New York, New York - BookTok influencer Meg Hood has helped lead the "cozy fantasy" craze within the online literary scene, and in an interview with TAG24, she revealed how a viral subgenre has fostered a community built on kindness, warmth, and a little big of magic!

Hood built the foundation for her "cozy" community on TikTok and Instagram after the release of Travis Baldree's beloved fantasy novel Legends and Lattes in 2022.

The book follows an orc named Viv, who has traded in her lethal battle swords for coffee beans and cinnamon rolls as she opens up a new café within a medieval fantasy world.

Hood recalled Baldree's work being the first time she had seen the term "cozy" associated with a fantasy novel (the label isn't entirely new to literature, of course, as cozy mysteries are a staple of the larger mystery genre).

Hood decided to take her love for Legends and Lattes to TikTok, where she quickly found other readers just as passionate about it as she was.

"Somehow, that video went viral, just talking about how excited I was about this weird little book that was so nice," she told TAG24. "I got a whole new audience that was also interested in that style of story."

Hood said that she "immediately" fell in love with the community she found through her interest in these "low-stakes" tales. That community quickly gave her a sense of "home," a feeling further amplified by the stories' resemblance to childhood favorites like Harry Potter and the subgenre's frequent inclusion of the "found family" trope.

With the continued popularity of Baldree's 2022 novel, cozy fantasy has rapidly expanded through online communities, and Hood is ready to take the subgenre even further.

Baldree's Legends and Lattes was first published in 2022, and Hood finds its post-pandemic popularity to be no coincidence.

"We were just kind of coming out of the haze of the pandemic, so everybody at that moment was still looking for ways to kind of stay soft and inch back into life.

"I think we all were a little bit traumatized, and so having some softer stories to lean into, it just felt really, really good."

But while these "slice of life" reads are rapidly growing in popularity, there hasn't been too much evolution in their contents – at least, not yet.

Hood has partnered with Bindery Books, a new membership platform for readers that allows influencers (referred to on the site as "tastemakers") to share exclusive content and, once they amass a large enough subscriber base, create their own publishing imprint that will fund the publication of a manuscript they select.

After first joining Bindery last December, Hood recently unveiled her imprint, Cozy Quill, which looks to expand mainstream cozy fantasy beyond its current parameters.

"A lot of cozy fantasies tend to be a little bit more Western, kind of medieval European-style stories. A lot of them are set in cafés right now; a lot of people saw the impact of Legends and Lattes and kind of wrote their own versions of that, which was so great to start because it kind of established a foundation for cozy fantasy," she said.

"But now, I want to see where it can go. Take me out of the coffee shop! Where do we go now?"

As a Bindery tastemaker, Hood looks to bring the cozy fantasy genre outside medieval European settings and provide the opportunity for more diversity on the scene.

"A lot of times with cozy fantasy, because it is a newer genre right now, it's not a very diverse subgenre," Hood said.

"So what's exciting to me is that Bindery came in and was like, 'You want to diversify the genre, so let's put out books.'"

By featuring what "cozy" means to other cultures, Hood believes the genre will become far "richer" – likely increasing its staying power as well.

Cozy Quill has not yet acquired its first title, but this focus on elevating the genre will be a vital factor in Hood's selection process.

"As long as we keep it diverse and we get a lot of different [writers] lending their voice to the genre, then I think it won't go stale," she said. "If we can move away again from the café, I think that's how it will thrive.

"It's just making sure that it's always kind of reinventing itself and what cozy means. I think the word cozy will most likely evolve as things happen over the years."

Readers can follow Cozy Quill's publishing journey on Bindery Books.