Heightflation among literary male love interests is out of control man. So many people got into an arms race to make taller and taller dudes that people will be legitimately shocked if you say a male love interest character is 5'10" and ask why you chose to make him so unbelievably short. I can only presume this is because they read that Prince Sexyfae was 6'4" and don't actually conceive about how colossally large that is, and just imagine a normal slightly above average height to the point that their brain adjusts and the heightflation cycle starts.
Someone on the /r/RomanceBooks subreddit did an analysis of the best selling romance books of 2024 and found this:
Most of them are vaguely described as over six feet, with the most common explicitly stated heights being 6'3" and 6'6". There were more MMCs over 7 feet in height than under 6 feet in height, even though 84% of American men are under 6 feet/1.83 meters. 6'6" (slightly over 1.98 meters) is fucking gigantic. I really don't think people's envisioning of these characters is really keeping up with how massively large that is. A slim build at that height is around 200-210 lbs, a muscled and built frame at that height is more like 260 lbs or more. Most stores don't even carry clothes that fit that kind of size.
Among my characters, my only MMC that is Romance Novel MMC-height is like… Crow (6'7"), who's character largely revolves around the fact that he's superhumanly fucking huge. The fact that random ass businessmen or cowboys or 18th century aristocrats or whatever in romance novels are just casually walking around at approximately the same height as my barbarian superhuman mutant MMC is actually hysterical to me.
We've gotta correct on heightflation lmao this is getting silly. People act betrayed and deceived when you make an MMC 5'11" (two inches above average American height). Love interests will become kaijus pretty soon.