😁

Some of the coziest fantasy books aren’t even under the genre of cozy. Name of the Wind was one of the coziest of all. Harry Potter is quite cozy due to nostalgia. Trilogies like the First Law and Farseer trilogies are so cozy due to living in the shoes of the character. The stories are paced in a realistic and organic manner. Right now I’m on Wheel of Time book 9. The series is absolutely cozy because it’s such a realistically paced series. The story and characters develop in the most natural way. Moment to moment day to day story telling.

My cozy fantasy is Kingdoms of Death.

20:00 what its the US doing in guantamo?

London Seance Society was sooo bad and forgettable that all I remember of it was that it was a waste of my time. I watched the spoiler part of this video and none of your discussion even rang a bell I forgot it so hard.

Man, it's so rare that people talk about worldbuilding being just WRONG, off-kilter. I really appreciate you doing so. It just sucks out all the enjoyment out of a book. A lot of recent-ish authors do it too, so casually like, "wouldn't it be cute if... uwu" and nobody even points it out. It ruined Divine Rivals for me and pretty much everything T. Kingfisher has written. I'm looking forward to that video you may post one day. Cozy fantasy means something entirely different to me and I think no two people's cozy will be the same. For some reason The Library at Mount Char was very cozy-feeling (in spite of all the ludicrous amounts of gore!) and The Night Circus. It's very hard to pin down, and deliberately low stakes, lack of tension and forever downtime for the characters shouldn't make it cozy by default.

You made me want to read these books, just so I can hate them with you….

I had a similar reaction to T. Kingfisher's Nettle and Bone where our protagonists just decide to kill the prince/king. Like, they have this powerful magic and fairy godmothers and they can't come up with some way to stop his Evil Doings other than to just go in and commit good old fashioned hands on murder? And they're the good guys?! I know people who love this book and when I mention this to them they just sort of blink at me. :-) Great video, as usual.

It's an interesting topic, this F'd up morality that an increasing number of writers display. I love a little darkness in fiction, or a lot sometimes if it's from Chuck Palahniuk :) But, like you said, authors with proper morals frame it in a way that it has weight and consequence and is understood that it has a negative effect on the world. This casually kill and torture for eternity, idea being presented as the obvious, good thing to do, or for example shows like She-Hulk and Rings of Power having protagonists doing things that are actually villainous, but glossed over as righteous, shows some kind of out-of-touch world view for the writers and publishers, producers, etc. Does it come down to lack of real life experience? Is it a generational thing? Not sure.

haha Amazon links for books you slagged off

I just watched the episode about Long Way to a Small Angry Planet. I wonder how they supplied oxygen to all those cows on Mars and removed the methane 🤡

Cute

I started reading Legend and Lattes because I loved the pitch and since I love so many slice of life books, and fantasy books I thought I would love it too. It was so poorly executed that I ended up hating it. wtf you mean "we need to discuss how to bring coffee to this area that doesn't know what it is, let's go to thriving CAFÉ"?????? Noe I immediatly dismiss recomendations from people who say they liked the book, and refuse to read books comp'ed to it as well such was the anger after finishing it

Yeap! To me the so called cozy fantasy is emphasizing the least interesting aspects of traditional fantasy stories. Sure there are people who like those parts, but I can't imagine that there's so many of them to have a separate sub-genre or even a genre shift.

We need that disquiet gods review bruh

Can someone explain what Emily Wilde did that was gross? I haven’t read it

Oh no you are completely correct about the genre, it sucks, and i have nothing good to say about any of it.

I've really never liked "and then they got what they deserved" as an uncritically-presented-as-positive resolution.

cozy fantasy misses the point about fantasy. blame woke sjw times for it.