What is Islam’s attitude to fiction, novels, and romantic stories? Allah (SWT) says in the Quran:
"And of mankind is he who purchases idle talks (i.e. music, singing, etc.) to mislead (men) form the Path of Allah without knowledge, and takes it (the Path of Allah, the Verses of the Quran) by way of mockery. For such there will be a humiliating torment (in the Hellfire). And when Our Verses (of the Quran) are recited to such a one, he turns away in pride, as if he heard them not, as if there were deafness in his ear. So announce to him a painful torment." (Luqman 31:6-7)
These verses of the Quran were revealed to PROHIBIT, according to the Mufassireen and Jurists, MUSIC and the STORIES of romances imported from Persia. Since these things divert man’s attention from the remembrance of Allah and transport one into the realm of illusion and imagination the Quran OUTLAWS them. Islam strongly discourages fiction and encourages one to live in reality and not in illusion which has the tendency to make one negligent and forgetful of the prime purpose of man’s creation which it to gain Allah’s Pleasure by fixing the gaze on the Akhirat (Hereafter) and not on the TV screen. Islam, therefore FORBIDS the wasting of time in listening to idle talks and fiction or false stories.