MMA was born from the hyper-macho Gracie family – founder Carlos Gracie, Sr had 21 children, with three wives and three girlfriends. One of the girlfriends and one of the wives were sisters.
Unsurprisingly, when the UFC debuted in 1993, the fanbase was overwhelmingly male. However, things have changed with the growth of MMA into a modern sport, so much so that in a 2011 interview. UFC president Dana White estimated that 45% of the fanbase is now female,
“Whenever you go to any of the big fights, there’s girls there with their husbands or their boyfriends or whatever but there’s a lot of girls there either by themselves or with friends,” said White. “It’s been amazing how fast our female fanbase has grown. We didn’t see that coming.”
One unexpected result of the growing female MMA fanbase is romance novels with an MMA theme. Top-10 Bestselling Author on Barnes & Noble and Top 25 on Amazon Sarah Robinson made MMA the focus of her new book, Breaking a Legend.
“Breaking a Legend features washed-up mixed martial arts fighter Rory Kavanagh who rescues a big black and white dog named Ace from a dog-fighting ring where he was a bait dog,” she explains. “While his romance with new-to-town, knockout blonde Clare Ivers takes center stage in the novel, Ace is a large character in more ways than one and modeled entirely after our dog Charles.”
Below Robinson explains the appeal of MMA to the romance novel market.
Mixed Martial Arts is a full-contact sport that combines martial arts, wrestling, and other combat sports into one beautifully vicious battle.
As more people began to learn about MMA, it became linked with the very definition of “alpha male,” which quickly led it to being very popular in the romance industry. Not just the book world, but everything — television, music, pop culture. A similar event was even featured on the latest season of The Bachelorette!
So of course fighters and MMA have been the perfect addition to romance novels, and I am so excited to join those ranks. To me, there is nothing hotter than a man who wants to fight for you — no — demands to fight for you. A man who is willing to bruise and ache if it means taking care of you and giving the woman he loves everything. I bring that to you with the alpha Rory Kavanagh, and the rest of his brothers are just as delicious.
Fighters are this amazing mix of predatory and protective. It’s the bad boy who also loves with all his heart, and what woman doesn’t want that? Even in the real world, men who have that type of job or role are intriguing to women. Personally, my husband is a police officer and I’d be lying if I said I don’t get a little hot under the hood when he comes home telling me about how he had to grapple with a felon. Because I know he was the victor.
He fought evil and won so he could come home to me. How hot is that?
How hot is that?
Click on your favorite image below to buy Breaking A Legend…
