I think it needs to be said: Fourth Wing, like Twilight, is a romantasy novel. Romantasy grossed something like $480M in book sales alone last year, and is the largest grossing genre in fantasy. There is nothing new or illegitimate about it. It is not a fad.

I see a lot of assumptions about readers of different books from romantasy (i.e. a common one: that they're new readers, or new to fantasy). Please discard your assumptions.

People used to say the same thing about Twilight fans. They tried to delegitimize them, or their status as a fantasy reader, because they liked Twilight.

Romantasy predates your existence, and will outlive you. It is not a fad. Its readers and books are not transients just passing through.

If you find romantasy distasteful, that's okay, but let's all please discard the notion that these readers are any lesser, or newer, or whatever.