The success of Wicker gives publishers a visible sign that sentient object romance has an audience beyond self-publishing. The film, starring Olivia Colman and Alexander Skarsgård, is based on Ursula Wills’s short story “The Wicker Husband.” Social media attention has helped turn the adaptation into a cultural talking point: erotic audio app Quinn ran a fan fiction competition, and the film earned $5.75 million in its U.S. opening weekend.
Sentient object romance, or SOR, takes familiar romance conventions and gives the love interest an unexpected form. In Vera Valentine’s self-published novel Unhinged, the romantic lead is an anthropomorphic door; the book also features forced proximity, a secret admirer, a submissive male character, Greek mythology and explicit sex. Valentine’s other works have paired characters with sentient cherry punch, balloon animals and Thanksgiving leftovers.
The premises may sound far from conventional, but the genre shares territory with literary fiction exploring desire beyond human relationships. Kate Folk’s Sky Daddy centers on a protagonist sexually obsessed with planes, while Maggie Su’s Blob follows a woman who shapes her ideal man from alleyway goo. Valentine sees a readership taking shape: “We have honest-to-god genre fans now.”
A readership with its own community
Valentine’s WTF Romance website lists more than 160 SOR titles. The genre also has a presence at Monsterotica Book Con, organized by author Cassie Durand. Valentine says the event has “a whole row of just sentient authors.” That community could support more than individual releases: she expects collaborations, shared fictional worlds and anthologies to grow as the category expands.
For publishers, the appeal may lie in how these books recast romance’s familiar relationship dynamics. Wills’s wicker husband was made “for her alone”: he doesn’t argue or complain, doesn’t eat, and devotes himself to the woman who created him. His nonhuman nature is central to the fantasy, offering a version of romance that doesn’t rely on a conventional human man as the love interest.
Jess Verdi, senior editor at Harlequin, connects interest in SOR and monster-filled romantasy to readers’ broader appetite for stories that challenge social expectations. She points to a moment when people feel angry, frightened and less in control of their lives. In her view, fiction about women and femme characters breaking norms, along with fantasy that uses darkness to echo real struggles, can find a natural home in romance.
“Romance trends shift rapidly,” Verdi says. She sees readers gravitating toward stories that move away from the male-female relationship patterns that have long dominated the genre. That shift helps explain why nonhuman love interests can feel like more than a novelty: they give authors room to explore intimacy and power on different terms.
From fan-driven fiction to publishing lists
Traditional publishers have often waited for independent success to prove a concept. Chuck Tingle, a major figure in SOR, spent decades self-publishing queer, campy fiction about monsters and sentient objects before Tor Nightfire acquired his first traditionally published novel, Camp Damascus, in 2023. More recent pickups from self-publishing include Harlequin’s publication of Isabelle Taylor’s seven-book monster romance series, Claw Haven.
Those moves point to a pool of stories and readers already developing outside traditional publishing. “The Wicker Husband” is set for inclusion in a collection of Wills’s work that Tordotcom acquired for publication in spring 2027. The film’s attention may bring more readers to the genre, but Verdi expects the market to keep changing regardless of one adaptation.
She sees fiction as entertainment and escape, as well as a way for readers to encounter their experiences and work through difficult feelings. SOR adds an unusually playful possibility to that mix. As Verdi puts it, if readers want to fantasize about a sentient wicker basket, juice pitcher or vegetable—and have a laugh along the way—“more power to them.”
