Gen Reads Tournament

romance-free facedown

[gen-reads-tournament]

Gen Reads Tournament

Submissions are: OPEN

FAQ:

What is this tournament?

This is a bracket for books with no or very low romantic content, that aren't just for kids. Why? Because it can be really hard to find books that fit that brief, even for the mod (a trained librarian!) This tournament will highlight some gen reads, and at the end, all submissions will be added to a Google spreadsheet, which will be posted on this blog and left up for community reference and romance-free book recommendations.

Define "gen"?

In fanfiction, a gen fic is a story that focuses on something other than sex or romance. For the purposes of this tournament, any book with no or minimal focus on romance (i.e. background pairings but no romantic plots or subplots) is fair game! Canonically aro and/or ace characters are a bonus but not necessary.

What should I submit?

Any book or book series (audiobooks, ebooks, comics and graphic novels included), fiction poetry and biography, any and all genres, as long as it is romance-free or otherwise fits under the label of "gen"! You may submit as many titles as you'd like, but please for the sake of the mod's inbox limit yourself to submitting each individual title only once.

Can I submit propaganda for my favorite gen read?

YES! Propaganda is encouraged! This is first and foremost an excuse to crowdsource book recommendations for gen readers! I'm not going to completely ban anti-propaganda (defined as criticizing a competitor to promote your own favorite book), but please keep it in the spirit of friendly rivalry or I will be forced to revise that policy.

Additional aromantic and gen book-finding resources under the cut:

aro & ace books

Goodreads aro shelf

[magpies-and-crows74]

I think there’s a tendency to think of aspecs as ‘lacking’ something that the majority of people have, even if they’re not judging, or if they’re aspec themselves. And it’s easy to do when society and labels revolve around attraction and certain types of relationships, but I think we need to remember that we are not living our lives without something, we are living our lives with a different mode of operation, different priorities, rich lives and so on. We are working on different axes, not the same axis at zero

[tolkiengenweek]

Tolkien Gen Week 2026

DAY FOUR: Solo ● Work and Craft ● Language Tolkien’s characters must spend time on their own! What does your favorite character do by themself? What’s a favorite hobby or a craft they’ve dedicated their life to? What’s a struggle they endured alone? And how did they tell those stories to others? This is a day to explore the relationship of a character with themself, their skills, or their language.

These prompts are optional, and we are open to any gen content whether or not you stick to our suggestions!

Please tag your posts with #tolkiengenweek AND @ mention this blog @tolkiengenweek so they can be easily found. If your submission turns into a long post, please put what you can beneath a “Keep reading” divider. If you are posting your submission to AO3, you can add it to the event collection here.

[gen-reads-tournament]

Gen Reads Tournament - Submissions Now Open!

Gen Reads - Submission Form

The purpose of this tournament is to highlight books with no or very low romantic content, that aren't just for kids. Ideally, submissions s

This is a bracket for books with no or very low romantic content, that aren't just for kids. Give me your favorite non-romantic books and we'll do battle for the title of Tumblr's Favorite Gen Book.

Please spread the word! At the end of the tournament, all submissions will be posted in a spreadsheet and left up as a resource of gen book recommendations, so the more, different titles we get the better!

FAQ