Romance? Absolutely not. Erotica? Definitely. BDSM? Also absolutely not; no, this is dubcon at best, abuse, and a slave in an absolutely unvarnished world (good for the author for not painting real slavery with a pretty brush) grabbing on to the slightest hint of happiness he can cling to--violent and callous as it often was--and calling it love. That being said, it was also hot and remarkably well written. The prose is artful, the worldbuilding was brilliant, the plot secondary to the characters but still entertaining. I was left feeling kind of oily and unpleasant at the very end--you'll almost certainly know why when you get there--and reminded of how awful the whole situation really is despite the prot's claim to happiness, but I was also left wishing it hadn't ended quite so soon. I'll be picking up the next book in the series for sure.