Author Charged Over ‘Dark Romance’ Book That Sparked TikTok Backlash

An Australian author who wrote under then pen name Tori Woods was arrested over a “dark romance” book that sparked a wave of backlash on social media as critics raised concerns about whether the book promoted pedophilia.

Why It Matters

The controversy over the book has rattled the online book community and sparked discussions about what is appropriate content to include in “dark romance” books, a subgenre that often explores more taboo romance stories.

What To Know

The author, whose real name is Lauren Tesolin-Mastrosa, was arrested after detectives executed a search warrant on her home last Friday after receiving reports of a “fiction novel containing child abuse material,” the New South Wales police confirmed in a statement to Newsweek.

They obtained several copies of the novel to be “forensically examined” and charged her with possessing child abuse material, disseminating child abuse material and producing child abuse material, according to the statement. She was granted conditional bail and is set to appear in court on March 31.

A close-up of books sitting on a desk in a library.

jovan_epn/iStock via Getty Images

Newsweek reached out to the author via Facebook message for comment and to local courts for information.

The arrest stems from controversy over her book Daddy’s Little Toy, which was described as a dark romance novel and was released this month.

The book’s listing describes it as a “loose retelling of Cinderella,” but it faced fierce backlash as reviewers said the plot focused on the romantic relationship between a male character and a female character he began “noticing” when she was only 3 years old.

Videos discussing the book had amassed hundreds of thousands of views on “BookTok,” a community on the social media platform TikTok where users discuss books and reading.

The book has since been removed from Amazon and Goodreads, and the author addressed the controversy in a post from her now-deleted Instagram account, where she wrote it is “DEFINITELY NOT promoting or inciting anything EVER to do with CSA or [pedophilia].”

“What is being said is grossly disturbing and breaks my heart as well as makes me sick,” the post reads. “DLT is FICTIONAL and meant to represent the DD/LG world. I understand where I went wrong and that is why I had removed it from Amazon this morning.”

She also wrote that their relationship did not begin until both characters had reached the age of consent.

Pixel and Quill Studio, the business that designed the cover of the book, wrote in a statement posted to Instagram that it was unaware of the book’s content when designing the cover, after receiving criticism for working on the book.

“I have cut ties with Tori Woods, effective immediately. In no way, shape, or form did I know what was ACTUALLY in that book,” the designer wrote. “I designed the cover. All I had known about the book was the blurb which read ‘barely legal’ and in my mind I truly thought that was okay, I thought that meant the FMC had just turned 18. I did not know that thoughts & feelings had started WAY before that.”

What People Are Saying

TikTok user @bribwriter: “I totally thought I had seen it all, but then this book shows up, and I realize that the internet can still shock me. This is not dark romance. This is straight up [pedophilia].”

TikTok user @aliiiireads: “These people start reading this book and they find out it’s an adult a** 30-year-old man fantasizing about his best friend’s three-year-old daughter, and then he fantasized about her until she’s 18 and was like, ‘Oh she’s finally 18.’ What?”

TikTok user Simone Umba: “The things that you wrote in the name of an age gap romance. That is not an age gap romance.”