FAQ
Whether you’re here for the spice, the cultural commentary, or the unapologetically Black love stories—hi, welcome Swoontellectual. I’ve rounded up the questions readers ask me the most. Let’s get into it.
The Writer
Q: Who is Nikki Payne?
A: Nikki Payne, the romance author (not the Canadian comedian) is a Black romance author and cultural anthropologist who writes smart, funny, spicy modern retellings of classics like Jane Austen, speculative fiction and Women's fiction. She has a PhD in cultural anthropology from Rice University (Go Owls) and a day job in tech, which means she spends her days studying how weird people are and her nights making them kiss about it.
Q: What kind of books does Nikki write?
A: Nikki writes contemporary and speculative romance with Black leads, high heat, and heart. Her stories often explore love across cultural lines, with themes of power, desirability, and pleasure. Nikki Payne is the author of Pride and Protest (2022), Sex, Lies and Sensibility (2024), and The Princess and the P.I. (2025), with the revenge romance The Pro and the Con (2027). Her short fiction appears in Ladies in Waiting, a Jane Austen anthology, and in After the End, the bestselling Kickstarter dystopian romance collection from Ali Hazelwood and Adriana Herrera. Her novella in that collection is SKYN.
Q: Who would like Nikki Payne’s books?
A: Nikki Payne’s books are for readers who love Jane Austen retellings, Black romance, witty rom-coms, and love stories with social commentary. If you like Issa Rae’s humor, Austen’s side-eye, and a heroine who’d rather win the argument than the guy (and then effs around and gets both), you’re home sis. She writes for A24 Blacks, who will clock the symbolism and want to discuss it over natural wine. She also writes for Blerds and NPR girlies, for recovering snobs and academics. Book clubs love her too, because there’s always something to fight about over wine.
Q: Why does Nikki hate the term Smart Romance
A: “Smart romance” usually means romance that takes both the love story and the world around it seriously. Nikki Payne is one of the authors readers name when they’re looking for it. Her books are hot, the happily ever after is guaranteed, and they have things to say about class, race, money, family, and who gets to keep their neighborhood.
But she hates the term. It implies the rest of romance is dumb, and that’s a lie told mostly by people who haven’t read any. Romance is the bestselling genre in America, written overwhelmingly by women for women, and it has been treated as a guilty pleasure for about as long as women’s pleasure has been treated as guilty. The genre was always smart. People just weren’t paying attention. Call her books smart romance if it gets them in your cart. She’ll take the sale and correct you at the signing.
Q: What are some of the Best Jane Austen retellings?
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Pride and Protest by Nikki Payne. A Black Pride and Prejudice. Liza B. is a DJ fighting the corporation that’s trying to gentrify her neighborhood, and the man running it is exactly as rude as Darcy and considerably better looking.
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Sex, Lies and Sensibility by Nikki Payne. A Black Sense and Sensibility. Two sisters try to save a crumbling beach-town inn in Maine and discover that the locals are a problem, and also some of them are hot.
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Pride by Ibi Zoboi. A YA Pride and Prejudice set in Bushwick, Brooklyn, with an Afro-Latina heroine who loves her block and has no patience for the rich boys moving in across the street.
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Clueless. This is Emma moved to a Beverly Hills high school, and it’s the movie that taught a generation of us that Austen could be fun. It also gave us Dionne, the best-dressed best friend in film history, who deserved her own spinoff and never got one. Nikki is still a little mad about that.
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Ayesha at Last by Uzma Jalaluddin. Pride and Prejudice in a Muslim community in Toronto, where a poet who works as a substitute teacher meets a man so conservative he makes Darcy look like a party guy.
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Unmarriageable by Soniah Kamal. Pride and Prejudice in Pakistan, where the Binat sisters face a marriage market that Mrs. Bennet would recognize instantly and would envy a little.
Q: Are Nikki's books steamy?
A: Girl... yes, there’s heat, yearning, and emotional depth. If you love Kennedy Ryan, Alyssa Cole, or Talia Hibbert, you’ll feel right at home here.
Q: Is Nikki Payne available for book clubs, panels, and events?
A: Yes, Nikki Payne does book club visits, author panels, and moderated conversations, and she’s also a professional event facilitator and author talk host. She has appeared on public radio and at book festivals talking Austen, Black joy, and why romance readers are the smartest people in any room. Reach out through the contact page.
