R O M A N C E  T R O P E S

Welcome to our second instalment of our Potpourri series! Since it's the month frequently referred to by it's holiday all about love, we're going to talk about some of our favourite romance tropes to read in fic!

S O U L M A T E  A U

This trope is all about having your favorite pairing be fated soulmates, whether that be through matching tattoos, thoughts in the other's head, a countdown timer to when you're going to meet your soulmate, or one of a plethora of other AU options! I hosted a challenge in 2019 for this specific trope because I just love it so much and know how many unique takes there can be on it! The trick to making this work is drawing out the time up until when the two fated lovers realize or find out that they're soulmates, and then having some sort of inter- or intra-personal conflict after the fact. When this trope is combined with other popular ones such as Enemies to Lovers, we get some really juicy action out of this trope.

F R I E N D S  T O  L O V E R S

Who doesn’t like it when Harry and Hermione (Harmony) hook up in the tent during their hunt for the last Horcrux? Shame on Ron for running off like he did! In literature, we have the (failed) friends to lovers of Laurie and Jo in Little Women. They each fall in love with another friend though - Laurie with Amy and Jo with Professor Bhaer. This novel was a total win-win for juls when she was young and reading the series by Louisa May Alcott. (This and the Little House on the Prairie books set her firmly on the path for writing.) 

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It’s a tale as old as time, people! And what’s more, is there are so many ways for it to play out and each is just as good as the last. Whether it’s childhood friends growing old together or a friendship solidifying into more, the friends-to-lovers trope is one that we love for a reason. You can dose your friends-to-lovers with a nice, healthy dose of other tropes as well, or top it off with some fluff or angst- maybe even both! 

F A K E  D A T I N G

Who doesn't love a good ol' fake dating trope fic? Person A asks Person B to be their fake partner for x event or amount of time for y reasons, and then they realize they actually like each other and the "fake" part gets dropped from their relationship soon after. @down-in-flames hosted a Fake Dating challenge just a few months ago, and had some phenomenal entries that incorporated this trope in a multitude of ways! This is a trope that can be easily paired with many others, two frequent ones being "There's Only One Bed" (see above) and "Friends to Lovers" (see below), and these combinations always make for fluffy, romantic stories that you just can't get enough of! Fake Dating isn't done often in regular fiction, but that's just because there hasn't been an author to write it yet 

S T A R - C R O S S E D  L O V E R S

Star-crossed lovers... A trope for the lowkey masochists amongst us... because seriously no sane person would willingly sit and dedicate time to falling head over heels with a paring who are doomed to a tragic fate right from the start. The heartbreak would be too much… Unfortunately I am one of those people. I read these too much. I’m writing one- and yes I will be breaking my own heart in the process don’t you worry. The idea of fate, forces beyond their control and even the stars working to make sure that a couple who should be together never will be is beautiful and so sad and has me screaming abuse at my laptop every time they do ~ inevitably ~ not get together in the end. They are romantic tragedies that have been filling our pages since long before Romeo and Juliet’s death-marked love and I will continue to devour all of the tragic fic you can throw at me. Happy endings are overrated, right? 

T H E R E ' S  O N L Y  O N E  B E D

Two unattached people end up sharing a bed for various reasons. A hotel booking mishap. A storm happens, and there’s only one room left in the inn. The car breaks down… the possibilities of getting into this situation are endless. The possibilities of handling this situation are endless also - in often times hilarious ways. Take Clark Gable and Claudette Colbert’s characters in the movie It Happened One Night. This movie from 1934 tackled this trope beautifully. This trope is also perfect for the Drunken Night in Vegas - where the couple often times wakes up in the same bed, possibly married by a Elvis impersonator. @CheekyTorah-Lex is actually hosting a challenge about this exact trope right now, so sign up if you haven't already, or just wait in anticipation for all of the new fic featuring this trope to be published! 

H E A D ' S  D O R M I T O R Y

^{( HP SPECIFIC)}

Okay folks, this is a trope that I myself am guilty of using in my Dramione novel, but come on, what's not to love about it? It's a great way to force your main pairing (or not, even, if you want to subvert the trope!) into coexisting and interacting with each other in the privacy of their shared space without others to observe them. It's easily clichéd, but it's also easy to subvert the trope if one half of your pairing is *not* Head Boy/Girl while the other one is. This trope is fairly locked in to the Harry Potter universe, but it's adaptable to other fandoms that are crossovers with HP too. 

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I love this trope! Especially when combined with Enemies to Lovers! It features in most of my favorite Dramiones and is a great way to force them to get over themselves and actually have a decent conversation. This trope leaves them no choice but to learn to get along and become at least friends. I love reading the stories (Dramiones because lets face it that's pretty much ALL I read) with this trope that allow the pair to show their love in the little things like an extra ten minutes in the loo or having food sent up because they know the other one hasn't eaten. If done right, it is a very sweet, way to tell a love story. 

M U T U A L  P I N I N G

Mutual pining is the underrated trope you know you love but doesn’t get any of its much deserved hype, thanks to some of it’s more popular friends. Two oblivious boneheads staring longingly at each other? The satisfaction of two people who are clearly meant to be together finally realizing that the one they’ve been crushing on for this whole fic LIKES THEM BACK? Beautiful. Give me everything.

E N E M I E S  T O  L O V E R S

This is an especially popular trope among HP fanfiction! Who doesn’t love a good Draco and Hermione (Dramione) or a Snape and Hermione (Snamione)? Or a Draco and Harry (Drarry) or Draco and Ginny (Drinny)? Watching the sparks fly between these couples at the beginning is what makes these couples so popular, even if, at times, they should be oh, so unbelievable. In literature, my favorite of this genre is between Anne Shirley and Gilbert Blythe of Anne of Green Gables by L.M. Montgomery fame. It starts so innocently by him calling her ‘Carrots’ because he thought it was cute. Anne gets offended (and rightly so, in my opinion) and breaks her slate over his head. Their enmity eventually translates into a healthy competition at school - and they, (of course), finally fall in love and marry. 

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Okay now we’re talking… ENEMIES. TO. LOVERS. Is it hate or is it sexual tension? Does she want to kiss him… or kill him? Aside from pure drama value this trope is just so satisfying from a character development point of view. Taking two characters who start out hating each other and watching as they slowly grow and develop into people who might actually work as a couple is everything. Then of course we go through the back and forth of “no I can't possibly like her its her” or maybe the classic doesn’t-realise-it-until-it-hits-them-in-the-face-then-can’t-ignore-it as our former enemies finally acknowledge that actually they are perfect for each other… It is everything you need as a reader. There’s always twists and turns and the possibility that it won’t work out. Beautiful stuff. All the fic please. 

If we didn't cover a trope you enjoy reading and/or devour fic that has that trope, let us know what it is and why you like it in the comments!

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credits:

blurbs: juls, madi, sarah, deni, tasha
graphics: deni
draft: madi